by Olivia Hayle
“Fuck. Put the phone on speaker, Skye. Touch yourself for me.”
And his voice… I circle faster, my breath quickening. “If you do the same?”
“It’s always a negotiation with you, isn’t it?”
“Always.”
Through the phone, I hear the distinct sound of a zipper being undone. My hand moves faster, circling, the pressure building. His breathing is heavy on the other end, the phone on speaker next to the tub.
“Talk to me,” I say. “I like your voice.”
It sounds like he’s smiling when he replies. “So you keep saying. All right. Are you touching your clit for me?”
“Yes.”
“Good girl. Slide your fingers further down, slip one inside for me.”
Dear God. I do what he says, a moan escaping me at the sensation. “I wish it was you.”
“My hand?” he asks. “Or my cock?” I sink deeper into the bathwater without responding, and a throaty laugh comes through the phone. “You’re blushing now. I can tell.”
“Maybe.”
“I’m so hard for you here, Skye. I want to fuck you so bad.”
My fingers are circling faster now, my breath coming in gasps and moans. It’s his voice. His words. The picture of him on his hotel bed, stroking himself, hard because of me.
“You are,” I say.
He growls. “Damn it. Tell me you’re close, don’t hold back, I can’t—”
“I’m close. I wish my fingers were your tongue. I wish you were inside me.”
“Oh baby, me too.”
I close my eyes at the endearment and flick my fingers back and forth. Pleasure starts deep inside, spreading to my stomach, my legs, my entire body. It’s too much. I moan, my body arching, my orgasm exploding through my senses like a tidal wave.
Through the phone, Cole groans loudly, cursing.
And then both of us are just breathing.
“Wow,” I murmur. “Are you still there?”
“Barely. Fuck. I should’ve taken off my shirt.”
My laughter is breathless. “That was so hot.”
“Beyond. I wish I was there, though. Fucking you in a bathtub is now high on my list of priorities.”
I glance down at my narrow little tub. Unlikely, although I’m sure he’d find a way to sex me senseless anyway. “So do I. My fingers are good, but they’re not you.”
He groans. “Don’t. If you keep talking, I’ll get hard again, and my dick is already sore from how hard I was stroking.”
“Famine. Disease. Thirty-seven times eight.”
Cole laughs, the sound rich and full in my small bathroom. “Thank you. Crisis averted.”
“Have you conquered the world yet?”
“Only half,” he says. “Some people resist my rule. Curious, that.”
I snort. “Put me in touch with their leader?”
“Rude.”
I sink deeper into the warm water, my body feeling languid and loose. “Two girls came into the bookstore today. They wanted to take a picture of the bookheart.”
There’s a pause, long enough that I wonder if I’ve ruined everything by mentioning the store. It’s the reason we’ll only ever be casual, after all.
But then he laughs. “You’re feeling pretty good about that, I’m sure.”
“Yes. I think the word is ‘vindicated.’”
“That’s a good one,” he says. “You have an eye for that sort of thing, Skye.”
I have no idea what to say to that. “Is the weather nice in LA?”
“It’s always nice. But I’ve been in back-to-back meetings, so no chance of enjoying it, I’m afraid.”
“Poor little developer.”
“The poorest,” he agrees, a smile in his voice. “So tonight I was your booty call, as you so flatteringly put it?”
I want to protest, but when I open my mouth to, they all fall flat. He’s right. “Yes,” I admit. “I’m happy you picked up.”
“I’m happy I was the one you called.”
There is no one else, I want to say. But that would reveal more than I’d want to. “Honored is the right word,” I say.
“All right.” His voice is teasing. “Honored.”
There’s a knock on his end, audible even on the phone. “Damn it, I need to go.”
“Take care,” I say, and regret it immediately. What was I doing? Signing off an email?
“Later, Skye.”
The phone call ends and I sink further into the bath, and then further still, until my head is under the water. It seems like an accurate description of how I’m feeling—in way over my head.
The next morning, there’s a delivery to the bookstore. Skye Holland, the packet says. Fragile.
Karli is on the phone when it arrives, and I quickly carry it out to my car and away from her eyes. My suspicion is confirmed when I tear up the cardboard, too eager to wait.
It’s a box filled to the brim with bath salts, bath bombs, bubbling bath oil. It smells like Bath & Body Works on steroids. And below it, a small bullet vibrator. Water-friendly, it says on the box in pink letters.
I want to sink through the ground. I want to open the box and test it.
And attached, a small handwritten note.
Booty call me all you like.
14
Skye
A low whistling in the bookstore makes me smile. Timmy is bent over his oceanography book, intent on finishing his homework, whistling on and off. When it comes to anything animal-related, he’s more than motivated.
I hardly have to help, either—and as much as I like doing so, that’s getting tougher and tougher. Parts of his math homework have already begun to look alien to me. At least I can be helpful in his English class.
“Are whales and dolphins friends?” he asks, not bothering to look up.
I smile down at the cash I’m counting at the register. “I don’t know. They don’t live together, and I don’t think they spend a lot of time together, but they don’t dislike each other. Does that make sense?”
“Yeah,” he says, scribbling something in his notebook. “Kind of like you and Mom.”
I lose track of my counting completely. It’s an offhand comment, like he’s stating something obvious. “What do you mean?”
He looks up, pushing his glasses back. “You don’t spend a lot of time together.”
“We do,” I say. “Some.”
“Not much.” His voice is cheery with a child’s triumph. “Either I’m with her, or I’m with you, but I’m not with both of you at the same time.”
“Hmm. That’s true, buddy. But we’re definitely better friends than dolphins and whales.”
He nods, returning to his homework, like my answer explains everything.
Maybe it does, and maybe it’s not particularly complicated. But at the same time, Isla’s been getting on my nerves in a way she never used to. Just tonight, she’d ignored me when I’d said I’m busy tonight, guilt-tripping me into changing plans to look after Timmy. It hadn’t been big plans—yoga, dinner, calling Cole again—but I’d looked forward to it.
Just thinking it feels traitorous. I love having Timmy around. His shoulders bent over his homework, the vulnerable nape of his neck, the cheerful whistling… he’s the best nephew I could ask for.
But would it hurt Isla to plan ahead for once in her life? Sometimes, I’d appreciate more than a few hours’ warning. And Timmy deserves far better.
Not that she gets that. Where reason is concerned, my sister has always had a mind like a colander. She hears what she wants to hear and siphons off the rest.
Timmy leans back, ink on his fingers. “Did you know that sea turtles can live to be a hundred?”
“They can? That’s impressive!”
“And so old!” He flips a page in his book, and even from this distance I can see the outsized drawings of orcas on the page. “Have you ever been to the aquarium?”
“Yeah, but it was a long time ago. Do you want to go?”
“Of course. I’ll talk to your mom and figure out a good time. Maybe this weekend?”
His smile is massive. “You’re the best.”
“No, you are.” I walk around to the reading room table and ruffle his unruly hair. Freckles dance across the bridge of his nose. “I’m almost done with closing up, and then we’ll head home. Do you want to make homemade pizza for dinner? I have dough in the fridge.”
“Yes, let me just finish my homework first.” His voice is so serious that I have to bite my lip to stop a smile.
“Of course, sweetheart. Take as long as you need.” He turns back to the page, and I smile all the way to the cash register. Isla’s son, the picture of studious. I might not see eye to eye with my sister, but we both think Timmy’s the best kid around—and we’re both right about that.
I wipe down the counter with a wet rag. There’s not a customer in the store, but that’s not unusual for a Tuesday evening. Besides, customers have been filtering in and out all day—and our sales are definitely on the rise. The thought makes me whistle, too.
But then the door opens, the bell sounding, and there he is. Without warning or prior notice—a day before his trip was supposed to end.
Cole’s eyes find mine right away. They’re blazing with purpose, his suit jacket stretched taut over wide shoulders. No tie. Undone top button. The determined lines on his face hit me with force and all I can do is stare.
He crosses the distance between us in long strides. “Did you get my delivery?”
“Yes. But—”
He bends me back with the force of his kiss. It’s demanding, lips moving across mine with a clear message. We’re finishing what we started when you called me in the tub. And then, when his tongue slips inside, something far filthier. We’re using that vibrator.
Or maybe that’s just my mind.
I push him back, breathless. “Cole—”
“I came back early.”
“Welcome back.” My eyes flit to the reading room. “We’re not alone.”
He leans back, his arm dropping from my shoulders to my waist. “Karli?”
“No.”
Timmy peers at us through the cased opening, a smile on his face. He ducks his head as soon as he sees us looking.
“Hi again, kid!” Cole calls loudly. “Sorry to interrupt your time alone with your aunt.”
“That’s okay!” Timmy calls back. I extricate myself from Cole’s arm. How will I explain this? Not to mention to my sister, when he inevitably tells her about it?
Cole must have read this and more on my face, because he shoots me a smile. “Don’t worry,” he says under his breath. “We’ll handle it.”
“Okay. Yeah.”
“You need to close up the store?”
“Yes.”
Timmy has closed his book—homework forgotten, apparently—and is leaning against one of the fantasy bookshelves. “You know a lot about baseball,” he tells Cole, without a shred of the shyness he usually shows around strangers.
Right. They’ve met before. I release the breath I’ve been holding and force my shoulders to relax. Beside me, Cole is the picture of ease.
“A fair bit, yeah.”
“There are tryouts at my school,” Timmy volunteers. “Later this year, I mean.”
I blink at him. “You’re going to join the team? That’s awesome!”
He shoots me an exasperated you-wouldn’t-get-it look, coupled with an eye-roll that says I’m being embarrassing. All of a sudden he’s ten going on fifteen, teenager savvy and all.
Cole nods knowingly. “Tryouts are scary,” he says. “I get it.”
“Yeah.”
“I’ve had to do a bunch of them.”
“You have?” Timmy takes a step forward, his hand itching at his side. He’s started writing up anything he considers important lately.
“Yes, for the swim team. It’s not the same sport, but I can give you some pointers.”
Timmy nods enthusiastically, pointing to the reading room table. “Let’s sit,” he says, like they’re about to have a meeting.
Cole shoots me a crooked what-can-I-do kind of smile. “Is that okay?”
“Yes. Yes, absolutely,” I say. His charm is irresistible, it seems, both to ten-year-old boys and their old-enough-to-know-better aunts.
I close and lock the register. I turn off the lights upstairs, and double-check the back entrance through the storage room. And all the while I listen to snippets of their conversation, Cole asking Timmy if he’s played before, if he has a good baseball racket to practice with.
Something about it strikes me as a distinctly masculine conversation. Peering around the corner at them, Timmy is wide-eyed and enthusiastic, watching Cole as he explains something that is beyond me. Coach. Pitch. Angle. Bracing a strong hand on his thigh, he’s the picture of male vitality. It’s something neither Isla nor I can provide.
By the time I’m finished, they’re still deep in conversation. Timmy has half a page filled with notes. I lean against the cased opening. “Hey, guys. Ready to head out, Timmy?”
The grin he aims my way is blinding. “Cole said he’d take us to a baseball game! To see the Mariners!”
Oh no he didn’t. I give Cole a withering look, but he just gazes levelly back at me. “I have VIP season tickets. Might as well use them. The kid needs to see proper games if he wants to start playing one day.”
“Please say yes, Auntie,” Timmy says, almost bouncing with barely concealed excitement. “You don’t even have to watch. You can bring a book!”
That makes me smile. “We’ll go, if our schedule matches Cole’s. He’s very busy.”
“There’s a home game tomorrow night,” Cole supplies helpfully. “And I’m not too busy.”
What he’s offering… well, it goes well beyond the casual status we’d decided on. Warmth spreads through my chest and brings a smile to my lips. Regardless of Cole’s motivations, this will make Timmy’s week.
And judging from his puppy-dog eyes, I will quickly lose my best-auntie-in-the-world status if I say no to this. It’s a long way to fall.
“Let me call your mom,” I tell Timmy. “If she says yes, we’re going tomorrow.”
“Yes! Yes, thank you so much. Thank you, Cole.”
“My pleasure. I don’t go often anymore. It’ll be fun, kid.”
Cole walks us to my car, parked just across the street. Timmy doesn’t protest when I say that Cole and I need to talk on our own for a minute or two. Instead, he gives Cole a thumbs-up and a cheerful see you tomorrow!
When the door closes, I turn to Cole, rubbing my neck. “This is really nice of you.”
His lips twitch with a smile. “Are you about to say thank you?”
“Yes, I might be. I… Cole, it’s too much. If it was for me I wouldn’t be able to accept it.”
His hand lands on the curve of my waist, comfortable, like it belongs there. “Nonsense.”
“Thank you,” I say, my voice sincere. “Truly.”
“But…?”
I lower my voice. “What part of this is casual, though? It’ll complicate things.”
He tips my head back and presses a kiss to my lips. It’s soft and warm, the kind of kiss you give someone when you know there’ll be lots more opportunities. “We won’t let it. And your nephew will love you for eternity.”
I smile, a bit crookedly. “Buying a kid’s love, huh?”
“It’s the way I was raised.” He kisses me again, deeper this time, running his hands down my arms. “Tell him I’m just a guy you’re dating. Your sister won’t know the difference.”
“You’re right.”
“Wear a baseball hat and sunglasses to the game, and no one will recognize you.” He flicks my nose again—it’s quickly becoming a habit of his—and grins. “This is still casual.”
“Good,” I say happily. “We’ll go, but we’re still enemies.”
He laughs, releasing me. “I’m counting on that
, Holland. And don’t forget to bring a book.”
Normal game day experiences for me have included waiting in line. Lines to get in, lines for the security check, lines to get a hot dog or a pretzel. Turns out the one percent doesn’t live like that.
With Cole’s VIP tickets—and VIP status—Timmy and I are ushered along through a separate entrance. We ride in an elevator instead of taking the stairs. It’s almost ludicrous, and when Cole sees my expression, he gives me a not-so-subtle elbowing. “I don’t make the rules.”
I elbow him back, his chest a solid brick wall. “Do you have different snacks too?” I ask. “Gold-infused soda? Truffle-flavored popcorn?”
“No. That would be ridiculous.” A pause. “But the caviar-flavored pretzel is to die for.”
I laugh, keeping a hand on Timmy’s shoulder. “Sounds delicious.”
Timmy’s wearing his favorite baseball shirt, complete with the team’s logo and winning colors. I’d pulled out one of my own—about two sizes too big and twenty years too old, one of the few pieces of clothing I have from my dad. I’ve tucked it into a pair of jeans, a baseball cap low on my head.
Cole isn’t in a suit. It was so jarring at first that I had to needle him. “Not used to seeing you without a tie,” I’d said, which was a mistake. In his eyes, the rebuttal was clear as day. You’re used to seeing me without anything at all. Check mate—there was nothing I could say to that in public.
We’re escorted to a terrace-like seat. The pitch unfurls before us, green and endless. Four padded chairs and a table with a monitor embedded, and on it, stats about the players are already circling.
“Wow,” Timmy exclaims, climbing into one of the chairs. “Look!”
Batting practice is done, it seems, and both teams are milling on the pitch, preparing for the national anthem.
Cole hands me a menu with the entire snack selection. “What do you want?”
I scan the lists, a smile on my lips. “No caviar pretzels. Damn.”
“They must be out.”
“Then what will you have?”
He snorts, pulling out one of the chairs for me. “The normal ones are nice, too. A bit of sea salt. Melted butter.”
