Sofia’s mouth dropped open. “I didn’t recognize you without your cello case.” She smiled at the nice guy who’d given her a gentle kiss outside a coffeehouse in New York City. “Hi, Nathan.”
Nathan Swanson came forward and hugged her. “Hi, Sofia.”
“Hi,” Joss and Paget, and some of the customers, said in unison.
He was a looker, and his startled What kind of Narnia did I walk into? expression was charming.
“What are you doing here?” Sofia asked after she introduced him to her coworkers.
“I’m road-tripping with some friends this summer. We’re on our way to Wellfleet, but I remembered you said you were moving to Cape Cod and I looked you up. We’re checking out the lighthouse and the Ferris wheel, after here.” His green eyes caught on a double-ended dildo and he nervously scratched his neck. “So this is really your place, huh? My friends are going to lose their minds in here. I’ll make sure they come through before we head out of town.”
Then he watched her with uncertainty through a haze of silence.
“Um, so, Nathan, can I help you find anything?”
The nudge appeared to startle him, and he dragged in a sharp breath that made her suspect he was gathering courage. “Look, I had an amazing time at the coffeehouse…Do you want to do that again? Or maybe we can have dinner tonight?”
A date. She was being asked on a date. The last man who’d taken her out was Burke, and she hadn’t seen him since the Fourth. The Xs on her desk calendar marked twelve days since his departure.
He wasn’t far away, in Boston working the shipyard, but she respected his plea for time to sort out his shit. Waiting was hard, but rejection was bitter. They were two unfortunate sides of the same coin.
In front of her was Nathan Swanson, a man who played the cello and kissed hesitantly and was presenting her with a third option: toss the coin away.
“Dinner tonight.” She was in love with someone else. But twelve days ago he’d shut down on her and let her leave the marina in grief. She was free to share a meal with Nathan Swanson, welcome to smile at him under the streetlights, at complete liberty to let him begin to mend the frayed edges of her spirit—something Burke had left in tatters. “There’s a little fish-and-chips place that has a dance floor. Practically nowhere to sit, and you’re going to have to shower off the smell, but I really feel like dancing.”
“If this fish-and-chips dinner and dancing goes well,” Nathan said, “what then?”
“When are you leaving Eaves?”
“Depends on the reason I’d have to stick around. What time can I pick you up?”
“Nine thirty.” That would allow time to count out the register and muster some enthusiasm. There was a difference between being free to move on and wanting to. “So…tonight, then.”
The bell announced his exit and moments later Paget moseyed over, wearing a black tank dress and sporting an incredulous glint in her smudge-lined eyes. “Sofia, what are you doing?”
“Changing a bulb in this lamp.” Another few screws and the shade filled with light over a selection of panties.
“I mean about that man who was just here. The one you’re having dinner with tonight. What about Burke Wolf?”
“Burke Wolf isn’t here.” But she couldn’t stamp his name on her heart and loan it out to someone else, and she knew Paget was thinking the same thing. “I don’t know if Burke…”
“What is it?” Paget gently patted her arm.
“What point is there to loving a man who’s not here? It’s crazy.” Conversation done, she strode to the back to trash the blown bulb and to regroup alone.
The entry bell wailed, the sound so alarming that she immediately flew from the back and rushed through Vices to investigate the commotion as a couple burst into the boutique.
Activity had slowed and the smattering of customers all whirled around.
McGuinty Slattery, his arm flung around Caro’s shoulders—What?—announced, “Yo, ladies! Hannah’s in labor.”
“Evan’s sleeping over at a friend’s tonight, so I’m heading to the hospital with McGuinty,” Caro volunteered. Was she oblivious to the three women staring at her with their eyebrows practically kissing their hairlines?
“Abe’s already at Community. When he called he said Hannah was freaking out because her water broke at the restaurant.”
Yup, Sofia could see why a restaurant owner might be nervous about customers’ reaction to embryonic fluid on the floor. “McGuinty, wait.” She came forward as Joss and Paget continued to shoot Caro expectant glances. “Hannah told me her due date. The babies are two weeks early.”
He nodded, exchanging a concerned look with Caro. “We know. Abe said he’s not focusing on what can go wrong. If we want to get caught up in what-ifs, let them be positive ones.”
“Mm-hmm,” Caro agreed. “Like, what if both babies are girls and Abram’s completely outnumbered?” She smiled at McGuinty, who returned an appreciative grin of his own.
What was this connection? And when had it happened? Caro hadn’t mentioned that something had changed in their dynamic, hadn’t confessed to caving under the temptation of McGuinty’s solemn strength, sexy copper-colored beard, and burly smolder.
“You guys mind if I split?” Paget asked, taking inventory of their customers. “I’d love to see Hannah before everyone else descends on the hospital.”
“Go,” Sofia said. “I’ll take care of things here, then I’ll be along.”
“And I’ll hang with you,” Joss said. “We can close up shop for an hour or so to visit.”
“C’mon with us,” McGuinty offered to Paget. “Save that tin can with a steering wheel some gas.”
“Quit knocking my ride. It’s a classic.” Paget pretended to deck him, but he simply secured his other arm around her and gave both women a squeeze.
When they left, Sofia and Joss handled the remaining customers before flipping the sign to CLOSED.
With no eavesdroppers within earshot, Sofia turned to her friend. “Not that Caro’s obligated to keep us updated on her sexy-times status, but…”
Joss smirked. “Think she’s given up playing Penelope?”
“Penelope?”
“A character in Homer’s The Odyssey. She kept her honeypot locked, a no-fuck zone, until her one true man, Odysseus, found his way back to her.” She tilted her head. “What? You look puzzled.”
“Nope, I remember The Odyssey from high school English. It’s just that I’ve never heard anyone sum up Penelope’s story like that.” Sofia gave it a thought. “Who do you think Caro’s holding out for? Or was holding out for?”
“Anyone’s guess. But who’s without secrets? We should respect hers.”
Sofia grabbed their purses from the back, considering the almost defensive note in Joss’s voice. But who’s without secrets?
What were hers?
*
They picked up several coffees on the way to Community. The little shop was already abuzz with chatter about Hannah Slattery making a splash in the kitchen of her fancy restaurant. Thankful to collect the order without the barista engaging her in You heard the chef at Hot Dish broke her water while she was cooking, didn’t you? gossip, Sofia reached the hospital in great time to get in, say hello, and scoot before Hannah’s large family arrived from the mainland and things became really chaotic.
In the labor-and-delivery waiting area, people swooped down on the drinks Sofia and Joss held, leaving the carriers empty before Abram reached them.
“Eight was supposed to be plenty,” Sofia said, baffled.
The man must have been six-plus feet of taut nervousness, but he laughed easily, issuing one-armed hugs to her and Joss. “It’s all right. Thanks, though.”
“How’re you holding up?” she asked when Joss took the carriers to dump them. “How’s the wife?”
“Hannah’s fantastic. The OB says she’s doing great and the babies are, too.” He casually scanned the room. “C’mere for a sec.”
“Sure.” They stopped in a wide hall that was surprisingly sedate for a hospital section that housed at least one patient in active labor.
“Hannah didn’t want to know the sex of the babies early, begged me to promise I wouldn’t go poking around to find out, either. A nurse was talking…Girls. Daughters.”
Sofia squealed, then pinched her lips. “Sorry.”
“Don’t be. I’m just…It’s unreal. But it is real. And I’m not making a damn bit of sense.”
“Congratulations, Abram.” The tears—well, they had to be from a place of overwhelming joy, though something inside her sighed wistfully as it sometimes did when she watched Caro with her son or other mommies and daddies with their children. Curiosity and envy could imitate each other if they caught a person at the right moment. “I think your girls are going to be lucky to have you and Hannah. Is it fine if I pop in to say hi?”
After visiting a sweaty and tense Hannah, who appeared remarkably tiny wrapped in tubes and attached to monitors, she slipped to the waiting room and sat beside a familiar friend. “Hey, Grandpa. Or should we start calling you Great-Grandpa?”
Niall Slattery squeezed her hand. “Still Grandpa.” He glanced at her with fatigued eyes and released a forlorn sigh. “Thinking about my Amy, and the boys’ parents. I picked out chairs for them. John and Luna would sit there by the pop machine. Amy would sit where you’re sitting, next to me.”
Sofia wasn’t his Amy, but she rested her head against his arm the way she imagined his late wife might’ve. He’d endured so much loss, yet seemed to have immeasurable love and goodwill in reserve. “I like to think they’re here, even if they’re not sitting in these chairs. You’re going to spoil those babies, aren’t you?”
Chuckling, Niall didn’t answer and she knew she’d pegged him exactly right.
As more visitors began to fill the room, Sofia called Nathan the cellist to cancel dinner, then she drifted from one conversation to another, and when McGuinty stepped out to drive Paget back to the boutique, Sofia snatched an opportunity to ask Caro a question: “What’s going on with McGuinty?”
“What?”
“Are you guys in a good place now, or…?”
“He brought me camellias, to the bar.” She shrugged. “There was a time when all a man like him would have to do is smile at me and I’d sit on his face. Now there’s every reason to pass him up.”
“Uh, first, you gave me a super-inappropriate visual, considering we’re in a hospital waiting for two precious babies to be born. Second, if you want to be with him, then be with him.”
“Sofia, it’s not that simple.”
“It is.”
“Oh?” Caro shrugged. “All right, then, love. Tell him that.”
She turned around. Burke.
He was here, and her pulse rushed faster the longer she stared at his lean muscle and messy brown hair and that scruffy jaw she’d missed touching.
“Hey, Sofia. Caro.” So nonchalant, as if he’d forgotten he reflected everything she loved and hated about herself, as if he didn’t know that missing him was breaking the heart that had saved her life.
Caro acknowledged him with a smile and disappeared around a corner. Where was she going? Where was Joss? Weren’t friends supposed to back each other up in times of man-crisis?
“I came through to see Abe and Hannah, but it’s go time.” Staff had cleared the room of visitors, save for Hannah’s mother and husband. “I’m going to take off.” But there was hesitation as he patted his pockets, and she tried to capture it.
“Uh—um—” she stammered, struggling for something to say that would keep him here, with her. “Are you searching for something?”
He plucked out his keys from those criminally perfect-fitting jeans, and his muscles moved in cruelly sexy harmony as he freed his phone. “I found it already.”
Why couldn’t he put the phone down instead of walking away, gesturing that he was headed to a cell-friendly part of the building?
Why didn’t he know by now that no one loved him the way she did? Other women might make him laugh harder or burn hotter, but no one could love him better.
“We should get going,” Joss said, approaching. “What’s the matter? Is Hannah—”
“Burke’s here. I mean, I don’t know where he is this minute, but I saw him.”
“And did you two talk?”
Talk led them in circles, provoked them to sidestep each other. So they wouldn’t talk. Sofia started for the corridor. “It wasn’t the right time before, but it’s going to happen.”
*
Entering Blush with a pounding heart but not a hint of anxiety inside her, Sofia shopped. Midnight-blue bustier with white piping. Matching V-string panty. Sheer stockings.
“One other thing,” she said to Paget, who stood at the register with saucerlike amber-green eyes, frozen when she was supposed to be scanning the items and laying them in a shopping bag. She set down a smooth plastic bottle. Champagne-flavored lube.
After closing the boutique for the night, she settled Tish in the apartment, changed and freshened up, and when she still hadn’t second-guessed herself, she cinched her long white sweater, slid into the driver’s seat of the Lexus, and set course for the marina.
There were no fireworks in the sky entertaining the pier tonight. Only thick shadowed clouds lazing over dark water as she dialed Burke’s phone number.
“Sofia?”
“Hi, Burke. The reception’s not the best here on the marina, is it?”
“You’re here?”
She hung up and dropped the phone into her purse. The hem of the sweater brushed her thighs and her stiletto heels struck the planks with determination.
Burke emerged from his boat, alarmed. “Are you okay?”
“I have a question. May I?” She gestured to the boat. May I step on board? May I ride you until dawn? May I have a place in your life forever?
“Yeah.” He guided her to the main saloon. “What’s your question?”
“Can we last one night without hurting each other?” She loosened her sweater and the soft white fabric slipped over her shoulders and down her arms.
Burke’s lips parted, and, frowning, he let his gaze sweep her from elegantly bunned hair to bustier to sheer stockings—pausing below her waist. The V-string was sheer, too.
“I can fuck you senseless—and Jesus, do I want to,” he said, his harsh voice scraping the air, “but I can’t promise it’d fix anything. Odds are it’ll stir up more complications.”
“Sex isn’t about fixing stuff, not for us. It’s about telling each other things we deserve to hear,” she said wearily. “A one-night truce. If we can’t keep the hell away for just one night, then we’re weaker together than we are apart. If we can make it through, though, then that means everything.”
“Truce.”
Truce. It was going to happen, now, and anticipation slammed her.
He knocked the bunched sweater from her wrists and the thing soundlessly hit the floor.
She thought she might loop her arms around him, but he spun her and grinded his hips against her. She felt his stiffening cock through his jeans and all the lights went on inside her.
Wake up, her body chimed. Now’s the time. It’s him. It’s always been him.
With certainty, he turned her again and began unlacing her bustier.
“I missed you,” she whispered as the garment became slack around her and started to slip.
The interior light caught the glint of emotion brightening in his eyes. “I missed you every damn day. At the hospital, when I said I found what I was searching for? It was you.”
A hard tug, and the bustier joined her white sweater. Burke lifted her; she locked her legs around his waist and the next thing she knew, her bare skin was encountering the cool softness of his bed.
Standing at the foot of the bed, he shed his clothes and let her take in the details. On closer inspection she noticed his markings—not the collection of tattoos but faded sc
ars.
She held out her hand and when his fingers linked with hers, she pulled him down. In stockings and the V-string, she was almost naked, but she wanted total nudity. Nothing hidden, nothing enhanced.
Honesty.
“Last time we forgot a condom, Sofia.”
“This time I didn’t. There’s one in each of my stockings, more in my purse. There’s also lube, but I think right now you can see for yourself that I’m ready for this.”
“This?”
“You. I’m ready for you to”—she pried off one stocking—“fuck”—then the other—“me”—then the V-string—“senseless.”
He leaned over her, kissing her, spiraling his gifted tongue the way she liked, nipping her bottom lip the way she needed him to. He worked his way downward, playing with her breasts, oh-so-gently fastening his teeth around her nipples. Each zing of pleasure had her gripping anything she could find—his hair, his biceps, the sheets.
“Oh…” she moaned from somewhere deep when he teased. “Oh my…hell!”
He pushed her knees apart wide.
“I have flavored stuff in my bag,” she offered.
“I want to taste this, right here where it’s wet.”
“Okay.”
“Yeah?”
“Yes.”
“Tell me you want me to lick you. Tell me how hard you want me to taste you.” He grazed her inner thigh with his teeth. “Mmm, I’ve got time.”
She didn’t. She’d lose her mind any moment now. “Remember this when I have your dick in my hands. I might make you tell me exactly how you want me to take you.”
He chuckled and she felt his warm breath on her center. So close he was. Maybe if she lifted herself upward…
Burke murmured, “I think I know what you want, Sofia. I think I know you now.” Then he spread her intimately and the flat of his tongue met her.
Ohhhhhh…
If oral was a talent, then he deserved medals.
“Good, Sofia?”
“Mm-hmm.” He kissed her but somehow made his lips fasten onto her clit, drawing it away from her body, then releasing it.
Trophies. He deserved solid gold and platinum trophies for working her with intuition she would never be able to explain.
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