Chapter 39
LAUREL
The woman on-screen has confessed to murder twice. I’ve no fucking clue who she killed.
I’m curled up on the sofa with a blanket twisted around my legs, pretending to watch whatever crime series I put on twenty minutes ago, except I’ve spent most of it replaying the same pieces of last night instead.
Rain on my skin. Beckett chasing me when I ran from him, both of us laughing like idiots.
His arm banding my waist beside the car, his large palm against my bare back, his face a breath from mine with rain sliding from his dark hair over his cheek.
I remember. Two words, and the man made restraint sound dirtier than half the shit anyone has whispered in my ear.
I press the heel of my hand over my mouth. Useless. The giggle gets out anyway.
A freaking giggle.
I yank the blanket over my face and kick one foot against the armrest. What the hell has happened to me?
I’m over thirty, still married on paper, recovering from vocal surgery, tangled in more legal bullshit than any sane person should know exists, and Beckett Vale blushing on my porch has reduced me to this.
My brain doesn’t even have the decency to stop there.
It gives me his hand over mine on the drive home, his fingers threaded through mine for miles, my mouth against the back of his hand and the heat in his eyes when he pressed his lips to the same spot.
Now we’re even. I make a strangled sound into the blanket. Oh God, this is so pathetic.
I’m also grinning so hard my cheeks hurt.
My laptop chimes from the coffee table, and I reach for it with the silly hope I’ve been pretending not to have all day.
Evelyn’s name erases the grin without much effort. A forwarded PDF from Mrs. Warden. Sloane’s proffer.
I sit up and shove the blanket from my face. Most of it confirms what Mercer’s investigators and the forensic team have already dragged into daylight, names and dates and messages I recognize from conversations I’m sick to death of having. I skim until four words stop me: She’ll get over it.
Grant has said versions of those words about me for years—when I was angry, hurt, stubborn, tired, inconvenient.
Now, I’m glad I changed my mind and went to the showcase.
I’d told Grant I wasn’t going; spending our anniversary at another Mercer event smiling under stage lights while people asked when I planned to make another record ranked somewhere below dental surgery on my list of preferred activities.
But women supporting women got me there, and as fucked as everything that followed was, I wouldn’t have it any other way.
I needed to see it for myself. Needed the truth to hit me whole, because otherwise Grant would’ve had time to come home with some polished little sob story and decide how much of it I deserved to know.
He knew the part of me he could count on after the damage, the part that fought, cried, screamed, slept in the guest room, came back upstairs and tried again.
He had turned my forgiveness into a resource he could spend ahead of time.
She’ll get over it.
Hell, history had given him plenty of evidence.
I close the PDF. I don’t need another hour of lawyers translating my failed marriage back to me. I understand the sentence just fine.
Grant gets no more of my evening.
My thumb opens Beckett’s thread.
Laurel: Come over.
Beckett: You asking or ordering?
Laurel: Second date.
Beckett: Fuck. I need a minute.
Grinning, I tuck one leg under myself.
Laurel: Wear something comfortable. Something you can sit on the floor in.
Beckett: Laurel, you invite me over at night, call it a date, mention the floor—don’t expect me to behave like a gentleman.
Laurel: I expect nothing of the sort.
Beckett: Good. What do I bring?
Studio B flashes through my head, along with a pair of glasses I once threatened to knock crooked.
Laurel: Your glasses.
Beckett: Jesus Christ.
Laurel: Eight.
Beckett: I’ll be there.
Giggling like I’ve lost my damn mind, I toss the blanket aside and get off the couch.
∞∞∞
Dusk has gone blue against the windows, the last of the daylight slipping through the trees when the bell rings. I’ve changed clothes twice, put the first outfit back on and spent the last ten minutes making sure everything was exactly where I wanted it.
Beckett stands on the porch in a black T-shirt and charcoal sweatpants riding low on his lean hips, the waistband only making the narrow cut of his waist more obvious.
The shirt molds to his shoulders and chest, every shift of muscle visible under the cotton, the sleeves hugging his biceps and leaving the veins along his forearms on full fucking display.
I’ve spent an unreasonable amount of time pretending not to notice any of it, and the sweatpants are doing absolutely nothing to drag my thoughts out of the gutter.
His hair has none of its boardroom discipline either, dark and mussed from the drive, a few pieces falling over his forehead.
But I get stuck on the black frames over those gray eyes.
Oh, he came here to be a problem.
“You wore them.”
His mouth twitches, pink creeping into the tips of his ears. “You requested them.” He gives me a slow, molten once-over, from my bare feet to the soft pink shorts, white tank and cardigan hanging open over it, then meets my eyes again. “I was afraid there might be consequences.”
I swallow. “There still might be. I don’t make empty threats.”
“Good thing I came prepared to lose.”
There goes my stomach.
I step aside. “Come in, Vale.”
He passes me with the clean cedar-and-citrus scent I remember from last night, and the urge to bury my face in the warm curve of his neck hits with such force I have to shut the door with both hands.
Beckett has been inside this house once, but the first visit came with my big-headed brother planted in the kitchen, chewing a sandwich like a goat and making himself everybody’s problem.
This feels different. He toes off his sneakers beside mine near the entry and follows me into the kitchen with that crooked little smile, like he belongs in a version of my life no one has had the nerve to show me yet.
He lifts both hands, palms out, wearing the unmistakable expression of a man waiting to be congratulated. “I didn’t bring anything else. No wine, no flowers. Though I came damn close, I followed instructions.”
“Good boy.”
He stops dead.
Oh. The blush comes back.
I lean one hip against the island and let my eyes run over him with zero shame. “Did I break you?”
“No.” His voice drops half an octave. “But I’d appreciate some warning if you plan to say that again.”
“Why?”
“Because I’m trying very hard to remember we haven’t even had dinner yet.”
I bite my lip, and his hazy eyes drop to my mouth.
How the hell are we supposed to make it to the end of the night?
∞∞∞
Dinner turns into a raid on my refrigerator.
I’ve got fresh pasta, tomatoes, basil, parmesan and no clue what ambitious version of myself bought all of it, but Beckett spends ten seconds assessing the shelves, shuts the door and points at me. “Move.”
I hand him a wooden spoon instead. “You’re being bossy in my kitchen.”
“You invited a man who cooks and presented him with ingredients in distress. This is an emergency.”
He finds a pan, rejects the first one with enough offense to make me laugh and takes over the stove like I hired him, garlic hitting warm oil a few minutes later and filling the kitchen with something that smells far better than the protein bars and half-assed meals I’ve been living on between appointments.
I perch on the counter and steal tomatoes from his cutting board. He knocks my hand off, lets me get away with it the second time and finally slides the bowl closer because we both know this battle is over.
Music runs low from the speaker beside the sink, an old playlist I haven’t touched in years shuffling through songs I forgot were on it, and when Neil Young’s “Harvest Moon” comes on, Beckett pauses mid-stir.
“Of course this is on your kitchen playlist.”
I narrow my eyes. “Careful. You’re standing near my knives.”
His mouth pulls at one corner. “Can’t even compliment you without getting threatened now?”
“You can. Make it worth the risk.”
“I’m rusty.” He checks the sauce, sets the spoon aside and holds out his hand. “Come here.”
I eye his hand, then the stove. “Your sauce.”
“Has four minutes.”
“You timed it?” The expression he gives me answers that. “Right. Terrifying cook. Forgot.”
I slide off the counter and put my hand in his, and the second his other hand settles at my waist I forget how to breathe right, every nerve in me flickering alive.
My palm comes to rest on his shoulder, solid muscle warm beneath thin cotton, his fingers closing around mine as we start moving in that lazy side-to-side sway.
His hand spans half my waist, palm rough through my tank, thumb feathering my knuckles.
Two hearts thudding. Broad hands. Calloused palms. Soft strokes. The rest of the world a distant murmur.
I melt into all that is Beckett Vale.
“Lau—”
I step on his foot.
A breath huffs against my temple. “Ow.”
I tip my face up. “Liar.”
“I may never walk again.”
“I knew inviting you here was a mistake.”
“You say that with your hand pulling me closer.”
I still for half a beat because he’s right.
Worse, my fingers have wandered to the nape of his neck without me noticing, combing through the short hair there, brushing warm skin as if they have every right.
Beckett’s breath stutters, low and rough, and the fact I can do that to him goes straight to my head.
“Maybe my hand has poor judgment.”
“Your hand has excellent judgment.”
“Cocky.”
“You invited me back less than a day after our first date.” A shameless smirk tugs at his mouth. “I’ve earned a little confidence.”
I try for dignity and miss by a mile. “Keep talking and I’ll send you home with uncooked pasta.”
“Cruel woman.”
“You were warned.”
His laugh burns low and warm as whiskey.
He lifts our joined hands and spins me under his arm, laughter bubbling out of me as I turn, and I come back dizzy enough to brace a hand on his shoulder.
Beckett’s arm closes around my waist at the same time, drawing me flush to him until the laughter thins between us for an entirely different reason.
Our faces are a breath apart. The shameless grin fades from his mouth by degrees. His gaze stays with mine for one beat, then gives him away, tracing the shape of my lips. I feel my own smile disappear with it.
“You’re thinking about kissing me.”
“I’ve been thinking about kissing you since you opened the door last night.”
“That long?”
His brows climb. “Cruel. Do you have any idea how badly I slept?”
A grin threatens. “Good. I like knowing I wasn’t the only idiot staring at the ceiling.”
The teasing in his face softens. “You were?”
“No.” I shake my head. “I’m not repeating myself.”
His eyes widen with delight. “Laurel Bellamy, were you giggling?”
“No!”
He laughs, and I smack the flat of my hand against his chest. His fingers circle my wrist and keep my palm there, right over his heart.
It’s racing. Mine answers with a hard thud of its own.
A sudden sizzle slices through the spell we’ve fallen under.
I clear my throat and pat his chest twice. “Sauce.”
Beckett shuts his eyes. “I’m starting to hate that sauce.”
“Four minutes are up, chef.”
His eyes open again. “You’re enjoying this.”
“More than I should.”
We eat at the island, shoulders brushing every time one of us reaches for parmesan, and I refuse to tell him the pasta might be the best thing cooked in this kitchen since I moved in because his ego has had a very good night already.
He tells me Theo got caught running a candy business out of his schoolbag and Lila confiscated thirty-seven dollars in cash, three packs of sour gummies and what Beckett calls “a distribution network spanning two grade levels.” I counter with the time Dean hid my Halloween bucket and sold my own candy back to me piece by piece, and Beckett nods as if this confirms a longstanding theory.
“This explains so much about your trust issues.” I kick his ankle under the island. He laughs and keeps eating.
We talk about terrible movies, books he pretends not to judge me for abandoning halfway through, the fact he owns three different coffee grinders and refuses to admit this is deranged.
Sometimes neither of us says anything at all.
We eat, our knees bump under the island, Beckett’s fingers tangle with mine, and the quiet never turns awkward or asks either of us to fill it.
I’d forgotten silence with another person could feel this easy.
When we finish, I slide off the stool. “I’ve got something upstairs.”
His brows lift, a whole question forming behind those frames, and I chuckle as I close my fingers around his hand. “Come on.”