Chapter 28 Beau
Beau
There’s this thing about being in love that people don’t really tell you about—maybe because it’s a bit hard to explain.
It’s…the comfort. The tedium. The period after the initial thrill, after the adrenaline’s worn off, after you’ve lost that desperate, unstoppable urge to fuck her senseless.
It’s watching her move across a room and knowing she’s yours.
It’s catching her eye and knowing you’re hers.
And it’s still wanting her.
Not like before—not the urgent, teeth-clashing, clothes-half-off kind of wanting.
But the deeper kind. The kind that sits behind your ribs and burns slow.
The kind that creeps in when she laughs under her breath at something you said, or when she stretches in the morning, t-shirt riding up to show just the barest glimpse of skin.
She was working on a new episode, curled up in my hoodie in the big chair she’d set up at her desk.
Her bare legs were tucked under her, mic plugged in, notes scattered on the table.
She had some big headphones on with bat wings on them, reading glasses that made her eyes look huge, the screen reflected in them.
I stood in the doorway of the shop…just watching her.
Enjoying the look of her. Her beauty. Her voice.
“…locals say the knocking started around midnight,” she was saying into the mic, voice smooth, low, professional. “Three distinct raps on the back door. Always the back door. No footsteps. No silhouette. Just the sound, over and over again, until you get up to check—and then it stops.”
I leaned against the doorframe, arms crossed, and let myself smile. She didn’t know I was there yet. Or maybe she did. Noelle had a way of knowing things without turning her head.
“Of course,” she went on, “most of the official reports blame wildlife. Branches. Pipes. But that’s the thing, isn’t it? If it was a pipe, why would it move from house to house? Why only three knocks?”
She clicked something on her laptop, then leaned in closer. The hem of my hoodie slipped off one shoulder.
I nearly groaned.
“Some say it’s the spirit of a woman who froze to death in 1973,” she said. “A widow who got locked out by accident. Others say it’s a cryptid—a mimic. Something that learns your rhythms. Something that knocks in your mother’s voice. Your dog’s bark. Your own laugh.”
She paused to sip hot chocolate from a mug I’d brought her earlier. Then she set it down, squinting at the screen.
I cleared my throat.
She jumped.
“Jesus, Beau,” she said, ripping the headphones off with one hand. “Were you just…standing there?”
“Just admirin’ the view.”
Noelle rolled her eyes, but her mouth curled at the edges. “The view of me looking like a gremlin in gamer headphones and compression socks?”
“You in anything is worth pausing for,” I said, stepping into the room, slow and easy. “But you, sittin’ there tellin’ spooky stories with that smart little tone in your voice? Might be my favorite.”
“Oh my god.”
“No, really. I was learnin’ about knockin’ ghosts and wondering if I should be scared or turned on.”
She pointed at me with her pencil. “If you derail my audio again—”
“What happens?” I asked, crouching beside the chair, brushing her knee with my knuckles. “You gonna punish me?”
She arched a brow. “Tempting.”
“You gonna keep talkin’ about door-knockin’ mimics while I’m under this table?”
Her lips parted. “You wouldn’t.”
I grinned. “You wanna test me?”
She didn’t move fast enough to stop me.
By the time I was on my knees, ducking beneath the table, her chair shifted just a little—legs spreading instinctively. One of her hands dropped to her knee, steadying herself.
Her left hand. The one with the ring.
We weren’t married…not even properly engaged, no more than we’d been the night we saw the Gloamstrider, when I’d been unable to stop myself from putting that ring where it belonged. We’d kept saying we’d give this a week, maybe two. No pressure. No plans.
But one week had spun out into fifty.
And now she’d nearly been here a year, and I was still just as feral for her as the night she first told me she wanted to climb me like a tree.
I pressed my lips to her inner thigh, just above the edge of her sock. Her breath hitched, and her fingers tightened on her knee—but she didn’t stop talking.
“Other versions of the story say the mimic is lonely,” she murmured into the mic, her voice wobbling only slightly. “That it doesn’t know it’s hurting people. That it’s just looking for a way inside.”
I kissed higher. Her skin was warm and soft, and I was starving for her.
“Or maybe it does know,” she said, her voice starting to strain. “Maybe it…oh fuck, Beau—”
I ran my tongue just beneath the hem of her sleep shorts, felt her shiver.
“You can’t make me come while I’m recording,” she hissed, not into the mic this time.
“Can’t, or shoudn’t?” I whispered, nosing the fabric aside.
Above me, she let out a strangled noise, half-choked with laughter and desperation.
And I thought: God, I love this woman.
Everything about her. Her mind. Her mouth. Her voice in my ears, her hands in my hair, her laugh when she tried to pretend she wasn’t already giving in.
“Noelle?” I murmured. “You gonna keep recording? Gotta get your story done before midnight, right?”
Her hand found the edge of the table, gripping it tight. “You’re evil.”
“You knew what you were doin’,” I said, licking a slow stripe along the inside of her thigh. “Sittin’ here in my hoodie, legs bare, talkin’ about ghosts with that sweet little podcast voice of yours. You were beggin’ for distraction.”
She made a noise like she wanted to argue—but I slipped one hand under her hoodie and flattened it over her stomach, holding her still as I finally tasted her properly.
The noise she let out wasn’t safe for broadcast.
I chuckled against her and kept going, slow and greedy, until her hips started to roll and her head hit the back of the chair. She tried to keep quiet. Really tried. But her mic was still hot, and she must’ve realized it, because she reached for the mute button with a shaking hand.
“You better not stop recording,” I warned. “Let all those little cryptid fans hear what happens when you rile me up.”
“Beau,” she groaned, “you’re gonna ruin the whole episode—”
“Guess we’ll have to do another take,” I said, voice thick with want. “Or maybe we just leave it in. Tell ‘em it’s the sound of the mimic gettin’ what it came for.”
“You’re the worst,” she gasped.
“Mm. Maybe.” I eased a finger inside her, then another.
I brought her right to the edge, watching her come apart with a kind of fascination that never faded, even after all this time.
She clamped a hand over her mouth, muffling the worst of it—but her body didn’t lie.
She was trembling, thighs twitching, hips chasing my mouth like she never wanted it to end.
And God help me, I didn’t either.
When she finally sagged back against the chair, boneless and flushed, I crawled up to kiss her—her belly, her ribs, the soft curve of her jaw. She turned her face into me, eyes glazed.
“You’re such a menace,” she whispered.
“Still wanna get back to work?” I asked.
She blinked. “What?”
I reached up and flicked one of the bat wings on her headphones. “Because I could flip you over right now. Bend you over this desk. Keep those socks on.”
Noelle bit her lip.
“Take you nice and slow,” I said, “until you’re so full of me you forget what episode number you were even on.”
She reached back and shut her laptop with one hand.
That was all the permission I needed.
I tugged her to her feet and turned her around, pulling her shorts down just enough to bare her.
Her hands braced on the desk, ass tilted toward me like she’d been waiting for this all damn day.
I dropped my jeans and lined myself up, then paused just long enough to grab her by the hair and make her look at me over her shoulder.
“I love you,” I said.
Her whole expression softened. “I love you too.”
And then I pushed in—slow, deep, a drag that made her whimper, her whole body bowing toward the desk.
I stayed there for a second, just breathing with her.
Just holding that moment between us. Her hands gripped the edge of the desk, knuckles white, back arched into me like her body was trying to fuse with mine.
I bent over her, brushing my lips against her shoulder. “You okay?”
She nodded, breath shaky. “Yeah. God, yeah.”
The sex was good—always had been. But it was this that ruined me. The stillness. The closeness. The weight of her against me and the feel of her wrapped around me like a home I hadn’t known I was searching for. She reached back with one hand, fingers brushing blindly against my hip.
I caught her hand and laced our fingers together, braced it on the small of her back, and started to move.
Her breath hitched every time I bottomed out, her legs shaking under her, her forehead dropping to the desk like it was the only thing keeping her upright.
“Jesus, Beau,” she whispered, voice ragged.
“You feel so fuckin’ good,” I murmured.
She let out a desperate little noise, all broken pride and breathless pleasure, and I knew she was close again. I reached around to press a hand low on her belly, holding her steady while I fucked her deeper, more focused, chasing every soft sound she gave me.
“I got you,” I said. “I’ve always got you.”
She came hard, her whole body trembling, and I barely made it a few more strokes before I followed—hips stuttering, forehead pressed between her shoulder blades, every inch of me strung tight and coming undone inside her.