Chapter Thirteen
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
SOMETHING LIKE THIS
ELOISE
“You’re late,” I hear Ezra say as I get out of my car, three minutes past noon.
I turn to find him stepping out from the wood line, and I wonder if he’s just gotten through with hiding a dead body. The perks of reading dark romance and lusting after psychopaths and serial killers.
“Why are you such a peculiar person?” I ask, tugging at the hem of my shorts and looking around the area. The grass is a perfect shade of green and the cicadas are buzzing in the trees. When my gaze settles on him again, he’s a lot closer and a lot sweatier than I noticed before.
“It’s nice to see you, too.”
We stand in front of each other, and I look around again, not sure what comes next. “Sorry?—”
“Oh, no it’s okay,” he reassures me with a slight grin. He doesn’t even know what I was going to say. But if I’m being honest, neither do I. Was I apologizing for my awkwardness? For my tardiness?
My hands swing at my sides as he nods and gestures toward the house.
“I just have to take a quick shower and then we can go,” he tells me, jogging toward the front porch. He takes his steps two at a time.
“Go? Go where?” I follow him, demanding answers. “I thought we agreed on lunch here.”
“We agreed on privacy, right?” He looks back just as he hits the top step before opening the door. “No one will see you where we’re going.”
“No one will hear me scream as you kill me either, I’m guessing.” I stop short as I speak, crossing my arms over my chest as I try to find ways to get this over with as quickly as possible.
“And I’m the peculiar one.” He lifts a brow at my dramatics, before turning to enter his house.
“At least we know our roles,” I call after him, but he’s already inside. I’m back to swinging my arms, not knowing what’s going on all over again.
Rather than stay outside where the trees watch my every move, I follow him inside. It feels like a dangerous venture, knowing that somewhere in this house, he’s naked. And wet.
It would be so easy …
“Make yourself comfortable!” he shouts from the top of the stairs, causing me to jump. “I’ll be right out.”
My hand is at my heart, somehow hoping to slow down its racing as I look around. It’s still empty in here, and I wish I could understand the point in him purchasing the place. I don’t let myself fall into the rabbit hole of wondering where I fit into his plans.
Because I don’t.
This ends in six weeks. I counted this morning after he left, telling myself that if I took it week by week, I’d be able to get in and out of it without turning this into something bigger than it has to be.
I can keep a secret from my sisters for six weeks. I’d spent years keeping the state of the bookstore from them, only letting Sophie in once I realized I might not be able to do it on my own anymore.
I wonder if Ezra has any siblings. What his relationship with them—if he has any—is like. If his parents are alive and if he sees them regularly. What his life is like outside of this home that isn’t really a home.
What kind of man drops tens of thousands of dollars on a stranger? What kind of man buys a huge house but doesn’t bother furnishing it? What kind of man is Ezra?
As I walk through the house, appreciating the high ceilings and large windows, I imagine what he’d fill the space with. Would he prefer classical furniture? Or something more modern?
I imagine there won’t be a makeshift tent in his home, like the one we built for Kitty in the dining room that I never could take down. Not until she left, anyway.
“What’s got you thinking so hard?” Ezra asks, making me jump again from my place in the kitchen.
Stainless steel appliances gleam at me, offering a distorted reflection of the both of us.
He’s wearing navy shorts and a smile, and I try so hard to keep my eyes on his face. But even I’m not that strong.
When does this man find the time to do a single sit-up? He always seems to be handling business in New York, traveling, or bothering me.
“Wondering if you’re a psychopath,” I tell him, unable to give myself away.
His laughter has his core working, and I admire his physique. Some men have bodies that are purely for aesthetics. They probably couldn’t lift a woman worth a damn.
Ezra’s body looks like he could not only pick up any woman but show her a good time while doing so. He’s bulky and broad.
“What’s giving me away?” he asks, taking a step toward me, crossing the threshold into the kitchen.
“You came to Cherry Cove, bought a house here, and gave me a bunch of money,” I tell him as he walks closer to me, making my heart race again.
“You forgot the part where we had sex,” he whisper-shouts as he heads toward the fridge.
My pulse slows, and I watch him grab a bottle of water from the fridge and take a deep pull. “That’s the part I’m trying to forget,” I tell him. It’s the truth. If I forget, I can’t want it again.
“Not if I can help it.”
“What’s your angle here?”
“I already told you,” he answers, putting the water bottle back in the fridge and shutting it. “I like you.”
“You liked having sex with me,” I counter.
“I like you .”
“You like the idea of doing it again.”
“I…like…you.” He smiles. “Why is that so hard to believe, Eloise?”
Because I’m surly and mean and I have the worst temper.
“You don’t know me.”
“I look at you when you think no one is,” he tells me, and it sounds much too lovely to be coming from his mouth.
He’s confusing me; the image I had of him is warping just like our reflections in the fridge.
The contract is easier when I hate him.
I need to hate him.
He steps closer. “That first night, you looked like you needed someone to see you. I haven’t stopped looking at you since.”
I can’t roll my eyes, can’t scoff at his words. They resonate, whether I want them to or not, echoing in the space between my hard exterior and the softness I want to keep him from.
“I need to hate you,” I confess to him.
Let me just hate you for six more weeks.
“Why?” he whispers as he reaches for my hand.
“Because. I just do.” It makes everything easier.
My words feel sad, unreleased emotions pushing them out of me in a way I can’t hide.
Don’t cry. Don’t you cry.
It’s like he knows because he doesn’t react with intensity.
Instead, he smiles and says, “Hate me if you must. But you’ll be on my boat while you’re doing so.”
His words shock me, and I yank my hand away. “Your boat ?”
“That’s right. We’re eating lunch on my boat and if it so suits us, maybe we’ll sail a little.”
“You’re forgetting the part where I have a store to run,” I remind him.
“And you’re forgetting that you’re the boss.” He shrugs. “Don’t make me dare you.”
I roll my eyes this time, but I allow him to pull me from where I stand as I wonder what exactly I’ve gotten myself into.
The sun is beastly, baking me from where I lay on the stern of Ezra’s boat.
No. “Boat” isn’t the proper way to describe this massive entity.
It’s a yacht. I confirmed it with Ezra, who answered like I’d asked him if he thought my hair was long.
When I explained that I didn’t have a swimsuit before we left his house, he offered to buy me one, which led to a disagreement. Also known as us bickering back and forth until he told me to forget it. Finally, I bargained that I could drive us to my house only if he stayed in the car as I ran inside. It was a mad dash as I ran in, grabbed my favorite bikini, and peeled out of the driveway before either of my sisters could catch us.
Now we’re roasting on his yacht , in the middle of the lake after having eaten sandwiches with the crusts cut off. Fancy.
He was right. No one can see us out here.
“When did this thing get here?” I ask, wondering how it even got here.
“A few days ago,” he responds, his eyes on the horizon.
“You didn’t buy it with the house, did you?” I’m afraid of his answer—of hearing that he made another decision that would cost him more money. Something my “companionship” could never cover.
“No,” he answers, bringing his arms loosely around his knees. “My dad got it for me a while ago.”
“Holy crap, I wish my birthdays were like yours.” I adjust my body on the hard surface, hoping the movement doesn’t cause my bikini to expose any inappropriate parts of my body. That’s the last thing I need.
He chuckles. “To celebrate my first million. Not my birthday.”
“ Million ?!” I screech, sitting up and pulling my sunglasses from my face. “You can’t be serious.”
He lifts his brows and looks away. There’s a tension that sits on his reddening shoulders.
“Don’t tell me you’re the kind of rich who resents his money.” I shove my sunglasses back on my face, settling back on my elbows. “I never could understand that.”
“Of course not. I earned everything I have and paid my father back with interest.” He waves his hand at my confused expression and says, “He was an initial investor in my company.”
“So why the face?”
“What face?” he asks, like he doesn’t know.
“That one,” I answer, pointing toward him.
He’s still staring at the horizon, and I wonder if he’s going to answer when he does. “I don’t want things to change between us.”
I roll over on my stomach and press my thumb into my palm, watching over the top of my sunglasses as it turns white and then red when I let go.
“I hardly wanted your money to begin with,” I remind him. Maybe I’d hoped for someone to drop a fortune into my lap, but our transaction is an honest one. No one is being taken advantage of here, and I have no intention of ever needing any more from him.
The sound of children jumping off a dock across the lake, laughing and screaming, has me looking in their direction. We’re the only boat out today, and if I stare hard enough I can see the speck that is my home.
“You have to know that I had no idea who you were when I showed up,” he says, breaking the silence between us.
I gathered he didn’t when I realized most of the paperwork in this town has me down as Lucy and not Eloise. I’m pretty sure it’s illegal, but welcome to small-town living. As long as people know who you are, they don’t need your legal name.
“In the beginning, I thought it was about that. That you’d somehow targeted me. But it’s more about the fact that you were trying to take the shop from me.” It’s the first time we’ve spoken about this without bitterness on my back.
“Only if you wanted to sell it,” he says, and I shake my head.
“Don’t lie to me. Everyone around town is talking about how you and your partner are trying to back them into corners for a piece of their pie.” I can’t look at him. I can’t find another reason to dislike him when I’m sitting here, full from the food he provided and relaxing on his boat.
“Listen, I don’t know what they’re talking about, but I’m an honest businessman. I don’t make my millions off the backs of bodies I pushed to the ground,” he insists. “I find weak links and offer ways out. I don’t create them.”
And I think of the weak links I’ve created in my business; the ones that’d been passed down from my parents, way before I knew what to do with them.
When Ezra explains it this way, I can’t be upset.
Certainly not after he swooped in and saved it all.
I roll over again and splay out on my back, one of my hands dangerously close to his foot. I haven’t reached for him since the day we met.
“If I take away your reason for hating me, what’s left between us?” he asks, looking down at me.
Is this when I decide to be a little braver, a little more like my sisters?
“Lust,” I tell him, letting my gaze linger over his eyes, lips, and back up to his eyes. My sunglasses shield my perusal from him but he’s not stupid. I bet he can feel the potent desire just as strongly as I do.
“Will you let yourself really do this with me, Eloise?” he asks.
I want to say no. I want to tell him to bring me back and to keep this as professional as possible.
But I also want to stop being afraid.
“If you shut up for long enough, I might.”
He chuckles—he always chuckles—and reaches for my fingers, rubbing them in his easy grip. “I have a question.”
“Shoot,” I say.
“Why does everyone call you Lucy?”
There’s a smile on my face before he’s even finished. “All of the Bordeau girls go by their middle names. I’m Eloise Lucille Bordeau. Kitty, my younger sister, is Eleanor Katherine Bordeau. And my older sister is Elizabeth Sophie Bordeau.” My smile widens at the memory. “When we were kids, we always wanted code names. Something for just the three of us. Kitty was four and hated stumbling over Katherine. Everyone else started using our middle names too and…here we are.”
An image of us running through the house holding hands replays in my mind. We were inseparable. And with the loss of our parents, one would think it would have brought us even closer.
But growth is a damning thing sometimes. If you aren’t ready for it, it can chase you away, your tail tucked between your legs.
If I ever kept a secret from Sophie, it was that I knew she was going to leave, way before she ever told me.
It was in her eyes. In the way she’d stare off in the middle of dinner. Or when she’d cry once Kitty went to bed after a really hard day.
She loved us but this wasn’t the life she saw for herself.
I understood that.
“And if you had the life you’d always dreamed of, what would it look like?” Ezra asks.
It’s a loaded question for a woman who doesn’t get asked many personal questions.
But the answer is easy.
“Something like this,” I whisper. “Something that feels a lot like this.”