Chapter Forty Morning After Everything
Chapter Forty
Morning After Everything
Hayes
I wake up to the smell of bacon and the sound of Frankie singing off-key in my kitchen.
For a second, I think I’m dreaming. Then I remember last night—her taste, her laugh, the way she said my name like a prayer—and my chest does this stupid expanding thing that makes it hard to breathe.
She’s here. In my kitchen. Making breakfast.
I grab a pair of sweatpants and pad barefoot toward the noise. The perfect chaos that only she can bring.
Frankie’s standing at my stove, wearing nothing but my dress shirt from last night and a pair of my socks that go up to her knees.
Her hair’s a disaster—sticking up in twelve different directions—and she’s using my expensive spatula to flip bacon while humming what sounds like a Top 40 song I don’t recognize.
She looks perfect.
“Morning,” I say, leaning against the doorframe.
She turns, and her face lights up. “Oh good, you’re not dead. I was starting to worry I’d killed you with my feminine wiles.”
“Feminine wiles?”
“That’s what my mom used to call it when women got what they wanted from men. Though I’m pretty sure she was being sarcastic.”
“Did you get what you wanted?” I give her a sly look.
Her gaze dips lower, across my chest and down my torso. The way she’s looking at me—like I’m her personal buffet and she’s starving—makes my blood run hot.
“Maybe,” she says, her voice dropping to that husky register that does things to me. “Though I think I might need a repeat performance. You know. Just to be sure.”
“Is that so?”
She steps closer, close enough that I can smell my soap on her skin. “Mm-hmm. Quality control is very important in my line of work.”
“And what line of work is that again?”
“Professional temptress, apparently.” Her fingers trail down my chest, and I have to bite back a groan. “Though I’m still learning the ropes.”
“You’re a fast learner.”
“I had a very thorough teacher.”
Damn. The way she says thorough should be illegal.
Because that’s exactly what last night was. We spent hours together tangled in my sheets, learning exactly what the other liked.
I reach for her, but she dances away with a laugh, spatula still in hand.
“Uh-uh. Breakfast first. I didn’t slave over a hot stove just to watch it get cold.”
“I can think of better ways to work up an appetite.”
“I’m sure you can.” She waves the spatula at me like a weapon. “But I’m not letting you distract me with your . . . your . . .” She gestures vaguely at my entire existence.
“My what?”
“Your stupid perfect chest and your bedroom hair and that thing you do with your mouth.”
“What thing?”
“You know what thing.”
I absolutely do know what thing. But watching her get flustered is too entertaining to stop.
“I’m afraid you’ll have to be more specific.”
Her cheeks flush pink. “The smirking thing. Where you look all smug and satisfied like you know exactly what you’re doing to me.”
“Don’t I?”
“That’s not the point.”
“What is the point?”
“The point is breakfast. Food. Sustenance.” She turns back to the stove with more force than necessary. “Some of us need actual nutrition to function.”
I move behind her again, caging her against the counter.
“Hayes.” Her voice is breathless.
“What?”
“You’re doing it again.”
“Doing what?”
“The thing.”
“Still not specific enough.”
She turns in my arms, and the look she gives me could melt steel.
I move closer, wrapping my arms around her waist and tugging her close. She fits against me like she was made for it.
“What are you making?”
“Breakfast. Obviously.” She touches her lips to mine—just a quick kiss. “Hope you don’t mind I raided your kitchen. Though honestly, your food situation is tragic. Who keeps seventeen types of mustard but no decent coffee creamer?”
“I don’t drink coffee with creamer.”
“Of course you don’t. You take it black like some kind of sociopath.”
“I am not a sociopath.”
“Jury’s still out.”
I press a kiss to her neck, tasting salt and the faint sweetness of her perfume. “What’s the verdict on breakfast?”
“Well, I found bacon, eggs, and some fancy bread that was probably baked by someone with the word artisan in their title.”
“Perfect.”
She turns in my arms, studying my face. “You’re different in the morning.”
“Different how?”
“Softer. Less . . .” She waves the spatula vaguely. “Intimidating corporate overlord. More like a regular human who might actually eat carbs.”
“I eat carbs.”
“When?”
I pause. When do I eat carbs? My trainer has me on this ridiculous protein-heavy diet that makes everything taste like cardboard.
“Exactly.” Frankie grins. “When’s the last time you had pancakes? Or a doughnut? Or literally any food that brings joy instead of optimized nutrition?”
“I don’t really—”
“That’s what I thought.” She turns back to the stove. “We’re fixing that. Starting now.”
The bacon sizzles. She’s cracked eggs into a bowl and is whisking them with the kind of violent enthusiasm that makes me slightly concerned for their molecular structure.
“When did you learn to cook?”
“I decided it was time.” She gives me a shy smile.
“Can I help?”
“Can you make coffee without it tasting like motor oil?”
“I think so.”
“Then yes. Coffee duty is yours.”
I move to my espresso machine—a Italian monstrosity that cost more than most people’s cars—and start the familiar ritual.
“Geez,” Frankie mutters, watching me. “Even your coffee routine is intimidating. Do you have a special certification for that thing?”
“It’s not that complicated.”
“It has more buttons than my washing machine.”
I glance over at her. She’s pouring the eggs into the pan with one hand while flipping bacon with the other. Multitasking like she’s been doing this her whole life.
I’m impressed.
The espresso machine hisses. Steam rises from the milk frother.
“Have you learned to use a washing machine yet?” she asks over one shoulder.
“My parents didn’t exactly encourage domestic skills.”
“Too busy teaching you how to crush your enemies and acquire wealth?”
She’s joking, but she’s not wrong.
“Something like that.”
Frankie plates the eggs and bacon, then turns to face me. Her expression’s gone soft.
“Hey. I wasn’t making fun of you.”
“I know.”
“It’s just . . . different worlds, you know? Sometimes I forget how different until moments like this.”
I hand her a perfect cappuccino. She takes a sip, and her eyes roll back.
“Okay, maybe the fancy coffee machine is worth it.”
We sit at my kitchen island—something I’ve never done before. I usually eat standing up, checking emails, already mentally at the office.
This is . . . nice.
“So,” Frankie says around a bite of bacon, “what’s the plan for today?”
“Plan?”
“Yeah. It’s Saturday. Normal people have weekend plans.”
I don’t have weekend plans. I have conference calls and reports to review and—
“What do you usually do on Saturdays?” I ask.
“Depends. Sometimes I hang out with Tessa. Sometimes I catch up on laundry, clean my apartment. Exciting stuff.” She takes another sip of coffee. “What about you?”
“Work.”
“Work work? Or rich-people work?”
“What’s the difference?”
“Rich-people work is like, checking your stock portfolio and complaining about your yacht captain. Real work is actual work.”
I consider this. “Probably rich-people work.”
“Thought so.” She grins. “Well, today you’re doing normal-people Saturday.”
“Which involves?”
“I don’t know yet. We’ll figure it out.”
The idea of a day without a schedule makes my palms sweat. “I should probably—”
“Nope.” Frankie reaches over and plucks my phone from the counter. “No phones. No work. Just us and whatever random shit we feel like doing.”
“Frankie—”
“When’s the last time you had a day off? And I mean a real day off, not a working vacation where you answer emails by the pool.”
I can’t remember. Literally cannot recall the last time I went twenty-four hours without checking email.
“Exactly.” She tucks my phone into the pocket of my shirt. “So today, we’re going to be aggressively normal.”
“What does that mean?”
“I have no idea. But it’s going to be fun.”
Three hours later, we’re in Central Park and I’m learning that aggressively normal involves a lot of activities I’ve never considered.
Like feeding ducks.
“This is ridiculous,” I say, watching Frankie throw breadcrumbs at a particularly feisty mallard.
“It’s not ridiculous. It’s therapeutic.” She hands me a piece of bread. “Throw it.”
“I’m not throwing bread at ducks.”
“Why not?”
“Because I’m a grown man.”
“So? Grown men can’t enjoy simple pleasures?”
The mallard waddles closer, eyeing me expectantly.
“He’s judging me.”
“He’s hungry. Throw the bread, Hayes.”
I toss the bread half heartedly. It lands about two feet away. The duck gives me what I swear is a look of disappointment before waddling over to retrieve it.
“See? That wasn’t so hard.”
“This is insane.”
“This is living.” Frankie bumps my shoulder. “When’s the last time you did something pointless just because it made you happy?”
I don’t answer because I can’t. Everything I do has a purpose. Every decision calculated for maximum efficiency.
“That’s what I thought.”
We walk toward the playground. There are families everywhere—kids on swings, parents looking exhausted and happy. The kind of chaos I usually avoid.
“Man, I love watching kids,” Frankie says, settling onto a bench. “They have no filter. No shame. Just pure, unprocessed emotion.”
I watch a little girl throw herself down a slide with complete abandon, shrieking with joy.
“Terrifying.”
“Why?”
“All that . . . feeling. What if she gets hurt?”
“Then she’ll cry for thirty seconds and go down the slide again.” Frankie looks at me. “That’s how you learn. Trial and error. Not everything can be controlled.”
The words hit harder than they should.
“I know that.”
“Do you?”
I turn to study her face. She’s watching the playground, but I can feel her attention on me.
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Nothing. Just . . . you like your ducks in a row. Your plans planned. Your outcomes predictable.”
“That’s called being responsible.”
“Sometimes. Sometimes it’s called being scared.”
“I’m not scared.”
She finally looks at me. “No?”
“No.”
“Then why did you run in France?”
The question hits like a slap. We’ve been dancing around this all morning—the careful politeness of people pretending the past doesn’t matter.
“That was different.”
“How?”
“I was . . .” Damn it. “I was terrified.”
“Of what?”
“Of you. Of how you made me feel. Of fucking it up.”
Frankie nods like this makes perfect sense. “And now?”
“Now I’m still terrified. But I’m more scared of losing you again.”
She reaches over and takes my hand. Her fingers are small and warm and somehow steady in a way that makes my chest tight.
“I’m scared too.”
“Yeah?”
“Terrified. You’re everything I thought I didn’t want. Rich, complicated, emotionally unavailable—”
“I’m not emotionally unavailable. Not anymore. Not with you.”
The look she gives me is so sweet and soft, I want to drag her straight back to my bedroom. Instead, I stand up, pulling her with me. “Come on.”
“Where are we going?”
“Ice cream.”
“Ice cream?”
“You said normal-people Saturday. Normal people eat ice cream in the park, right?”
Her smile could power the city. “They do.”
“Then that’s what we’re doing.”
An hour later, we’re sharing a cone of chocolate chip cookie dough—her choice, obviously—and arguing about whether Die Hard is a Christmas movie.
“It takes place at Christmas,” she insists.
“That doesn’t make it a Christmas movie.”
“It absolutely does. Christmas is part of the plot.”
“Christmas is the setting. That’s different.”
“You’re wrong.”
“I’m never wrong.”
“Oh my God.” She stares at me. “You actually believe that.”
“I have an excellent track record.”
“Everyone’s wrong sometimes, Hayes. It’s part of being human.”
“I don’t like being wrong.”
“Nobody does. But it happens anyway.”
I consider this while she takes another bite of ice cream. A drop of chocolate lands on her chin.
“You’ve got . . .” I gesture at my own face.
“What?”
Instead of telling her, I lean over and kiss the chocolate away. She tastes sweet and cold and perfect.
“Better?”
“Much.”
We finish the ice cream and walk aimlessly through the park. No destination. No timeline. Just wandering.
It should make me anxious. Instead, I feel . . . calm.
We’ve stopped in front of a fountain. Kids are making wishes and throwing pennies while their parents watch indulgently.
“What would you wish for?” Frankie asks.
“I don’t make wishes.”
“Humor me.”
I think about it. Really think about it.
“More days like this,” I say finally. “More mornings in the kitchen. More pointless conversations about Christmas movies.”
“With me?”
“With you.”
She smiles and digs a penny out of her purse. “Then wish for it.”
“That’s not how wishes work.”
“How do you know? Have you ever made one?”
I take the penny. It’s warm from her hand.
“This is ridiculous.”
“Good. You need more ridiculousness in your life.”
I close my eyes and make a wish I’ve never let myself want.
The penny hits the water with a small splash.
“What did you wish for?” Frankie asks.
“Can’t tell you. It won’t come true.”
“That’s superstitious nonsense.”
“Maybe. But I’m not taking any chances.”
We walk home as the sun starts to set. My penthouse feels different when we return—warmer somehow. Less like a museum and more like a place where people actually live.
After we’ve worn each other out—more than once—Frankie curls against my side, quiet and warm. “I should probably head back to Tessa’s,” she says, but she doesn’t make any move toward her clothes.
“Should you?”
“Yeah. I mean, we haven’t really talked about . . . this. What it means.”
I sit on the edge of the bed and pull her down beside me. “What do you want it to mean?”
“I don’t know. I’m not good at this stuff.”
“What stuff?”
“Relationships. Feelings. Not completely fucking up a good thing.”
I laugh. “Neither am I.” I lean over and kiss her forehead. “We’ll figure it out.”
“Will we?”
“Yeah. We will.”
She curls into my side, her head on my chest. “Hayes?”
“Mmm?”
“I’m glad you made a wish.”
“Me too.”
“Even if it was ridiculous?”
“Especially because it was ridiculous.”
She falls asleep in my arms while I stare at the ceiling and think about how everything in my life just shifted on its axis.
For once, I’m not scared of the uncertainty.
I’m excited by it.