Chapter 203 Callum #2
Aurélie shifted, the hem of her romper whispering against her thighs.
My brain derailed for a second, replaying the way those thighs had parted so perfectly for me on the kitchen counter less than half an hour ago.
The way she’d gone boneless in my arms, eyes glazed, lips swollen.
The way she was commando under that damn thing, and I hadn’t stopped thinking about it since I put it on her.
Focus.
“Rule three,” Aurélie said, picking up the proverbial baton.
Her voice went light, effortless, but I could hear the steel underneath.
“No bringing work drama to the dinner table. We are happy to strategize, plot revolution, and plan our hostile takeover of the paddock—but in designated hours only. Tonight is not those hours. If anyone says ‘contract’, ‘FIA’, ‘Orion’, or ‘Henric’ over the pasta, they are doing the dishes.”
“Or, in Marco’s case, sleeping on the terrace,” I added.
“I feel targeted,” Marco said.
“You are,” she and I said at the same time.
Lucy snorted, then clapped a hand over her mouth like she wasn’t sure if she was allowed.
I turned my attention to her for a moment, taking in the way she hovered near the edge of the group, shoulders braced like she expected to be yelled at any second. Poor thing had spent the last year being turned into a brand and a symbol and a headline. I knew that look. I’d worn it.
“Rule four,” I said, eyes on her now. “No one here has to be on. Not for each other. If you need to tap out, you say so. No one guilt-trips you for going home early, or staying in, or needing time alone.”
Lucy’s shoulders dropped a centimeter. “Even if I’m the one who flew across an ocean to be here?” she asked.
“Especially then,” Aurélie said. “You’re allowed to be off-duty.”
Gratitude flickered across Lucy’s face. “Okay,” she said quietly. “I can do that.”
“Last rule,” I said. “You will witness a truly unhealthy amount of affection. You will keep your comments to a minimum.”
Marco scoffed. “Define unhealthy.”
“She has no panties on,” I admitted calmly. “How much further do you want me to go?”
A chorus of noises hit the entry at once.
“Fraser!” Ivy gasped.
“Oh my God,” Lucy squeaked, eyes flying to Aurélie’s legs like she could see through fabric.
Kimi pinched the bridge of his nose.
Marco beamed. “This is already my favorite trip we’ve ever taken.”
Aurélie elbowed me in the ribs, eyes wide. “Cal,” she hissed, mortified and secretly, darkly amused because I could feel it sparking through her. “You are not allowed to weaponize my commando status against our guests.”
“Then perhaps you shouldn’t have slapped my arse and run,” I murmured back. “Actions, consequences, mon amour.”
Her mouth curled, betraying her, and I had to bite back a grin. God, I loved riling her up. Loved that beneath the embarrassment and the nerves, there was always this thread of giddy, ridiculous joy when we did stupid shit together.
“To Callum’s point, if you don’t want to hear or see anything, I suggest you leave. We do not kink-shame here, and since this is our well-earned vacation, we will be doing what we want, when we want, where we want.”
She turned back to the others, recovering like the professional she was.
“The villa only has two spare bedrooms,” she said, slipping into host mode.
“You may stay in them for tonight only so you have time to find nearby accommodations for the remainder of our time here. There are fresh linens, towels, and a small sign that reminds you to drink water and use sunscreen. Pick your rooms but please, do not tear each other’s heads off. ”
I chuckled and looked over at her. She glowered at our friends in a way that made me want to wither away.
“But first—” She tipped her head toward the kitchen, her messy waves swaying. “I have pasta on the stove that I nearly died for, so I’d really appreciate it if you all pretended to be impressed.”
She said it lightly, but it landed like a stone in my chest. She wasn’t being dramatic.
Between the staged crash, the blood, the miscarriage, the weeks after Silverstone where I’d thought I might lose her to the sport or the grief or both, the fact that she was standing in our kitchen alive and bossy and worrying about pasta felt like a fucking miracle.
I watched their faces as she said it. None of them knew what happened after we retreated into the French countryside.
But judging by their reactions, they knew enough to not press.
Ivy’s expression flickered at the word died.
The way Kimi’s jaw tightened, barely noticeable unless you knew him.
The way Marco’s cocky posture softened, just for a second, before he pasted on another grin.
Lucy heard it too, even if she didn’t know the story. Her eyes went warm and determined.
These were our people. Flawed, loud, occasionally idiotic. But they came to our rescue before we even knew we needed it.
I let out a long breath. “Right,” I announced, clapping my hands once. “Shoes are off, rules are established, sexcation status has been disclosed. Any questions?”
“Yeah,” Marco said. “Where’s the wine?”
“In the kitchen, where civilized people congregate,” I said. “Try not to trip over your own ego on the way.”
He clutched his heart again. “He’s so mean to me,” he told Lucy. “You see this? This is bullying.”
“Pretty sure this is just… friendship,” Lucy said, lips quirking.
“Close enough,” Kimi murmured, steering them toward the kitchen. I noticed that not a single time did they get further than two feet apart.
They all moved toward the main room noisily, voices overlapping, complaints and jokes bouncing off the walls. I let them go ahead, hanging back in the entry with my fiancée for one more beat.
She exhaled slowly, watching them go. Her fingers flexed at her sides, a small, unconscious movement that told me more than any scale could.
“Scale,” I said quietly, wrapping an arm around her waist. “Still an eight?”
She glanced up at me, eyes bright. “Holding steady,” she said. “Maybe… eight and a half.”
I smiled, something warm and fierce cracking open inside my chest. “Good girl.”
Her pupils blew just a tiny bit wider. Fuck. I was going to be useless all night. I’d gotten so used to just taking her whenever, wherever, that this was going to be a challenge for me.
“Come on,” I said, curling my hand around the back of her neck, thumb pressing into the spot that always made her lean into me. “Let’s feed the animals.”
“Just wait until we drop the news of the wedding,” she whispered, melting into my side.
We walked down the hallway together. I could hear Marco already rifling through the cupboards like he owned the place, Ivy telling him to stop touching things, Kimi asking where the wine opener was, Lucy making a soft, awed sound as she caught sight of the view through the terrace doors.
The villa opened up around them, all white walls and pale wood and that endless stretch of darkening sea.
The kitchen light spilled golden over the countertops, over the pot on the stove, over the candle I’d lit under the guise of “ambience, not romance,” as if those were ever separate things with us.
As if everything in this place wasn’t a shrine to the fact that I was utterly, irreversibly gone for the woman at my side.
She peeled away from me to head for the stove, slipping back into her role as chef like she hadn’t been shaking around my fingers not that long ago. I watched her walk for a second, the sway of her hips, the way the romper skimmed the curve of her ass.
Yeah. Feral was one word for it.
I dragged a hand over my face. Focus, Fraser. I needed to keep her bubble intact first. Then I could think about how to get her back on the counter.
“Oi,” Marco said, snapping his fingers near the breadboard. “Host with the most, you promised carbs and trouble. Where is the wine?”
Aurélie shot me a smirk over her shoulder, wooden spoon in hand. “He needs his own bottle, baby. I like when Marco’s inhibitions are in the wind,” she mused.
I stepped up behind her, bracing a hand on the counter near her hip, claiming my territory with a casualness I did not feel.
“Careful, mo chridhe,” I murmured, low enough that only she could hear.
“Keep talking like that and I’ll give them a live demonstration of why you haven’t put knickers on all day. ”
She swallowed a laugh, shoulders shaking. “You wouldn’t,” she whispered back.
“Try me,” I said.
Her eyes flashed. Heat, mischief, love. All of it, just for me. Then she cleared her throat. “D’accord. Secretly I just want to see what an intoxicated Marco does to Ivy’s nerves.”
“Hey!” Ivy protested, slipping onto a barstool, aghast. “I had to sit next to him on both flights the entire time. My nerves are already shot.”
I reached for the wine cooler, keeping one hand on Aurélie’s hip as I pulled out one bottle to set it on the counter, then another.
Let them be here. Let them laugh and eat and crowd our kitchen.
They’d walked into our island. Our bubble. Our rules.
And over my dead body was I letting anyone—paparazzi, teams, or well-meaning friends—take this from her again.
“Well, they’re about to get worse,” Aurélie shot back, and I grinned, knowing where this was going.
Her right hand stirred the sauce while I slid the bottles across the counter toward Kimi, who held the wine opener.
He immediately got to work while Marco pulled four wine glasses out of the cupboard.
Mine and Aurélie’s were still on the counter from earlier.
I strained the noodles as our friends gathered around the breakfast bar expectantly, their glasses full of the inky Naxos red I’d promised earlier—cherries and trouble swirling in crystal.
Aurélie stopped stirring and grabbed my wrist, hauling me into her side. Then she dropped the bomb.
“Before we eat,” she said, lifting her voice just enough to cut through the chatter, “we have one more rule.”