Chapter 13
TAYLOR
‘Is everything in order, Miss Stone?’
I glance up from the tablet to find Charlie watching me from behind the saloon’s gleaming ivory-and-chrome bar.
We only met this morning, but she’s exactly what you’d expect from a chief stewardess on a yacht like Angelica: everything in its place, nothing out of line.
Blonde hair drawn tight into a bun. Crisp, white shirt tucked neatly into a black skirt.
Polite smile hiding whatever she wants to hide.
She radiates quiet control, the kind I usually possess in spades, the kind I’ve been sorely lacking since he-who-shall-not-be-named flipped my baby-making proposal on its head.
‘I think so,’ I say, wriggling my lying arse into the bar stool because I’ve not got a clue.
I’m supposed to be signing off on the catering plans for tonight’s dinner – our final evening together before the newlyweds jet off with Lottie for the next leg of their honeymoon – but my brain’s about as focused as a soap bubble.
‘Almost there,’ I add quickly, scrolling back to the top of the screen and crossing my legs so tight, my calves start to ache. But I’d rather feel that than the pulse building low in my abdomen as my eyes wander once more…
Past the plush white sofas, the mirrored tables, the pale teak floor, towards the curved wall of glass and the pool deck just beyond.
The pool deck – and the man taking centre stage.
Axel.
He’s waist-deep in the water, sunlight skimming over inked muscle as rivulets trail down his skin like a caress I ache to give – one he’d sooner bind my hands to deny me. He tips his head back, both hands pushing into his wet hair, and I forget how to breathe.
Charlie makes a noise – did she just gulp? Or was that me? Great. Mortifying.
‘Could I get a mimosa please, Charlie?’ Anything to cover up my lack of cool.
Her eyes snap to mine, a faint flush creeping into her carefully made-up face. ‘Of course, Miss Stone.’
Maybe it wasn’t me after all…
She sets about making my drink while I force myself to study the catering plan – scanning lines and ticking boxes – but my hands move on autopilot. All I can feel is the slow, deep ache that’s been coiled under my skin since yesterday.
And I thought the worst kind of torment was Axel taking me to the brink with his own climax and walking away.
I was wrong.
Torment is being on stuck on a tiny yacht… okay, so it’s not tiny. It truly is a mega-yacht complete with spa, helipad, and swimming pools, plural. But with Axel on board and an audience in every direction, it’s small, way too small.
I want to get him alone and then I want to…
Ugh, what do I want?
To tear him a new one while tearing off his clothes – God, yes.
Pin him, kiss him, curse him.
Anything to take back control and see this ache gone.
But then I’d be playing straight into his hands.
Letting this – whatever this has now become – continue before we’ve signed on the dotted line.
And I may have a dedicated legal team, but even they can’t draft a contract on a few hours’ notice, especially one like this. It’s so far out of their usual wheelhouse, I’m surprised I haven’t been inundated with questions and maybe even a recommended therapy session.
I tap my phone resting on the bar top, open my email for the umpteenth time that day, and…
Nothing.
I have a billion other emails, all marked urgent – membership churn in New York, profit slipping in Paris, Singapore’s launch bleeding cash, a PR mess in Milan – but not the one thing I actually want.
And that shouldn’t matter, not today, not when I have Sadie’s celebrations to think about.
But it does.
Because I want Axel. And this time, I want him on his knees.
Yes, I want to make a baby, but I want to make him beg too.
Last night, surrendering to his control in such a vulnerable way, thriving off his praise, having him break… I shiver with thrill of it even now.
But then he’d walked. Left me in a frustrated heap. And I’m going out of my mind trying to kill off the buzz. It’s unnerving, burrowed way too deep, impossible to ignore, equally impossible to control or sate without him.
And believe me, I’ve tried. Three failed DIY attempts later, and all I’ve done is wind myself tighter.
It’s utterly ridiculous, and totally unacceptable.
I’ve spent my life building walls to avoid feeling too much, needing too much. But here I am.
Needy. Reckless. Frustrated at myself for every pulse of it.
Truth is, I don’t need him to make me feel good, or whole, or wanted. I know how to be all those things without him. But damn it, I want him anyway.
His praise, his touch, his control…
And I know how fucked up that is.
It doesn’t take a genius with a psychology degree to know I have daddy issues, and probably a truckload more besides. And now he’s flipped the switch on our relationship, I can’t go back to seeing him as just Axel: my best friend, my rock, Axel.
‘Here’s your mimosa, Miss Stone.’
Charlie sets the glass down in front of me, the soft clink of crystal and the twitch to one of her manicured brows feeling like a tut-tut to my wandering head.
I lock my phone and plaster on a smile. ‘Thank you.’
‘Is there anything else I can get you?’
A six-foot-four slab of trouble that answers to Axel…
‘No, this is perfect,’ I say instead. ‘As is this.’ I hand her back the tablet and slip off the stool, readying myself for the masses, or one giant muscular mass in particular. ‘Any issues, though…’
‘I’ll be sure to find you first, but there won’t be,’ she says with the cool assurance of someone who’s seen every diva, disaster, and last-minute drama a mega-yacht can throw at her. ‘Please try and relax, Miss Stone. Let us take care of everything, it’s what we do best.’
She gives me a bright, white smile, and I do my best to soak up some of her calm by osmosis.
‘Thank you, Charlie.’
Axel
I hate these yacht pools. All gloss, no substance. You can’t get a proper lap in before you’re turning back again. But right now, I need it: the shock of cold water, the silence underneath, those few seconds where everything shuts up.
I’d like to say it’s the sun burning me up, but it ain’t.
It’s her.
Taylor. Drifting around in that flimsy bloody cover-up and a bikini that could barely pass as dental floss. It’s killing me.
I was supposed to leave her desperate last night, not give my traitorous dick a highlight reel to replay every five minutes and get high on. And high it fucking is.
For the love of all things holy…
I catch a glimpse of her through the saloon glass – sunlight catching the waves in her dark hair as it spills down her back, that sheer robe showing off everything it’s meant to hide – and I do an about turn, trying to focus on literally anything else.
Which is exactly when a trio of mini-misdemeanours come barrelling towards the pool: Lottie, Parker, and Josh.
They hit the water like human torpedoes in armbands, waves smacking me square in the chest.
‘Kids!’ Sadie launches to her feet, Josh’s dad Tristan close behind, but I wave them back. It’s fine. I wanted a distraction and got it – three times over.
Thank fuck for that.
The boys thrash and kick, laughter bouncing around the deck, while Lottie splutters between them, curls plastered to her cheeks.
‘Easy there, Trouble.’
I scoop her up before she disappears beneath the surface, and she grips my shoulders, spitting water as she grumbles, ‘I’m not twubble.’
I sweep her hair off her face before she eats it. ‘I beg to differ.’
But she’s not listening. She’s frowning at my chest as the boys splash around us. ‘What’s that?’
I glance down as she pokes a finger into the tattoo spread across my pecs.
‘It’s an eagle.’
‘An eagle?’ Parker pipes up. ‘It looks like the chicken on Nanna Isla’s farm!’
A fucking chicken, is he for real?
Lottie leans back to get a better look, nose wrinkling. ‘That’s notta chicken, silly.’
Thank you, Lottie.
‘That’s a cock’l.’
…It’s a what now?
Josh snorts so hard, he chokes on pool water, and I swear to God there’s a Taylor-shaped giggle behind me. Perfect. Of all the things I want her to witness—
‘Yeah!’ Josh shrieks. ‘It’s Nanna Isla’s cockerel!’
Lottie pouts up at me. ‘Why ’ave you a cock’l on you, Uncle G?’
And that’s it.
I lose it.
A laugh tears out of me before I can stop it: rough, real, shaking loose something I didn’t know was stuck.
Maybe it’s the tension that’s been building ever since last night – scratch that, ever since Taylor asked me to be her baby daddy.
Or maybe it’s something else. Either way, I’m gone.
As for Nanna Isla – Theo’s housekeeper in Wales, who dotes on these ratbags like they’re her own grandkids – she’d sure as shit love this. A lot more than my ego does right now.
‘It’s an eagle,’ I stress, trying to pull myself together. ‘Big and strong. Like me.’
‘No,’ Lottie says, shaking her head. ‘It’s definitely a cock’l.’
The boys hit hysterical level, and I meet Lottie’s sparkling blue gaze. ‘See what you’ve done now?’
‘You called me twubble.’
‘And you just pwoved it.’
And, oh my God, did I just drop an ‘r’ for her?!
Her smile widens into a smug little grin as the boys try to climb me for a closer look. And that’s when I realise, I’ve been played. By a four-year-old.
‘Why you little…’ I growl, then start tickling her until she’s wriggling and squealing, the boys shrieking for their turn.
Before I know it, I’m mid chaos: tickling, throwing, catching, dunking.
Their joy is wild and easy, and I can’t remember the last time I felt anything like it. I’ve no clue what I’m doing, but they ain’t complaining. Neither are their parents. They’re watching on with smiles as wide as their sunglasses.
And I know Taylor’s still watching. I feel her eyes on me, my body hooked on her every movement. As for Sadie’s We Rise women, open-mouthed fascination is the only way to describe it.
Now I get what Theo once told me after a solo park session with Lottie: