Chapter 35
Chapter Thirty-Five
Eleanor
How to pass a test when you don’t know you’re being tested.
T he phone rings three times before Gail answers. She’s at least out of bed this time, so I can’t be accused of waking her or disrupting her mid coitus.
“Ellie, it’s Saturday.”
“Correct.” Why does she point out the day of the week like I don’t know?
She sighs and flips to video call. She squints at me, and I recognize her home office. “What’s up? We don’t have a session planned until Monday.”
“I’m calling more as a friend than a client.”
She raises a brow. I understand we blur the lines more often than not, and I’m not the kind of person to explicitly point it out, but I need her skill to help me understand what is happening almost as much as I need my friend right now.
“You look different.”
“I feel different,” I answer, which itself is significant, given I struggle to connect to my emotions on a good day.
“Did something happen?”
I suck my bottom lip in and release a breath. “I had an orgasm.”
“Not normally something to write home about.”
Why would I write home about it? There’s no one there, because I’m here. Plus, I’d be writing to myself, and I already know what happened. “I came with Hunter.”
Silence fills the call as her face slackens in shock. “You came during sex? That’s a huge step, Ellie.”
“We didn’t have sex. There was an incident with my sex toy drawer.”
“Again?”
I roll my eyes. “Not the same, but that’s unimportant. Hunter wound me up, then left. I couldn’t finish the job with my favorite method, so when he got back, I was really, really angry. Then he made me come on the kitchen island.”
Her mouth opens, closes, opens again... and closes once more. “But no sex?”
“No. He put me in his bed, and we fell asleep.”
“You slept with him?” she almost shouts. “Way to bury the lead, Ellie.”
“The orgasm was more noteworthy. Besides, it wasn’t the first time we slept in the same bed.”
She blinks, a brightness in her eyes I’d never seen before. “Let’s settle on these two shifts in mindset happening back-to-back being equally weighted.”
“But I enjoyed the orgasm much more than I did when I slept next to him when I had period pain.”
“You really ran with the relationship hour and overachieved.”
I shift on the guest bed and stare at the hallway door as Hunter’s footsteps move past it. “We are getting out of the friend zone and into therapist territory,” I remind her.
She frowns, tilting her head in a way that reminds me of Charlie. “What do you need from me as your friend?”
I swallow the knot in my throat. “I think I’m falling for him.”
She smiles, and it’s so full of fucking sunshine it almost hurts to see. “Have you told him things you haven’t told others?”
“I told him things I haven’t even told you.”
She claps. Odd. I would have thought she’d get upset that a man I’ve known for less time has surpassed the comfortability and openness between the two of us.
“I love this for you! I’m so excited. Take your time, Ellie, and enjoy the fall. It’s about time someone broke through those walls and made you realize you have so much to offer the world not just as a hacker, but as Ellie.”
A gentle rap sounds at the door. “I have to go,” I tell her. “He’s knocking on my door.”
“I want updates!” she demands with a smile. “Daily.”
I roll my eyes and end the call. “Come in,” I shout.
He opens the door and blinks at me being fully dressed and ready for the day. “Hey.”
My lips twitch. Now, he’s shy? After giving me the best orgasm of my life he’s suddenly knocking on doors and saying ‘hey’?
“Hey, yourself.”
“Cheryl called. She needs a hand at the bakery.”
“I’m sorry to hear that. Hopefully, your phone call demand can wait.”
He runs a hand through his hair and takes a few steps into the room. “It can’t, and since you guys were meant to meet tomorrow anyway, I thought you could kill two birds with one stone.”
“No.”
“Eleanor.”
“I can’t cook.”
“Please? I promise to make you come several times tonight.”
My brows furrow. “Orgasms are not currency.”
“They should be.”
“You’re blackmailing me with pleasure.”
“You are being dramatic.”
I sigh and snap my laptop closed. I’ve already checked everything I can, and a few hours with William’s wife seems like a reasonable payment. “Fine.”
He grins, and I sit up straight, biting my lip. Why am I suddenly making everyone smile today? Since when am I that person?
“Great. Let’s go.”
The back room of a bakery that makes everything in house is huge and a little impressive. Cheryl is indeed alone, but she hardly seems flustered as she handles the multiple alarms with finesse while continuing to serve hungry folks at the counter. It’s made easier by the fact most customers have accounts or prepaid for their orders, so it’s simply a case of passing their goodies over.
I learn what a glaze is, and that there are more types of pastry than flaky. The entire kitchen smells of baked peaches, and it’s making my stomach rumble as I transfer cookies from baking sheets to cooling racks. Cheryl peppers me with seemingly harmless questions I answer truthfully, understanding they can be interpreted many ways.
Where did we meet?
On a plane.
How did we connect?
Through a mutual friend who was in a bad relationship.
How long have we known each other?
Eight months.
Is it serious?
For me, absolutely. But you’ll have to ask Hunter for his thoughts.
Do I think I could settle here?
Possibly .
When the morning rush has passed and the bakery is three-quarters empty, we pause for a coffee which gives her a chance to not shout these questions at me between customer demands, but actually look at me while I answer.
We lean against opposite ends of the kitchen, sipping from our mugs, when she switches tactics and opts for more in-depth ones.
“Hunter is a complicated man,” she starts, staring at the steam rising between her hands. I raise a brow but stay silent. It’s not rude, given she didn’t ask a question, but even I can tell she’s gearing up for something that’s making her uncomfortable. “He needs someone who understands they can’t have his attention one hundred percent of the time. Can you be that?”
“I have my own commitments. I can’t be with someone who needs me every second of the day, and it’s healthy to have our own goals and interests. I know the Reapers are a big part of his life, and that he has a job to do that goes along with that. I won’t get in the way of his obligations to William.”
She hums in the back of her throat. “The MC is not just a job, it’s a family, and he has commitments expanding beyond the nine to five, Monday to Friday. Nothing about working for an MC is typical.”
“And I’ve already stated I understand.”
She places her mug down, curling her fingers around the edge of the counter at her back. “I’m not sure you do. You can’t be with him and be separate from us.”
“I’m my own person, with my own commitments. He knows I won’t be a little wife shackled in the kitchen barefoot and pregnant. I’m not a damsel in distress, and I won’t allow my worth to be caught up in a man or an organization. I will be sensitive to his needs and the demands placed on him, but I will not have my personality swept away in something I didn’t sign up for.”
Cheryl throws her head back and laughs, tears gathering on her lashes. What’s so funny about what I said? Why am I making everyone happy today? It’s not normal. Did the orgasm transport me to bizarro land? How do I get back?
“You’re perfect for him, Eleanor,” she says as she finally stops cackling. “Strong willed, stubborn, smart. He needs that in a woman. It’s so easy to lose oneself in these men, and so many others have come into the fold being starstruck, but when that dies down, they realize how empty they are.”
Wait… I don’t— “It was a test?”
She nods. “And you passed.” That’s a relief; I don’t enjoy failing. “While you might not want to step into a wife role anytime soon, would you like to learn how to make his favorite pie? I swear by this recipe, and I haven’t given it to anyone else, but if he’s angry or distant—which he might be today—this pie always brings him back.”
Do I want to cook? No. Do I want a magic secret recipe capable of soothing his soul? Yes.
And that’s how I learned to make something almost resembling a peach pie. Or, at least, I tried.