Chapter 21
twenty-one
HANNAH
How did one act around one’s boss who used to hate you but then described how he’d love to cover your body in his cum?
The eternal question.
Much the same as you had before the “cum” comment, it seemed. Or at least that was what Beau did.
My stomach was swirling with butterflies when I entered the kitchen the next morning. I’d slept in, only because I’d stayed up so late tossing and turning, contemplating creeping down the hallway into Beau’s bed, despite his noble intentions. Despite my own.
I only lapsed into unconsciousness in the wee hours after making myself come to the thoughts of Beau’s hands, his almost scarily large cock—if the shape underneath his jeans was to be believed.
My limbs felt heavy, my brain foggy, as if I had a hangover. Beau was his own form of intoxication, far less dangerous than alcohol. Or far more. I couldn’t decide. I guessed it depended on whether he considered me a quick fuck or a whole future.
Which did I consider him?
That’s what scared me the most.
Clara was already up, swinging her legs at the breakfast bar, eating oatmeal. Beau was in the kitchen, stirring something in a pot.
“Good morning, Banana,” Clara said with her mouth full.
I gave her my entire attention, though it was tough because my body, my eyes, my entire existence wanted to gravitate toward Beau. I couldn’t stop remembering the taste of his lips on my tongue, his scent imprinting on my skin, the wild hunger in his eyes. The feeling of being looked at like that.
“Good morning, Blueberry.” I managed a warm smile for Clara despite the heaviness of my mood.
Because I couldn’t simply experience the elation of finding out someone I wanted, wanted me back.
Not when that person had been making my life a living hell for months.
Beau wanted me, and for some fucked-up reason, he’d been being a complete asshole to me to try to mask it.
That was seriously juvenile and problematic in many ways. I should not have just melted for him the second he showed me positive attention. I should not have wanted him back. At the very least, I should’ve made him work for it. Made him grovel.
I should’ve shoved down my feelings, not allowing myself to get tangled up with a man with the ability to treat me so callously, whatever his intentions.
A strong cocktail of regret, respect, sadness, and happiness hit me like a train as I observed Clara’s easy smile. Her carefree joy.
I did not want to jeopardize her happiness in any way. And though it hurt me, I accepted Beau’s decision not to sleep with me. I was grateful for it. He was trying to do right by his daughter.
I gathered my courage, pulling in a deep breath.
“Good morning, Beau,” I said, still standing awkwardly at the edge of the kitchen.
“Good morning, Hannah.” He didn’t turn, replying with his back to me. His voice was rough, deep. It caressed my skin.
I took another long breath before making a beeline for the coffee machine.
If I were going to deal with this, I needed copious amounts of caffeine.
But Beau, apparently, had the same idea, and we met at the machine, our fingers brushing as our hands outstretched at the same time.
His skin on mine was electric. Having his large body so close awoke my nerve endings with a current I hadn’t felt since last night. It was as if he’d unlocked a whole new level of sensation I didn’t know existed between us, within me.
This was not a man who hated me, whom I needed to hide from; this was a man who wanted me so viscerally that he had to create distance, both emotional and physical, because he didn’t trust himself.
He. Wanted. Me.
I repeated it over and over like a hymn.
I’d spent a lot of time in my head when I was growing up, a lot of time imagining I was like Matilda and could move things with my mind. Or that I was a forgotten witch who would come into her powers then be taken away to a world where I would have the ability to change things.
When I grew up, I put aside those childish dreams, though not wholly. I still dabbled with the modern magics of manifestation, crystals, and anything else that could help me believe I had some agency over my life.
But I’d long abandoned such practices since it hadn’t helped me any. Until now. Standing there at the coffee machine, it felt like I’d used some kind of power. That I had magicked this into my life. Beau Shaw wanting me.
Beau cleared his throat loudly. He hadn’t stepped back like I was contagious, like he had in the past. His body hadn’t even stiffened.
He remained where he was, hand outstretched, grazing mine, my arm seemingly suspended in space and time.
I reveled in the contact, at the shift in our relationship that was so jarring, so wondrous, that I couldn’t trust it. But I didn’t want to back away from it either, whatever promises I made to myself mere seconds ago.
“Banana, what are we doing today?” Clara’s loud voice fractured the moment.
“Let me,” Beau murmured quietly, nodding to the machine.
I nodded back, stepping away from him in a gesture that felt foreign, painful. Swallowing bile, I turned to the smiling face of the most precious girl in the world.
The little girl whom we were protecting by denying our baser urges. And looking at her clear, innocent, happy face, I couldn’t bring myself to regret that decision, not even a little bit.
So I did what I needed to do. I told her about our day. I accepted coffee from Beau then prepared myself for another miserable chapter in my life.
Not Beau hating me or me hating him.
But both of us wanting each other and pretending we didn’t.
I hadn’t thought I could recover from the life-changing night with Beau. The life-changing night where nothing actually happened.
He had told me all the things I’d wanted to hear, and he brought me as close to an orgasm as was humanly possible without physical touch. He made me feel like a woman. Worthy.
And then he decided not to act on his needs. His incredibly detailed and visceral needs.
So that was … it? I was supposed to go back to how things were twenty-four hours earlier, behaving like nothing had changed?
Like he hadn’t permanently cracked the foundation beneath my feet?
It didn’t seem tenable to live under the same roof as the man who wanted to fuck me until I screamed, let alone maintain professional distance, without some sort of implosion.
Yet we did. As usual, Clara worked as a buffer. Her presence made it impossible to act on my urges to run over to Beau and kiss him. Rip his clothes off with my bare hands, wrap my legs around his hips. I had many fantasies.
On the rare occasions when we were alone, Beau kept his distance. Sometimes.
Other times, he tortured me.
Like when I was getting a snack for Clara, who was in the living room building a magnet tile tower, and Beau had been in his home office doing … whatever Beau did.
I had opened the fridge and leaned forward when I felt it.
Heat. Completely juxtaposing the chill from the fridge.
I was grasping a yogurt when I turned, Beau’s body so close to mine that our clothes brushed.
I tipped my head upward to glimpse his tight jaw underneath his sexy beard, my breath catching at the intensity in his gaze.
His hands were twitching at his sides, as if he were having actual trouble keeping them there.
My heart rate spiked, and my breathing became shallow as I met his eyes, lips parted.
I’d thought he was the king of compartmentalizing.
That or he just had the power to tell his brain that I was off-limits, and then he’d no longer want me.
It had left me feeling bereft, weak, and consumed by thoughts of him, desperate for him.
It had been torture, wanting him when I thought he hated me.
It was quite another thing knowing he wanted me.
And he still wanted me.
A lot.
If the expression on his face or the electricity crackling between us was anything to go by.
I was stuck in his gaze, half in the fridge, half in the forge of his desire.
“Beau,” I whispered.
He leaned in, eyes on my lips as if he were going to claim them. Claim me.
Except he’d already claimed me and for longer than I’d like to admit.
I half closed my eyes, gravity—or my lust-drunk heart—pulling me closer to him, still clutching the yogurt, preparing for my world to be laid to ruin.
But he didn’t kiss me. He let out what could be defined as a sigh but was so much more violent than that.
When that powerful sound broke the moment, he didn’t rear back or close off. He rested his forehead against mine, wrapping me in his presence, his scent, the warmth of his breath. I stayed frozen for the scant moment he lingered there, unspoken needs, wants, and regrets passing through us.
Then he stepped back. But he took me with him, his palm flat on my back.
“Fuck, Hannah,” he hissed as he began rubbing my back. “You’re freezing. I’m so fucking sorry. I just…” He stepped back, dragging a hand down his face.
“You just…?” I questioned, not feeling any chill, solely the burn of his touch.
When he lifted his head, my nipples pebbled in need at his blown pupils, the tightness to his mouth and shoulders, the dark desire coating him.
“Daddy!” Clara exclaimed.
We both jumped at the small person who had entered the kitchen with us being far too deep in … whatever this was, to notice.
My desire was doused with ice.
And Beau’s form instantly transformed. His features softened, mouth turned up, posture relaxed, giving his daughter his full attention.
“Yeah, baby?” He crouched down on his knees to sweep back her hair.
And then the moment was gone. We were back in our defined roles. Father. Nanny. Separate.
BEAU
I was fucked.
Not in the way I wanted to be. I hadn’t known blue balls could be this bad. After I divorced Naomi, I’d thrown myself into being a father, had a one-night stand here and there, but then, when Clara was diagnosed, my needs disappeared overnight.