Attached At Heart (Wildflower #3)

15. Blake

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

blake

I SAT WITH A cup of coffee the next morning, staring out at the hot tub—the place where I nearly lost my goddamn mind.

Last night almost ruined me. The memory of Delaney wearing that tiny bathing suit while groaning my name would forever torture me.

But it wasn’t just the hot tub that did me in. It was also the way the waves echoed in my ears all night, taunting me as I tossed and turned on a couch that was about as comfortable as the on-call beds at the hospital. I woke up with muscles that screamed at me.

Rubbing the back of my neck, I experimented with stretching it, tipping my head down.

“Looks like it’s your turn for a neck massage.”

I stilled at the sound of Delaney’s voice. As much as I wanted to beg her to touch me, it was a bad idea. Last night was the first time I’d been certain, absolutely positive, that she recognized we had chemistry. That there was something there, something I’d known about for fucking ever. Hell, she checked me out. I’d stepped outside in my shorts, and Delaney had stared. Stared at me.

A ridiculous amount of satisfaction burned in my chest as I remembered the heat in her gaze and the deer-in-the-headlights look she gave me when she realized she’d been caught giving me a once-over. Or twice-over.

It was the reason I was sitting at the kitchen table decidedly not wearing a shirt.

Yeah, so what if I wanted to see her look at me like that again? Sue me.

Her reaction was also the reason I’d been more forward with her last night about my own attraction, more than I’d ever been before. Maybe I shouldn’t have done that. Maybe I’d revealed too much when I still didn’t know what was going on in that pretty head of hers. And maybe until I had a better idea of where she stood on me admitting she made me fucking hard as a rock with those breathy moans of hers, I needed to play things safe. Even if I wanted to take that look she gave me last night and run with it, I knew I had to walk.

Her touching me—for any reason—was not in the category of playing it safe.

“Don’t worry about it,” I said, my voice scratchy.

“It was the couch, wasn’t it?” she asked, walking around the table to make herself a coffee with the tiny Keurig-like machine on the counter. “I told you I should take it. You’re too tall.”

“You’re not that much shorter than me.”

Delaney was a tall woman. Or maybe it was just that she always stood tall with that ramrod-straight posture of hers.

“I’m at least four inches shorter than you,” she said with a roll of her eyes. “Here, let me help.”

She padded her way back over to me, wearing these cute little pajama shorts that made it hard to think. Breathe. I definitely couldn’t talk. Or protest what she was about to do. And suddenly, Delaney’s hands were on me, just resting on my shoulders at first and then massaging them. Lightly, but then…not. Her thumbs pressed into a knot at the base of my neck, and my heart rate spiked. Warmth coated my skin. A groan slipped out of me.

Delaney leaned in. I could feel her, so close to me. So close I could almost taste her. My brain spiraled down into a memory, one where I had been tasting her. One where she’d been in my arms wearing a wedding dress, and I felt her everywhere, and when I kissed her, she kissed me back.

I didn’t care what we called it aloud; we both knew in the whispered recess of our minds that there had been nothing fake about that kiss.

“Not so easy, is it?” she breathed, making my skin tighten. “To keep quiet?”

I gritted my teeth together, trying to dampen the desire that had flared inside me at hearing her voice sound like that. Seductive. Sensual. Did she even realize what she was doing? “Not when it feels this good,” I admitted gruffly.

“Good.” She made a humming noise in the back of her throat, and I felt my cock stiffen against the fabric of my shorts. “I don’t mind.”

“I didn’t mind it, either, you know.” I actually really fucking liked it. Hearing Delaney moan my name? It had been a new form of pleasure I never thought I’d get to experience. “I just wanted you to know what you were doing to me last night.”

“And what, exactly, was I doing to you?”

The same thing she was doing to me right now. Making it hard to think and turning me the fuck on.

“Delaney…” I groaned her name, struggling to keep my composure as her hands worked over my bare skin. Fuck me, this was bad. And good—too good. “Why do you want to know?”

“Because I think you might be doing the same thing to me, and I don’t…”

Her whispered voice vanished a second before her hands did, and I felt her retreat. Not so unlike I did last night. Was this payback? Or was she just as unsure of what was happening as I was?

All I could do was stare at her as she picked her coffee mug back up.

“So what are the plans for today?” she asked, sounding completely unaffected by what had just occurred between us. Which meant she was wrong. I wasn’t doing the same thing to her as she was to me. Because I couldn’t turn off my feelings as quickly as she just had. I didn’t know how to defeat the all-encompassing arousal as easily. I’d been pretending around Delaney for a hell of a long time, so it wasn’t like I didn’t have experience. But pretending it didn’t affect me when she fucking moaned my name or let her fingers wander my body? I couldn’t breathe, let alone carry on a normal conversation about our plans.

Delaney’s mug was floating in midair. She’d been about to take a sip of coffee when she froze, realizing I was looking at her, breathless.

“Lane,” I rasped.

At the sound of her name, she relapsed into motion again, taking a slow, steady sip of coffee. Her eyes stayed on mine above the rim of the mug, though. And I realized this trip was going to teach me things about desire I never knew before.

What the fuck was happening?

“I think we should get some groceries,” she said after putting the coffee back on the counter. Her cheeks were rosy, telling me there might be hope, that she was affected. I wondered for a moment what she might look like flushed from an orgasm. God, I’d love nothing more than to give her one. Just one. Just once. She’d make all those sounds for me like she did last night, and instead of telling her to stop, I’d tell her to be louder.

Scream my name, sweetheart. Go on.

“Just to have a few things here for the week,” Delaney continued. “For breakfast and…whatever.”

She cleared her throat, and I wasn’t sure if it was for my benefit or hers, but it worked.

“That sounds good,” I finally replied, pulling myself out of a daydream where Delaney was coming on my fingers. “I had the same thoughts, actually.” Between thinking about what she’d look like when she fell apart. “We could head into town, grab some groceries, get a bite to eat, explore a little bit.”

“Perfect.” She cocked her head to the side and pulled out her phone. “How far is it?”

“A mile or two,” I answered before she had a chance to look it up. “We could bike—there’s a few in the garage. Otherwise, this upgraded rental came with a Vespa we could use. Only one, though.” I flashed her a grin that I hoped didn’t look too excited. “I might not be an Italian pop star, but I can still do my best to drive you around Europe and do whatever your Lizzie McGuire dreams are made of.”

Delaney burst out laughing at that, and the tension broke between us.

For now.

Delaney and I opted to ride the Vespa into town, simply because it had a compartment under the seat where we could put a few groceries.

Not because it meant that we’d be squished together on that seat.

Not because it meant that she had to straddle me from behind.

That had nothing to do with the decision-making at all because I honestly wasn’t really looking to be tortured any more today.

I wasn’t sure if Delaney had thought of those details or not, but based on her giddy expression as she fit the helmet over her braided hair, I was almost positive her brain was not where mine was. That was for the best because, as I’d learned in the last twenty-four hours, it was considerably easier to pretend when Delaney was oblivious.

“How do I look?” she laughed as I buckled the helmet beneath her chin.

“Perfect,” I said automatically, giving her chin a tap to indicate she was all good to go.

She rolled her eyes at my response before looking down at her outfit—a pair of loose jeans and a linen shirt. “Well, considering you’re used to seeing me in scrubs or sweats, I probably look better than normal to you.”

“You always look good, Delaney,” I muttered, not wanting to lie when I didn’t absolutely have to. “You’re stunning no matter what you wear.”

“Stop.” She flicked me in the arm. “Just because we’re married doesn’t mean you need to feed me compliments. Appeasing my ego was not part of the deal.”

I hopped on the scooter without looking at her. “I’m not trying to appease your ego.”

She inhaled before she followed suit, sliding onto the seat with a more delicate approach. I felt one leg brush against mine and then the other. Luckily, we both wore pants, which helped to avoid that skin-to-skin contact that seemed to mess with both of our heads. But then Delaney’s chest grazed my back, messing with my head anyway. Her hands skimmed my sides as she wound herself tightly around my waist, flattening her body to mine.

“Well, then…thank you,” she said, breathing in my ear.

I’d forgotten what we were talking about.

I swallowed hard as I fit the key into the ignition. Hopefully, Delaney wouldn’t clock my harder-than-normal breathing or the way my pulse likely fluttered in my neck, right by where I could feel her presence. If she did, it would only take her a few moments to deduce what was happening to me, considering my lack of other symptoms that might correlate with tachycardia.

“I think we’re doing a very good job at faking this honeymoon,” Delaney said with a breathy laugh, and I decided breathy laughs when she was this close to me were almost as bad as breathy moans. “This feels very couple-y.”

I wanted to answer, You think, Lane? But instead, I nodded and suggested, “Maybe we should take a picture. I suppose this honeymoon is only as convincing as the evidence we bring home about it.”

“Good idea.” Delaney handed me her phone and then tightened her hold as though how hard she was squeezing me could be conveyed through the picture. “We can send it to Sully. I’m sure he’ll approve.”

I lifted her phone to snap the photo, and a grin immediately bloomed on my face from seeing Delaney’s head hovering over my shoulder, her smile wide, eyes sparkling. She looked happy, and maybe it was fake or forced, but at the moment, I was going to choose to believe it was real. That whatever ended up happening on this trip, regardless of the pretense of why we were on it, was real.

“I’d give you a convincing kiss on the cheek or something, but I can’t get that close to you,” she chuckled as I snapped a few pictures. Her head bobbed toward mine, and our helmets clinked together, demonstrating her point.

“Maybe another time,” I murmured, feeling the adrenaline shoot up in my body at the idea of Delaney’s lips anywhere near my body.

“Yeah,” she breathed, and her expression morphed into something unfamiliar in the phone screen before I lowered it, handing it back to her.

“Ready?” I prompted.

“Ready,” Delaney echoed, giving another squeeze to indicate she was holding on and prepared to take off. I ran my hand over her interlaced fingers on my stomach, wanting a little bit of proof that she was there and I wasn’t imagining it. I felt Delaney inch closer, her hips flexing into my ass in a way that had me reeling.

“Lane…” I choked on thin air for a second before getting myself together. “Trying to make it hard for me to breathe is not really the best approach when I’m about to drive us around in a foreign country.”

“Do you want me to drive?” she quipped back, loosening her hold a little as though that was the reason I couldn’t get air into my lungs.

“No, that’s not?—”

“Wait, do you even know what you’re doing?” she pressed, worry threading through her voice as her grip intensified again.

“I know what I’m doing,” I groaned.

But apparently, I wasn’t very convincing.

“I should have asked you before we decided on the Vespa if you actually knew how to drive one of these things. Maybe we should switch to the bikes. Just bring our backpacks to put the food in.”

“I know how to drive a motorcycle, so I’m pretty sure driving this isn’t going to be too difficult in comparison,” I argued.

To prove that I was confident and ready to go, I turned the key in the ignition and powered up the engine. It was, of course, a lot more subdued than the sound of a motorcycle revving to life, but subtle vibrations still coursed through my body. A gentle thrum heightened my already piqued senses.

I felt Delaney shift on the seat behind me. “You know how to drive a motorcycle?”

“Yeah, Noah has one,” I said over my shoulder.

“Of course he does,” Delaney sighed as though that explained everything.

“I don’t know what that means,” I said bitterly, knocking the kickstand up on the side of the scooter. “But I’m going to choose to ignore it.”

“It doesn’t mean anything.”

“Sure.”

“Other than that he seems like the type to have a motorcycle. You know, with the tattoos and everything.”

“You into those, Lane?”

“No,” she said simply. “Not really. I mean, I’m not not into them. Like they don’t bother me. Like if you were to get some—” She snapped her mouth shut again before ending with, “They’re okay, I guess.”

I nodded as slight amusement pierced through the haze of jealousy that had momentarily swooped over me.

“Let’s get going before they run out of food at the grocery store,” Delaney urged, and I realized I’d never been so excited to go shopping for food before.

“Okay,” I agreed, feeling lighter than I had in years. “Let’s do that.”

“So how do I compare to Paolo?”

Delaney and I had made it back to the house about an hour before sunset. The Dutch village closest to us was quaint and whimsical. Breezy, in a literal sense. The gusts of wind off the North Sea were intense but refreshing.

We’d spent the morning stuffing our faces with pannekoeken, which was an even more delicious version of a pancake, and the afternoon shop-hopping. Delaney found an ornament of Delft Blue ballerina slippers that I insisted we get because suddenly, all I could think about was putting up a Christmas tree with her. I’d never really decorated for the holidays before, but I wanted to this year. With Delaney. I wanted to put things under it for her to open. More presents than she ever needed. She’d complain, and I’d do it anyway. Fuck, I wanted that. I wanted to spoil my wife.

“Considering Paolo was a fraud in the end, I’d say you’re definitely coming out ahead,” Delaney replied, yanking me out of my delusional thoughts. “Although you’re your own brand of fraud.”

I frowned. “And how am I a fraud?”

Delaney wiggled her left hand at me, her wedding ring sparkling, glinting off the setting sun. We’d whipped up some pasta—it was a carb day, apparently—and had dinner on the back patio. I’d just polished off the last of my food in time for her to deliver a gut punch, making me fight to keep it all down.

“As my faux husband.”

I leaned back into the plastic chair, folding my arms across my chest.

God, how I wanted to tell her exactly what I thought about that title. Faux husband . Especially considering how real that ring she was showing off was.

I raised a brow at her. “Whatever you say, Delaney London,” I said under my breath.

She heard me. Her cheeks pinkened. “You know what I meant.”

“Uh-huh,” I muttered, acknowledging that I understood it even if I hated it.

“Regardless.” Delaney folded her hands on the table in front of her. “You’re miles above Paolo. I’ve heard your rendition of ‘What Dreams Are Made Of.’ You can actually carry a tune, and you’d never try to frame me for being talentless.”

“I’d never be able to convince anyone you’re talentless,” I chuckled before adding, “To be honest, I forgot how the movie ended.”

Delaney gasped dramatically. “You forgot about the best cinematic climax of all time?”

“You’re talking about Endgame , right?”

Delaney glared at me. “See, this is why you’re a fake, Mr. London.”

My lips twisted, trying to restrain myself. “And why’s that, Mrs. London?”

“Because my real husband would never deny the cultural significance that is The Lizzie McGuire Movie .”

A laugh slipped out of me. “Maybe your husband just needs a refresher. It’s been years since we watched it. Should we see if there’s somewhere we can stream it tonight?”

Her eyes lit up with a brilliant, childlike wonder, and my chest ached at seeing her like this. This side of Delaney had always existed, but it got shadowed by everything else in her life, all the responsibility she put on her shoulders.

“Really, you want to watch it?”

I’d never wanted anything more.

“Absolutely.” I went to pick up our plates, eager to follow through.

“Yes!” Delaney jumped out of her seat, grabbing the glasses from the table and shooting ahead of me into the house. “Can I shower quick?” she called over her shoulder. “I feel like I have sand stuck to me even though we didn’t even go down onto the beach. I swear it’s like embedded in the wind or something.”

“Of course.” I smiled, following behind her. “I’ll get it set up.”

Delaney raced off to the bathroom in response, practically skipping down the hallway, leaving me to sift through streaming apps in search of The Lizzie McGuire Movie . I found it—thank God—by the time I heard Delaney leave the bathroom, pad across the hall, and close the bedroom door behind her. But when nearly twenty minutes went by and she still hadn’t emerged to join me, I decided to investigate.

“Lane?” I called, giving a soft knock on the door.

Silence greeted me, which caused my mouth to tug into a frown.

“Delaney?” I tried again, louder this time. “Is everything okay?”

When she still didn’t answer, worry washed over me. Morbid scenarios flashed through my mind, and those thoughts caused me to twist the handle without a second thought, pushing my way into the bedroom. I didn’t hesitate, didn’t pause to think that maybe what I was doing would have consequences. I didn’t care about anything that didn’t involve Delaney’s well-being.

I stopped short when I saw her curled up on the bed, still wearing her towel. It was tucked around her securely, covering every bit of her I had no right seeing. Her damp hair was strewn over her shoulders, tangled on the pillow. She had her phone in her hand, like she’d been looking at something before simply…falling asleep.

Something seized up inside me at the sight.

Taking careful steps, I walked around the bed, wanting to double-check what I was seeing.

“Lane?” I said again, my voice barely a breath.

I didn’t really want to wake her up; I just wanted her to stir enough for me to ensure she was okay.

And that was exactly what she did, curling tighter into a ball and wrinkling her nose. She adjusted her head on the pillow. Then she inhaled and exhaled deeply, settling further into a heavy sleep.

A grin slid onto my face, and I folded the other side of the comforter over her, tucking it over like a taco shell. Then I moved her phone to the bedside table, plugging it in before turning to walk back to the living room.

I sank back onto the couch, back to where I was last night.

And then I pressed Play on The Lizzie McGuire Movie .

Maybe it would drown out the sounds of the ocean slamming against the shore.