Chapter 11 Hayes #2
A light flips on inside before I can move an inch forward. Benny’s small silhouette crosses the kitchen, and from the pool, I see her rifling through the pantry fridge, then climbing onto the counter stool and dipping a chip into the salsa. She’s in her jammies.
I affix my gaze back on Layla.
“Thanks for flying me here,” she finally says. “It’ll be a nice getaway from all the . . .” Her hand lifts above the water and gets waved around. “Chaos.”
“You deserve a breather.”
“And a pool,” she adds, lips quirking, meeting my gaze straight on. “It was very kind of you.”
“Kind,” I repeat. “Not a single person has used that word to describe me a day in my fucking life.”
Her smile is punctuated by a small laugh. “I think there’s more to you than you’re willing to admit.”
Oh, I admit plenty.
I admit fame and money don’t touch the parts of me that ache.
I admit I’m bored in a life people would auction their souls to live.
I admit the quiet is the worst—because that’s when the guilt crawls in and reminds me my daughter brushes her teeth, packs her backpack, and loses baby teeth without a mother to cheer for her.
I shake my head. “I don’t know what I’m doing half the time.”
“Welcome to the club.” Her smile is tender now. “The trick is to keep doing it anyway.”
I grunt in reply.
“You’re not as mean as you pretend to be.”
“Mean?”
Layla nods. “Yes. You stomp around grumbling and scowling, but you’re a big softie, aren’t you?”
My head shakes. “No.”
Her laugh is low. Amused. “Grumpy marshmallow.” Her eyes are dancing. “Lightly toasted.”
“Absolutely not.”
She hums. “Soft center. Crispy edge. Very bitable.”
“Muscle isn’t soft.”
“Right, but the part that put out snacks in the kitchen and extra towels in the guest bedroom because a certain someone was coming to visit?” She tilts her head toward the steps, where a neon seahorse leans against the tile. “That’s thoughtful.”
Pfft. Whatever.
She studies my face, something softer slipping through her teasing. “You’re doing fine, you know. With her.”
I almost roll my eyes. “You’ve known us for three days.”
“I’ve seen enough to know she trusts you.” She pauses. “And enough to know you probably don’t always trust yourself.”
I look away, to the squared glow of the kitchen window, to the outline of a kid sitting crisscross on the stool, happily decimating chips, oblivious to the world around her. Carefree.
Pretending to be bored by the pool in order to leave me alone with Layla.
Matchmaking little shit . . . She’s as subtle as a marching band.
I grin, letting my gaze slide back to Layla’s pretty face.
Then she does the craziest thing. The hand she’s kept under the surface finds my wrist, traces the vein there like she’s reading it, then slides to my palm. She turns our hands so our fingers line up, pressing them together. “Let me hold it for a minute.”
“Why?” The words come out rougher than I mean them to, but forgive me if I’m fucking confused right now.
Her eyes lift to mine. “Because I feel like you need human contact.”
Something knocks in my chest.
It shouldn’t matter that she’s touching me—hands touch all the time—but this isn’t casual. If it was, the gesture wouldn’t have shot straight to the places in my body that stay armored. Head. Chest.
Heart.
Her thumb brushes the base of my thumb, a little back-and-forth that steadies the pulse jumping there. “See?” she whispers. “Isn’t that nice?”
Nice? “Sure.”
I lace our fingers instead of pulling away. We float like this, water cradling us, and up close I can see a wet lash clinging to her cheekbone.
The freckles on her nose, even as the sun continues to set behind Camelback Mountain.
Then I do the craziest thing: Pull our hands out of the water. Turn our joined hands and kiss her fingers, slowly, watching her above her knuckles. Her breath hitches, and the little sound she makes . . .
“You keep looking at me like that,” she says, voice dipping. “And I’m going to think you brought me all the way to Arizona so you can flirt with me.”
“I’m not kissing you,” I vow, more to myself than to her.
Her brows rise. “I didn’t think you were going to.”
Good.
Great.
“Just so we’re clear,” I repeat, because my mouth needs a job that isn’t her mouth.
“Crystal,” she whispers, and I feel her sexy voice all the way down to my dick. When she wets her lips, my self-control grinds like bad gears.
“You’re staring,” she says, but it’s almost a question.
“Nope. I’m collecting data,” I manage.
“On?”
“How close I can get to breaking my own rule.” The one where I told myself she was here to spend time with my daughter and not with me, and we were going to leave it at that. The rule where I have no room for a woman in my life.
Too complicated. I don’t need Benny falling in love with her.
So yeah—no contact would be best, but here we are, holding hands.
“How close?” Layla asks. “What’s the margin?”
“Thin.”
“How thin?”
My hand turns, sliding from her fingers up to her wrist, to the inside, where her skin is soft, sensitive, and warm. I rest my thumb there—feeling her pulse quicken. She swallows.
“Hairline,” I murmur.
“Maybe you should . . .” She hesitates. “Test your willpower.”
“That would be kissing.”
Her nod is sage. “That does seem to be a problem.”
I huff a laugh that isn’t a laugh. “It does.”
“Tragic,” Layla teases, hair falling around her shoulders in wet sheets. “A loss for science.”
“For science,” I echo, her pulse tripping as my thumb presses down gently, making slow circles.
We drift closer still, our joined hands a warm weight between us. The pool lights go on, suddenly illuminating the water and painting light over her throat and chest, the hollow there rising and falling as if she’s trying not to pant.
“You’re doing really great, Hayes.”
Hayes.
My name on her lips . . .
“Thanks.” I smile. “So are you.”
Layla tilts her head. “You’re smiling more now than you were in Star Lake.”
True. “I’m relaxed.”