Headfirst

Chapter 15

Ivy

Ivy: Hi, babe. How are you? Ready to tell me what’s going on with you?

Sophie: Not particularly. How’s Texas?

Ivy: Strange.

Sophie: Strange, how?

Ivy: We kissed.

Sophie: WHAT?!

Ivy: And may have dry humped.

Sophie: MAY HAVE?!

Ivy: Also he saw my ass. Now we’re just pretending like it didn’t happen.

Sophie: Answer your phone, Ivy Bennett!

Ivy: Can’t. Going into a movie with Delilah. Love you, Bye!

————

“That was so cool!” Delilah says, waving Burrito in the sky like she’s flying.

“You liked it?” I ask her, laughing as I throw our trash away in the garbage can outside the theatre.

“Yes. Burrito did too. It was her family,” Delilah replies.

I snap my finger. “I thought those dragons looked familiar. Lots of similarities,” I agree, equally serious.

I grab Delilah’s hand as we leave the local movie theatre I found just down the street that plays children's movies in the mornings. Delilah and I walked down the block and watched one of the How to Train Your Dragon movies. She stood the entire time she was so excited.

“What do you want to do now?” I ask her, looking back and forth down the street. Tonight is our last night in town before we fly back home tomorrow morning.

“I’m hungry. Can we have pizza?”

I pull out my phone to look up a pizza place, just as a text comes through.

Wesley: You girls have lunch yet?

Ivy: No. Delilah just asked for pizza though. Must be daddy, daughter telepathy.

Wesley: There’s a pizza spot a few doors down from the tattoo studio. Are you nearby?

He sends me his location, and I see that it’s just a block away.

Ivy: We’ll be there in a few. Just around the corner.

We turn the corner, and I see Wesley waiting on the sidewalk with his hands in his pockets.

He is stupidly gorgeous. Dark hair pushed back and curling at the nape, tattoos standing out against his all black outfit.

I shouldn’t drool over the clothes he wears.

He wears variations of the same thing every day.

Plain white, black, or grey shirts, with classic black or grey pants, and his black work boots.

Still, the way the shirts mold to his muscles and drape over what I know is a toned stomach kills me everytime without fail. He looks rugged, and just pure man. He spots Delilah, and smiles broadly, showing off his dimples.

“Hey, bug!” he calls out, grabbing Delilah’s attention, which until now was still firmly set on Burrito.

She gasps. “Daddy!” she squeals—like she always does—and rips her hand from mine.

She runs full speed at him as he crouches down, arms out and ready to receive her.

She crashes into him, and he grabs her under the arms and lifts to toss her in the air, making her scream and belly laugh.

He moves her to the side, holding her with his forearm under her bottom.

They both turn to look at me at the same time, both with huge smiles, both with dimples.

Oh shit. My heart.

I only saw Wesley briefly this morning before he left for work. He acted completely normal. Which was a polar opposite from how he behaved leaving my room last night.

Last night.

Just remembering the taste of his mouth, and the way his eyes darkened watching me move on him, makes my stomach clench. Shocked is an understatement for what I felt when he pulled me into him, but I can’t say I’m not happy he did.

When he left my room last night, he was so awkward.

Like he didn’t know how to talk to me anymore, now that we knew what the other looked like while coming.

Yet this morning, it was as if it never happened, like it didn’t matter.

I don’t know which is worse. He obviously got it out of his system, and we can move on now.

I decided to take his lead, and pretend it never happened, regardless of how I’d like to do the total opposite. Regardless of how I’d like to ask him to do it again, and again, and maybe be more than friends. More than the nanny. Talk about it, like grown ups? No thanks. I’m good.

I’ve taken one too many blows to the ego in the romance department. I have felt inadequate and not good enough for a man more than I’d like to admit. I don’t think I can stick my neck out again. He won’t get involved with me romantically, and I need to remember that.

“Hey,” I greet him, feigning a casual tone.

“Hi. You girls have fun at the movies?” he asks us both.

“Yes Daddy, now we want pizza,” Delilah whines, showing the all too familiar signs of getting cranky when she’s hungry.

I think she’s tired too. This trip has worn on her. The busy days, the new environment, and the earlier than usual bedtimes has thrown her off.

“Okay, let’s go.” He tilts his head to the side indicating to follow him, so I do. We walk just a few store-fronts down the sidewalk, and Wesley opens the door to a shop that reads “NY Style Pizza” on the door.

I take Delilah from him, and she rests her head on my shoulder. I find us a booth and slide in. Delilah refuses to detach from me, and I know I was right about her being cranky and worn out.

Wesley orders for all of us without asking, which I don’t find hot at all.

Ugh.

He comes to the table with three paper plates of pizza, and I set Delilah down on her side of the booth. She eats quietly while I take my piece of caprese pizza and dig in. Do I ask how he knew caprese is my favorite? No.

At this point I’ll just assume he knows all. He played my body like a damn fiddle last night. He knew just what to say, and how to touch me. I squeeze my thighs together at his words echoing in my head.

I know.

Atta fuckin’ girl.

Such a good girl for me.

“You excited to go home tomorrow?” he asks, shattering my train of thought as he rips into his pizza.

I nod. “Yeah. I miss it. I miss Sophie, and Rose, and–” I clear my throat gently. “Your house, your parents house. I just miss it.”

He stares at me thoughtfully, before dipping his chin down. “Me too.”

We make uncomfortable eye contact a couple times throughout the meal, and it genuinely makes me question myself. I didn’t imagine last night, right?

We finish up eating and leave the restaurant. We walk past the tattoo studio Wesley has been working at, and I expect him to stop, but he continues with us.

“Don’t you have to go back?” I ask, confused.

“I do, but I’m going to walk you guys back.”

The overbearing man strikes again. Though I can’t blame him this time, I do have his daughter.

He walks us all the way back to the hotel and kisses a sleepy Delilah goodbye.

“See you two later. I’ll be back around five, we can go to dinner, then pack for the airport.”

“Okay. I’m going to put Delilah down for a nap. I think she needs it.”

He agrees, gently stroking his daughter's head that’s laying on my shoulder again. I flash him a quick smile, then spin to walk through the hotel entrance.

“Ivy,” Wesley calls out, halting my steps. I give Delilah a boost in my arms to readjust her and turn back to him.

“Yeah?”

“Thank you. For this. For coming with me, so I didn’t have to be away from her.” he tilts his head at Delilah. “Just….” he trails off, looking off to the side.

I think he’s finally going to address what happened last night, and I hold my breath expectantly.

“Just, thank you,” he finishes, giving me a tight lipped smile.

I deflate instantaneously, and do my best to appear unbothered.

“Of course,” I respond, hoping the curve of my lips looks natural.

We both remain in our respective spots on the sidewalk for several seconds before realization dawns.

“You’re waiting for me to go inside aren’t you?” I ask.

“Yeah,” he replies.

“Right,” I turn on my heel to enter the large glass doors.

————

“Can I hold the bag, Daddy?” Delilah asks Wes as we walk down the street and back to our hotel after dinner.

He hands her the bag of leftover cheesecake, and she starts swinging it back and forth. Wesley took Delilah and I to a nice Italian restaurant downtown after he got back from work. The food was delicious, but I couldn’t ignore the sweet wholesome smiles we got from other customers.

They’d look from Wesley, to me, to Delilah, and smile that what a beautiful family smile. It didn’t help that Wesley and I were both holding Delilah’s hand.

I wanted to scream, “I’m the nanny! He doesn’t even like me like that! Please stop muddling my brain and making me think I’m part of their family!”

You know, like a normal, rational woman, who’s not obsessed with her boss.

“Iby, will you spend the night when we get home? I like it when we sleep close.” Delilah melts and crushes my heart in one single question.

Wesley looks taken aback by what she said too, and glances over to me with a line between his brows. Is he irritated that she asked that? I can’t get a read on him.

“Um, well…” I start, looking at Wesley for any sign of what to say.

That would be weird if I stayed with them right?

I think it would feel weird to sleep alone again, but I’ll get used to it, it’s only been a few days.

I like sleeping close to Delilah too, but Wesley would probably be uncomfortable with me sleeping there unnecessarily.

“I should go to my house so you and your daddy can have quality time.”

“Yeah, bug. Nana, Papa, Auntie Soph and your uncles miss you. Ivy needs to go home to see Rose.” He’s not wrong.

I called her when we first arrived at the hotel, and she assured me she was fine.

She said her daughter had come over and planned to again the next day.

Then she threatened to “tan my hide” if I called her again.

I believe her too. I love her, but she has that scary grandma vibe about her.

Delilah sticks her bottom lip out. “Okay.”

“But I’ll be back the next day, alright?”

She nods, looking so defeated, my chest hurts.

She lifts her arms up to me in a silent question, so I take the cue and hoist her up into my arms. She wraps her little legs around my waist and hugs my neck in a koala embrace.

When I look over at Wesley, his jaw is clenched, and shoulders have visibly tensed.

Am I being too comfortable with her? I’m not going to refuse her when she’s so sad. When we finally get to the hotel, and up to our rooms, I hand Delilah over to Wesley.

“Thanks,” he says softly.

He acted normal at dinner—a little too normal if you ask me—but ever since Delilah asked me to stay the night, he’s quiet. Delilah protests taking a shower, but Wesley ends up convincing her, and I go to my room to start getting my stuff ready to leave tomorrow.

I leave the adjoining door open because I’m not showering just yet, and head into the bathroom to start straightening up the explosion of toiletries.

“Ivy?”

I step out of the bathroom and see Wesley standing in the doorway between our rooms.

“Yeah?”

“Lilah is asking for her goggles. She’s not in the shower, she just wants to wear them after she gets dressed,” he says incredulously. “Do you happen to have them? I don’t remember grabbing them from the pool.”

My hands are full of moisturizer and serums, so I point to my duffel bag on the bed.

“Oh, yeah. They’re in the front pocket of my bag. Go ahead.”

He nods in thanks, and approaches the bed. He unzips the front pocket, quickly finding the two pairs of goggles.

“They’re both the same size. You can give her either pair,” I say shyly, just now realizing how stupid I probably looked with kid goggles on.

Oh well.

He picks one, then puts the other back in the bag, zipping it up. He spots something, and points at the fabric handle of the bag, and tilts his head.

“I.D.B,” he says aloud, reading the stitching there. “Your initials?” he asks, looking over at me curiously.

“Yeah. My dad had them stitched on before I went away to college.”

I faintly hear little footsteps running toward us.

“What’s the D for?”

“Delilah.”

“What?” he scrunches his face in confusion.

“Delilah. Ivy Delilah Bennet,” I say again.

“Twins!” Delilah shouts from the doorway, running up to Wesley, snatching the goggles from him and running back to their room.

“Twins,” I agree, letting out a breathy laugh.

He doesn’t move, still just standing at the edge of the bed. He looks back and forth between the door Delilah just ran through, and then me, face still scrunched, lines etched across his forehead.

I’m still standing there, holding my lotions, and wondering what I said or did wrong to make him look like that. Is he mad he didn’t know my middle name?

Finally, he mutters under his breath, “Ivy… Delilah Bennett.”

He brings both his hands to his head and simultaneously rakes them through his hair, before settling them at the back of his neck.

Looking down at his feet, he shakes his head and repeats my full name again.

He huffs out a laugh, then glances up to meet my gaze—just staring—with an almost thoughtful look on his face.

Okay, now he’s starting to scare me. Just as I’m about to ask what the hell is happening or why he’s acting so strange, he shakes his head one last time, giving me a small smile and flicking his gaze to the floor.

“I’ll see you in the morning,” he says softly, then leaves the room, shutting the door behind him.

I watch him go, bewildered by that entire interaction.

I mouth silently, “oh-kay?” then turn back to continue packing.