Chapter 22
Chapter Twenty-Two
Bax
“It’s just a scribble,” I said, watching Bea next to me on my bed, naked and flat on her back.
Her knees were bent and knocking together while she stared at the picture I’d drawn of her.
She held it in her hand, and her dark, chocolate hair lay wild and disheveled beneath her shoulders, the wispy ends curling up and licking her arms. I traced a lock with my finger, watching how my skin next to hers made hers look darker.
“You’re beautiful,” I said. “I don’t think I could ever do you justice.”
She ignored my compliment, focusing harder on my sketch. “It’s not just scribbles. This is art.”
“Barely.”
“Bax, you made me look sexy. Only an artist can do that.”
“Then you’re an artist, too,” I said, feeling kind of shy and silly, coiling a lock of her hair around my finger now, “’cause you’re sexy every day.”
She blushed. “I don’t see myself that way.”
“Why not?”
She rolled and set my sketchpad on the bedside table, flashing me the perfect view of her ass. Reaching out, I slid my hand between her legs, gripped her thigh, and pulled, and she rolled back toward me and tucked her hands beneath her cheek.
“Dunno,” she said. “I guess I’ve always been a little different. You know? On the outside, all I see is short and chubby.”
“Chubby? You’re nuts. You’re perfect.”
The blush darkened. In the smallest voice, she said, “Thank you.” After a minute, she shivered and shook her head, finally interrupting the eye contact we couldn’t seem to break. “I’m not overweight. I know that. I’m more like a string bean—curve- less —but it’s just this thing in my head.
“When I was little, my daddy called me Belly. Apparently, I had a habit of runnin’ around without a shirt.
My mama said I hated them, and I’d take mine off in the most inappropriate places.
Church, the grocery store, when they pulled up to a drive-through window.
And I had a pot belly, so my dad would pat my stomach and call me Belly, like an old man after Thanksgiving dinner.
“I guess it stuck with me.”
Caressing my hand over her stomach, I leaned down to kiss it.
“No old-man resemblance here. You are beautiful and perfect just the way you are.” I dragged my lips over her soft skin and taut muscle, and she shivered and laughed.
“God, I love when you laugh. If we could bottle it, we could sell happiness to the masses.”
“Shouldn’t we get dressed?” she asked. “What if Athena and Shaylene wake up?”
Bea had fucked me long into the night. She was well sated now, three orgasms later. One I’d given her with my cock, another with my mouth when she rode my face again, and the other with both. The girls were fast asleep. Bea had checked to make sure, and my door was still locked.
“No. I told you I want you naked.”
“And I told you I think we should sleep fully dressed with our winter coats, socks, and boots on. That way, if Athena does see us, she won’t think anything’s goin’ on.”
“Would it be so bad if she did?”
“It wouldn’t be the end of the world, no. But I don’t wanna hurt her, Bax. I’ve only been here a week, and I’m leavin’ here once the job is done. Remember? The job in which I work for your brother?”
“Yeah. I remember, but if I told him I really want you, he’d accept it.”
What I’d said gave her pause. Her green eyes roamed my face.
“Would he? I’m not so sure. And besides, how are we gonna have a relationship seven hours away?
” She blushed again. Roses appeared on her cheeks like two full harvest moons, and I rubbed my thumb over the warmth.
“I mean, you didn’t say the word ‘relationship,’ but I’m assumin’ that’s what you meant. But if you just meant sex?—”
“Actually, I wanted to talk to you about that, about the distance.”
“What about it? If you’re about to ask me to give up my job this soon, I’m sorry to tell you, my answer will be no.”
“I wouldn’t do that. And we’re not there anyway, but what if there was a reason for you to stay? A new job?”
“What new job?”
“The guys and Abey and I have talked about buildin’ an inn. We need a boathouse, concession stand, and other buildings. A bunkhouse for the seasonal employees. At least one more barn.”
“And Brand has agreed to build it all?”
“No. I mean, I mentioned the inn idea to him, and he liked it, but no, there’s no official plans yet.”
She swiped at the hair curling against her cheek a little aggressively. “Okay well, when he signs on, you let me know, but until then, my job is in Sheridan. Seven hours away.”
I felt a little bit of a cold front washing over my skin, but the bedroom was burning hot. “Have I made you angry?”
All emotion dissolved from her face. “I’m not angry.”
“You seem a little defensive.”
“Yeah, well maybe ’cause my job is the only thing I have that’s good in my life. And because you have a daughter whose life I don’t wanna fuck up. And maybe ’cause you’re?—”
“I’m what?”
“Still married. At least in your heart.”
Ouch . Bea watched as I collapsed onto my back, and breath escaped my mouth in a huff.
“I’m sorry,” she said, leaning up on her elbow. “But it’s true, isn’t it?”
“It’s actually not. And you’re the reason.”
She scoffed quietly. “How can I be the reason? You barely know me.”
Rolling back on my side, I draped my chest over her hip to grab the sketchpad and flipped it back to the first drawing I’d done of her and turned it so she could see.
Her finger trailed down the image but landed and then hovered over the purple sweatshirt I’d drawn her wearing.
Which was her favorite color, I already knew.
A little lavender piece of braided rope hung from her keychain, and the background image on her phone’s home screen was a photograph of purple wildflowers.
“When you showed up here and I realized I was attracted to you, it hit me. My marriage has been over for a long time. I had no choice in the matter, and because Candy’s dead, I thought that meant I couldn’t move on. Like, it wouldn’t be right for me to ’cause she didn’t get a choice either.
“But now I know the reason she’s not here doesn’t matter. She’s just gone. I’m not, and I can’t keep livin’ like I am. It’s not fair to Athena. It sure as shit ain’t fair to me, and it’s not fair to you.”
Bea stayed quiet for a few minutes, and I watched her processing what I’d said. It was true. It may have taken years too long for me to admit out loud, but it had been true a long time.
Her voice was soft and quiet when she finally spoke.
“I admire you. Maybe it took you a few years to figure things out, but you did. I didn’t.
I stayed in a marriage just ’cause I was afraid not to.
You didn’t get to choose how your marriage ended, but I did, and I didn’t have the guts to end it. Not for a long time.
“What if I make a mistake again? What if the choices I’m makin’ now are mistakes? What if I get stuck again? I don’t think I have it in me to pick up and leave a second time. I’m not sure I’d survive that.”
“You think this is a mistake? You and me?”
“No, I-I didn’t say that.”
“Sounded like you did.”
I rolled on my back, feeling confused and a little defeated. Maybe I was alone in this. Maybe the feelings I’d been having for Bea were one-sided. She was right; it had only been a week, and I’d been out of the game a long time. I’d probably been reading the signals wrong.
“Bax,” she whispered. “This is good, right? This thing between us?”
Why did Bea’s question sound exactly like the one I’d asked my daughter when I was still trying to dissuade her from asking me to change?
“Yeah, really good,” I said. “You have no idea how relieved I am to know I’m capable of feelin’ this way again.”
Apprehensively, she asked, “What way?”
“Attraction. Desire. That I could want someone the way I want you.”
She moved closer and rested her leg over mine. I gripped her thigh and yanked it higher. When I felt her soft skin against my stomach, I grew hard again instantly. To be fair, though, I’d been hard since she stepped foot in my bedroom.
With the palm of her hand, she touched my cheek and turned my head, and we stared at each other for the longest time, just considering the words between us. But when she leaned in to kiss me, I gave in. The confusion didn’t go away, but it fell to the wayside as need filled me back up.
“I want you too,” she whispered into my mouth. “Can’t that be enough for now?”
I didn’t have the answer. Was it enough? I wasn’t a man who had affairs. I’d been built for the long haul, but she was right that we barely knew each other. There were still a lot of things I hadn’t told her, things she’d probably need to know if we did decide to start a relationship.
And some of those things were too fucking hard for me to say.
“Get on your back, sweetheart,” I said. “Spread those thighs for me.”
I flipped her and pinned her wrists to the bed. Sliding down to the end, I dropped my legs over and put all my weight on my left foot, then yanked her ass to the bed’s edge.
Opening her thighs as far apart as they would go, I bent over her, pressing my mouth to the mess we’d made between her legs.
She gasped when I licked her cum onto my tongue and slid two fingers inside her, and she moaned loudly.
This time I covered her mouth with my hand, and then I fucked her, using the end of the bed as my crutch.
Damn my leg and damn the pain. It was just another thing in my life stopping me from doing what I wanted, what I needed . And right now, I needed Bea on her back. I needed to be deep inside her, so deep she’d have no choice but to feel for me.
So deep, she’d scream my name and it would be written on her soul in charcoal.
So deep that when she left, she’d take me with her.
In the morning, Bea jumped in the shower, and I went downstairs for coffee.
The privacy my bedroom afforded was very much worth it, but the stairs were still a bitch for me to navigate.
The PT guy had said I needed to get used to them again anyway, and knowing a closed-door haven for Bea and me existed up there, I wasn’t all that mad at the stairs anymore.
Although, it still took me a year and a half to get to the bottom or climb up.
Athena and Shaylene sat sleepy-eyed on the couch, seemingly oblivious and covered in fuzzy blankets. They’d moved their marathon to the living-room TV, but they barely noticed when I bumbled down the steps.
“Mornin’, Daddy,” Athena said, her mouth open in a yawn, but she didn’t look away from the TV.
“Mornin’, Road Trip. How’d y’all sleep?”
“Good,” both girls said in unison.
“Pancakes okay?” I asked on my way into the kitchen.
“Yeah,” Athena said. “I’ll make ’em after this episode.”
“No, baby, relax. I got it.”
Finally, she looked at me. “ You’re gonna cook? You sure?”
“I think I can manage breakfast today, but get 911 ready on your phone, just in case.” I winked, and she smiled.
Bea had set the coffee to brew late last night since she had to head to the cabins to work today, so while the machine gurgled and percolated, I got two mugs ready and pulled out the milk.
In the sing-song voice Athena usually reserved for when she really wanted me to buy her something, she said, “Oh, Daddy?”
“Oh, Athena?” I sang back.
“Is Bea havin’ breakfast with us too?”
“Uh, yeah,” I said, feeling my cheeks heat and redden. “Think so.”
When I peeked at her, Athena arched an eyebrow at me. She gave me a thumbs-up and smiled, then went back to her show.
Guess that told me what I needed to know about how my daughter felt about the new woman in my life.
Now, I just needed to figure out how I felt about the new woman in my life, and that woman needed to figure it out too.