Chapter 34
Isla
I woke in delicious confusion. Warm and cocooned, without the notion of time or place. Dust particles danced in front of my eyes, illuminated from the beam of sunlight where the curtains were drawn back.
Not my room. It was far too clean.
Blinking, I found a clock on the bedside table: eleven a.m.
Shit, I never slept that late.
I tried to sit, and felt the stiffness in my limbs. An acute soreness between my legs I don’t think I’d ever felt. Glancing over my shoulder, I found Alistair’s tired gaze on me, and his calf brushed mine in the middle of the bed.
“Morning.” His voice was sleep-roughened, a tired smile on his face that made me blush as the night played back like a film reel.
Yelling at each other. Stumbling to the sofa. Him fucking me into the mattress until my voice had grown hoarse. “I’m in your bed.”
“Aye.”
“We had sex,” I said a little stupidly.
Bloody hell. I sounded like an eighteen-year-old who’d just lost her virginity.
He stared at me from his side of the bed. “Aye.”
That was it? That’s all he had to say?
It hadn’t just been the once either. Somehow, we’d crammed weeks’ worth of want into a single night.
And it had been . . . frighteningly good.
I mean, I’d expected the sex to be good. Look at the man. There was no plane of existence where he was bad in bed. But he’d been . . . ravenous. Insatiable.
I was pretty certain we’d attempted every position in existence that allowed us to maintain eye contact.
Me in his lap. On my knees while he spilled down my throat, my hair curled around his finger, Isla on his lips. And afterwards, You take care of me so well, Isla, had been tattooed in low whispers over every inch of my skin.
I think I’d enjoyed that encounter the best.
Around three a.m., he’d even watched me shower.
His hands gripping the marble vanity like he’d been about to yank it off the wall.
I think he got off on the waiting, because the second I’d towelled off, he’d dragged me to the sofa and pulled me astride him.
Both of us sharing the temporary illusion that I was in charge.
Limp and trembling, it hadn’t taken long for my overworked thighs to give out, and he’d lifted me through every thrust while I groaned my orgasm into his mouth.
Now all he had to say was Aye.
“You want me to leave,” I realised with a cold slap.
Of course he did. What was I even thinking? I might not have any experience with casual sex, but last night had very much been a one-and-done situation. Well . . . a five and done technically. But I should have gone home hours ago. Never should have fallen asleep in the first place.
Holding the sheet to my chest, I shuffled to the edge of the bed, wincing as my entire body protested.
He caught my hand before I even had a foot on the floor.
“What I want, Lang, is to make you breakfast, put you in the bath, wrap you in a blanket and hold you on the sofa for the rest of the day, while we watch The Lion King with Teddy for the millionth time.” His eyes were sombre, his hair a tangle of curls, flattened on one side from sleep.
“Then tonight, once she’s sleeping, I want to lay you out on the closest available surface and eat you out until you’re ready to take me again. ”
My breath stuttered. Body flushed with heat. I was literally unable to speak.
“But, I also want to talk,” he said, a pinched expression on his face.
Looking away, I tucked the sheet beneath my armpits. “I don’t think there’s a lot to say.” I mean, he was leaving anyway. What was the point?
“There’s loads to say.”
I started to disagree, but he cut me off.
“Just have breakfast with me,” he said, his expression pleading. “Let me talk.”
“Okay,” I agreed, not sure what it would change.
“Chocolate milk or orange juice?” I called from where I stood, peering into my open fridge.
Through the connecting door that he’d refused to close, I watched Alistair turn from the skillet on his hob, spatula in hand. “Whatever you want.”
That felt like a lie. “Chocolate milk it is,” I warned. He only smiled in response.
I poured out two glasses, and had carried them as far as the sofa when I paused. Alistair was standing in the open doorway; two plates stacked in his hands. “I thought we could eat over here instead,” he said.
When he had a spotless dining table fifty feet away? Instead of pointing that out, I just said, “Okay.”
Setting the plates on the counter, he helped me declutter the table. Moving Teddy’s half-built Lego car aside with a precision that made my throat narrow.
When we finally sat down to eat, the pancakes were a little cold.
I didn’t mind. Being a parent meant eating almost every meal long after it had turned cold.
We ate in an awkward silence for several minutes, the only sound the scrape of cutlery, before I finally worked up the courage to say what I’d been stewing over since I’d climbed out of his bed: “Thank you.”
He looked at me across the table.
“For what you did for Teddy,” I explained. “The money.”
His teeth dragged over his bottom lip. “I thought you were angry.”
“I am.” I pushed the plate away, trying to put into words exactly what I was feeling. “I’m angry you went behind my back. I never would have accepted the money from you, and you knew that.”
“I did,” he agreed.
“Still, I shouldn’t have yelled at you—”
“You had every right.” He cut me off. “You should be angry.”
“So agreeable all of a sudden.”
“I agreed last night; I knew when I paid the money you’d be angry and I did it anyway.
” He shrugged. “I decided the risk was worth it because I wanted you to be okay more than I wanted you to like me.” Bloody hell.
His admission should have made me furious.
But instead I was resisting the urge to round the table and kiss him again.
“Why the sudden forgiveness?” he asked.
“I remembered something Heather said a few days ago—”
“Do I need to hire a hitman?”
“I don’t think so.” I rolled my fork over in my hand.
“She pointed out that this – the money, the gifts – is how you show people you care . . . and then I started thinking about your mum’s stupid vacuum and her doorbell.
Teddy deserves someone to go to bat for her, even if it was ill advised and pricked at my pride.
” I blew out a breath. I hated that part of this truth, how embarrassed I felt that I needed to rely on other people to provide for my daughter.
“Then I became about twenty per cent less mad.”
“Twenty per cent?” His eyebrows flew up, but I didn’t miss the hopeful edge to his voice.
“Maybe twenty-one,” I said, cheeks heating. “I blame the sex. I think it melted part of my brain.”
His laugh was warm. Intimate. “Likewise.”
We stared at each other for so long. I swallowed, unsure of how to break the moment.
“So—” He drummed his fingers on the table. An oddly nervous gesture coming from him. “Where does this leave us?”
This was the bit that made my heart want to crack.
I’d sworn to myself kissing Alistair came with a safety net. That I’d never get too deep because I knew it could never be permanent. Weeks ago, that promise had been set in stone. Now, it was like he’d been steadily carving away at that promise with a chisel.
Carve any deeper and he’d find my heart.
Truthfully, I think he already had. Everything felt so tangled, I couldn’t be sure anymore.
Looking at him now, the eagerness in his stare, I realised I was going to have to put an end to this before it got any more complicated.
“Look.” I stood, carrying my half-eaten plate of food to the kitchen so I didn’t have to look at him.
My appetite was gone anyway. “Last night was great. One of the best nights of my life if I’m honest, but I think that’s how we should leave it.
I meant what I said about the Cairn & Crust: I’ll ask Heather and if we’re disqualified—”
His chair scraped loudly on the floor. “No.”
I kept my back to him, resolute. “Alistair—”
“Fuck no.” He pulled the plate from my hands.
It hit the counter with a clatter. “You’ve worked so hard for this, Isla.
Maybe last night was nothing more than a rage-filled fuck for you.
I don’t care. Frankly, you’ll just have to get over the inconvenience of spending a few extra hours with your one-night stand.
I’m not letting you ruin this for yourself because you’re running scared. ”
“Scared?” I flinched. Finally looked at him. His eyes were shards of pale ice. Wait. He was mad at me? “I’m not scared. I just don’t see the point in prolonging this. I’m trying to make this easier on everyone . . . easier for Teddy.”
He laughed, shaking his head. “You have this habit of throwing out Teddy’s name when you really mean you.” He crowded me against the counter, eyes bouncing between mine. “Tell me the truth, Lang. You’re running from this to protect yourself.”
I didn’t get why he was pushing this.
“I’m running?” I shoved him back an inch. “That’s fucking rich considering you’re the one who’s about to tuck tail and leave. Cameron told me you’ve already held interviews for your replacement. I guess congratulations are in order, the patient feedback didn’t matter after all.”