by Celeste, B.
I can’t help but ask, “And Traci? What are her thoughts?”
The smallest curl of his lips appears before disappearing just as quickly. “Not that her thoughts on this matter, but she likes you too. I know she said as much when she saw you.”
I blush.
“Apparently, Nicki has brought you up quite often to her and Jake,” he adds, picking up his burger and taking a bite.
My eyebrows go up.
He chuckles. “You’re cute, honey. I ever tell you that?”
Cute? I shake my head.
“Well, you are. Worried about what Trace will think. I’m happy. I’d like to think you are—” His eyes focus on me like he wants a confirmation, which my smile gives him. “We both know Nicki is. That’s all that matters. Not Traci, not Hunter.” His tone is rougher when he says my ex’s name, and I try not to smile but fail miserably. So, I hide it behind the wrap I pick up and take a bite of.
Fletcher keeps going, making me fall deeper without him even realizing that what he says means so much to me. “Dominic is interested in watching that play. The one about the founding fathers. He must have heard us talking about it.” We had spoken about my love for the musical a time or two when I told him I’d seen it on Broadway years before it came out on a popular streaming service. I still liked putting it on as background noise when I cook and clean and quietly sing along to each number.
My lips part as I lower my food. “We talked about it in class a few times. I’d told them it was a great way for people, younger generations especially, to learn about how our country came to be.”
He makes a humming noise before swallowing another big bite of his lunch. “I think I’d like to see it too.”
The giddiness mixed with shock over that admission, since very few men enjoy watching things like this, overwhelms me. “There are some adult themes to it,” I warn him. “Nothing too graphic, but I thought I’d let you know in case you don’t want him watching that sort of thing. Plus, it’s long. Two and a half hours.”
Nicki has always been great sitting still in class, but there are some days he’s more anxious than others. Wiggling, fidgeting, paying more attention to whatever is happening outside rather than in the classroom.
“It’s about war,” Fletcher chooses to respond with. “Nothing he hasn’t heard about in his lifetime. But hopefully nothing he has to experience in it either. I imagine that’s vital to this play, right? The hope that surfaces after the battle is over.”
Fletcher has no clue that those words trigger something inside me that makes me wish we weren’t sitting in my classroom.
That’s why I put down my chicken wrap, reach over until my fingers dance along his arm, and say, “I’m ready.”
Two words.
So many different meanings.
But Fletcher knows exactly which I mean when his eyes flare with heat.
Dominic falls asleep using Admiral as a pillow on the living room floor halfway through the second act. Fletcher watches his son with a content smile on his face, his body eased on the couch with an arm thrown around my shoulders and my body pressed against his.
He hasn’t said anything about the play.
Nothing bad.
Nothing good.
But I can tell that he doesn’t mind it. He hasn’t looked at his phone once or done anything that makes it seem like he’s bored. He even asks a few questions about the accuracy of the storyline, which I happily indulge both boys on since I did plenty of research on the creation of the plot in comparison to what really happened.
When I was done rambling, he’d made only one comment about it. “Creative liberties, then.” There was no judgment in his tone. He even sounded impressed.
After the credits start rolling, I move away from Fletcher and look at the time. Nibbling my lip, I debate on what to do. Say goodnight? Wait for him to suggest otherwise? We haven’t talked about sleepovers. Considering this is the first time I’ve spent with both Millers in their domain, I’m feeling uneasy.
“Let me put him to bed,” he prompts, standing and stretching after sitting still for so long while I used him as a human cushion. When he lifts his arms, a sliver of his stomach appears, along with the thin trail of hair leading somewhere, I’d like to see again. His eyes catch my gaze, and a smug smirk tugs up the corners of his lips until I quickly look away.
“Stay put, yeah?” he adds, once his son is perched in his arms, cradled against his chest. Then, with one hand holding his son to him, he reaches down where I sit on the edge of the couch and brushes his knuckles lightly against my cheek. “Want to see you when I come back down.”
I give him a small nod and watch his big frame disappear up the stairs. It’s only then I get up and stretch my own legs, flattening my clothes out and taming the frizzy hair that’s gone wild since I put it down when I got here. I look at the various pictures hanging up on the walls and resting on the shelves. Pictures of Dominic and Fletcher together, some with Nicki and Admiral when they were both much younger, and images of a younger Fletcher in a uniform.
My fingertips graze the picture frame, drawn to the seriousness behind the glass. He’s standing tall, posture straight, face neutral, and looking away from the camera. I don’t know who took the candid shot, but whoever it was caught him lost in thought if his stance is any indication.
Taking the frame from the shelf, I brush off the dust from the side with the pad of my thumb. Most of the others are clean, but not this one. If I had to guess, I’d say it was intentionally missed.
I don’t know how long I was staring at it before I hear, “It’s amazing how time changes people, huh.”
Startling, I nearly drop the frame. “Geez. I didn’t even hear you come downstairs.” I put the frame back where it was. “Sorry, I was just looking. I haven’t spent much time in here to get a good look at these.”
When I’m at his house, we spend most of our time in the kitchen or dining room, depending on what’s going on. Sometimes, we’ll sit and talk in the living room, but not long enough for me to study the trinkets and images on the shelves since my eyes rarely trail from him.
“You don’t need to apologize.” He comes up beside me and stares at the picture I was examining. “I was thirty when that was taken. It feels like a lifetime ago, though.”
Amusement kicks up my lips. “That was only twelve years ago, Fletcher. That’s hardly a lifetime.” The look on his face is pained, like his memories hitting him while he looks at his younger self says otherwise. “But, I suppose, when people have gone through what you have, it probably feels like more than a lifetime.”
His eyes shift down to me. “Did he ever talk about it?”
I know who he’s talking about, but not what he’s referring to. “Did he talk about what?”
“Being overseas?”
Blinking, I trail my hand down his arm until our fingers link, then bring him back over to the couch so we can sit. “No, Hunter never said anything about it. It wasn’t like he saw any action, or he probably would have bragged.”
A heavy look shadows over his features as he sinks into the cushion and puts our hands on his thigh. “Soldiers who see the real action never brag,” he tells me grimly. His throat clears. “Did you know I served five tours overseas? Three in Iraq and two in Afghanistan. The things we saw were nothing I’d ever want to repeat to anybody, to save them from the burdens we were faced with after getting out.”
If he served that many tours… “You must have experienced hell.”
His breath is slow, steady. “Sometimes I think hell would have been easier than what happened over there.”
My heart breaks for him as his fingers squeeze mine to remind him where he is. Not there. Here. With me.
Distant eyes moving to me, he gives me a small, empty smile. “You don’t have to look at me like that, honey. Some men and women went through far worse than I did. Some of them didn’t make it back like I was lucky enough to.”
As true as that may be, it d
oesn’t make me ease the grip I have on his hand. “I can’t imagine what you must have gone through, but for what it’s worth, I’m glad you’re here.”
He leans over and presses a kiss against the corner of my mouth, then softly brushes his lips against mine. Finally, he draws back and leans his forehead against mine, his heavy exhale caressing my nose and mouth before pressing another kiss against my cheek.
“When did you retire?”
With one more peck against my lips, he sits back and gazes down at our hands. “I’d started the process after Traci told me she was pregnant. I was debating on doing it for a while. I was…tired. Damn tired at that point, Stevie. My body, my mind, they weren’t suited for the lifestyle anymore, for the things expected of me by my colleagues and country. And when I heard I’d be a father, it seemed like the perfect time to step down. Let myself breathe again. Be the best man I could be, the healthiest, for my son or daughter.”
As he speaks, my cheek rests against his shoulder, watching as his thumb brushes the back of my hand in slow strokes.
“I’m glad I left,” he continues quietly, something warm brushing against the crown of my skull. His lips, I realize, as he talks. “If I didn’t, who knows where I’d be now. I’m not sure I could give my all to Dominic or even a fraction of what I owed Traci. She never asked me for anything, not even when she told me about the pregnancy test being positive. Trace never expected me to do a damn thing about it, and that crushed a part of me. Made me want to try ten times harder to prove to her I’d take care of both of them.”
It’s good he can’t see my face because I’m definitely not making a good one. He must guess as much because those lips trail to my temple, where they press another kiss. “Like you, I don’t hold any torches for my ex. You have nothing to worry about.”
I know that, and I’m sure if I looked I’d see the same cocky smile on his face knowing I’m just as jealous over the same topic. “You don’t need to tell me that,” I assure him.
“Mm. But sometimes it’s nice to be told there’s nobody else that could compare,” is his reply, and I hear the smile in his voice.
I look up, chin resting where my cheek was on his shoulder. “You’re right. And in case I didn’t get my point across already, I wanted to let you know that there is absolutely nothing you need to worry about with me and Hunter.”
Another noise vibrates from his throat. “I’m seeing that.”
“Can I ask you something?” I ask him. His silence tells me to continue. “Do you believe in love at first sight?”
He remains quiet for a long stretch of time. The only sounds that fill the room are our steady breathing and the refrigerator running on the other side of the wall. When he does answer, it makes the organ in my chest squeeze. “I want to tell you yes and make a big statement about the first time I ever met you, but I’d be lying. You were on another man’s arm. His wife. And no matter the natural beauty you have, then and now, the way you’ve always carried yourself, always smiled at everybody no matter who they were, and brought light into those people’s lives, I was never going to look at you beyond that. Not when you were with him. Not when I had no right to.”
My heart pounds so hard I can feel it thumping in my ears.
He finishes me off with two sentences. “If love at first sight existed, there is no doubt I would have fallen deeply in it with you. No matter how wrong.”
I stare at him.
Unblinking.
Breath caught in my throat, I force out a choked version of his name. I barely even understand it, but he reacts all the same, like he can, nonetheless.
I want to say the words.
I love you.
I want to tell him how much he means to me. Because his response means more to me than anything I could have conjured in my imagination.
But he doesn’t let me get the chance to when he says, “I know, baby. Me too. You don’t have to say it now. Not yet. Not until you’re ready.”
Done.
So done with this man and his words and the way he looks at me like I’m the only woman on this planet. It seems impossible, but the second those eyes land on me, the possibilities are endless.
“I told you I was ready the other day…”
Yesterday, to be exact.
But the man sitting beside me simply kisses my cheek, then my jaw, one side of my mouth, then the other, before saying, “I want nothing more than to take you upstairs, strip you bare, and hear you moan my name and clench my cock, baby girl. But I don’t want you to be quiet, to hold back, because of Nicki. If you’ll wait a little longer, then this weekend…”
Fire burns through my blood at his words, so much so that I almost groan over him making me wait.
He chuckles at my obvious distaste over the thought. “If you’re quiet enough,” he bargains, eyes burning with the same need mine must hold, “I’ll make you feel good, ease the pressure until then.”
And with his mouth, hands, and fingers, he does just that to me on the couch, muffling what noises I can’t hold back with his hand and then his lips.
My body is happily sated.
My inner thighs blissfully sore from the rough bristles of his beard.
When we do go upstairs to bed, we sleep.
Only sleep.
It’s the best night’s sleep I’ve gotten in a long, long time.
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
Bex walks over to where I’m standing in front of the mirror and gives me a motherly smile that I’ve seen her give her two kids. I haven’t had time to speak much to either of them, but her daughter is the spitting image of Bex with the same welcoming, warm personality as her mother, and her son has the same dedication and family loyalty as she does. Seeing the three of them together, exchanging stories over coffee and whatever food her daughter brings home with her from school, always makes me smile, especially when her daughter brings me brownies since her mother apparently talks so much about me to them.
“You look beautiful,” she tells me, putting her hands on my shoulders and squeezing.
I flatten my palms down the front of the black belted wrap dress and lean my head against the side of hers when she leans in and rests her chin on my shoulder. “You don’t think it’s too much? It’s pretty fancy.”
“Does it make you feel pretty?” she asks.
I nod.
“Do you feel confident in it?”
Another nod from me.
“Do you think Fletcher will be wiping drool off his chin the second he sees you in it?”
This time, I grin. Fletcher has seen me in dresses before, but none of them look like the high-low hem one I’m wearing now. The dresses, skirts, and other clothes he’s complimented me in are all for work. Nothing showy or too expensive. Most of the time, he sees me in jeans and a slightly fitted T-shirt or blouse, and occasionally, whatever pajamas I’m too lazy to change out of on the weekends.
And, in hindsight, he’s seen me in far less too. Multiple times. Whether half-dressed with his head between my legs or fully nude with his fingers trailing between my thighs as my hand works his cock. We’ve had plenty of stolen moments where Fletcher has gotten me bare in some form or another with a wicked grin on his face while doing it.
My neighbor laughs. “Then I don’t think it’s too much. I think it’s perfect. Us women need to knock a man off his feet once in a while, and I have no doubt this number will do just that.”
She pats my shoulder before holding up her fingers, disappearing from the dressing area of the store where we’re shopping before coming back with a pair of strappy black heels. When she passes them to me, I see they’re the right size and quickly shoot her an appreciative smile.
“It’s been forever since I treated myself to new clothes,” I admit, sitting to slide the dressy shoes on. The heels aren’t too high or too thin, both good things since my clumsiness knows no bounds. “It feels strange.”
She must sense the slight guilt to my tone over going on a shopping spree for
something as vain as a dress and shoes for the date Fletcher and I are going on tonight because she says, “You deserve it, Stevie. Self-care is important. We all have to treat ourselves to something that makes us feel good once in a while.”
Though true, I can’t help but sigh. “I know you’re right, but all I can think about is what I could be spending the money on instead.”
My house is mostly all set up with furniture. It could use more décor to cover the bare walls, but as time goes on, little things like pictures taken or drawings that Dominic or other students have given me are hung throughout the house. My kitchen has turned into a beautiful oasis of various houseplants, livening up the space. And since Fletcher has taken over my lawn care, including shoveling and salting whenever the snow and ice comes, and promising he’ll mow the grass when spring graces us for more than a day at a time, I’m saving money on the service I’d been hiring since I moved over six months ago.
I shouldn’t beat myself up over buying new outfits considering most of my work wardrobe came from secondhand shops and clearance racks. I didn’t exactly spend a fortune on the things I wear at school, so the few times I buy brand new items won’t break the bank.
“Enough about me.” I stand and examine the outfit fully, tilting my foot and smiling at the final result. “How are you and Sexy Santa doing?”
Her cheeks turn pink. “His name is Todd,” she tells me, giving me a tiny laugh before giving me a once over. “And he’s fine, I’m sure. We decided it wasn’t going to work out.”
“Oh, I’m sorry.” I frown, wishing I’d asked sooner. Last I heard, which has probably been a month or more, they’d been seeing each other at least once a week. Sometimes twice. “I know you liked him.”
She pats the hand I put on hers. “It’s okay, Stevie. It was me who called things off. He’s a nice man, but it was becoming…too much.”
My brows pinch. “What do you mean? If you don’t want to talk about it, I understand. Heaven knows you’ve listened to all my woes. But I’m here if you want to talk.”