by Linda Kage
His face blanched of all color before a knot in his brow appeared and he lifted his face to suddenly scan the room.
“Where is Bentley, anyway?” he asked, starting to look worried as if he sensed she was having a hard time dealing with a four-child baby shower. Lifting his voice, he called, “Has anyone seen my wife?” And he took off, searching for her, leaving his mother just standing there, abandoned.
If Bentley was struggling, I hoped he found her soon. I didn’t want her to be miserable.
Speaking of significant others, though, Bella hadn’t arrived yet. Her parents and brother were already here, too.
Pulling my phone from my pocket, I shot her a quick text, asking where she was.
And I’d barely sent it off when a commotion across the room rose.
“Ten!” Noel boomed in outrage. “What in God’s name are you reading to him?”
I glanced up to find Ten leaned back and relaxing in a recliner with the feet kicked up and Braiden snuggled on his lap. What seemed to be a children’s book from here was opened in front of them, where Braiden appeared to be listening avidly to the story. Ten even had a set of reading glasses perched on his nose as he read.
Noel ripped the book out of his hand, exclaiming, “You are not reading this to my grandson!”
I didn’t have to wonder long what the book was. I heard the rumor float past me that it was titled Go the Fuck to Sleep.
Just as my phone let me know Bella had replied to my message, my own dad appeared at Noel’s side to glare at Ten too. “Really, man?” he demanded as he leaned down to pick up my nephew and remove him from the lap of the offensive book reader.
“What!?” Ten cried in defense as I told Bella to hurry her ass up or she’d miss out on all the fun. “I used to read this to Teagan every night.”
Noel only snorted. “Yeah, and how many calls did you get from her preschool, complaining about her language?”
Ten grinned proudly. “We broke records. Didn’t we, baby girl?” He lifted his voice to ask his daughter, who was on the other side of the room.
“We sure did, Dad,” Teagan answered with a fist of accomplishment lifted in the air, only for JB, who was cradling their sleeping daughter in his arms to lean toward her and say, “Uh, he’s not going to read that to Harper, is he?”
“What is your problem, anyway, Grandpa Noel?” Ten challenged his friend. “The kid was enjoying it.”
“Yeah,” Braiden chimed in from my dad’s hip. “What the fluster nuggets is your problem, Grandpa Noel? I liked it.”
Noel blinked at his grandson, then turned to Ten. “Did he just say fluster nuggets?”
“He did,” Ten confirmed as he motioned to the book Noel was still holding, “Because that’s in the title of the book: Go the Fluster Nuggets to Sleep. See, I guess, I’m not so awful after all, huh, you presumptuous air hole.” He kicked his footrest down so he could push his way to his feet and face off with Noel. “And if Teagan has a potty mouth, she probably learned it from your sister.”
“Oh, bullshit,” Caroline answered from somewhere in the room.
Ten pointed her way, telling Noel, “I rest my case.” Then he winked at his wife and grinned over her response.
So Braiden’s two grandfathers reluctantly let Ten finish reading Go the Fluster Nuggets to Sleep to him, and I got myself another cup of punch, taste-testing the pink one this time before I returned to my perch against the wall.
I sensed her the moment Bella walked it. The air in the room changed, or something because I just knew: she was here. And I glanced over to find her struggling with four of the largest gift bags I’d ever seen.
Every instinct screamed at me to go to her and assist with her load, but Gray appeared soon enough to help her. I kept watching her, though, wishing I could head over there anyway because I just wanted to be close to her.
But she wasn’t ready for that, so I contented myself with simply looking. Except then she finished delivering her presents to their waiting reception tables, and she looked around, pausing her search when she found me.
When she started my way, I straightened in surprise. Then alarm. If she was willing to approach me in public like this, something must be horribly wrong. And it sure looked a hell of a lot like she was making a very obvious beeline straight for me.
There were others gathered near enough to me; I suppose she could’ve been approaching them, but she was looking at me, and then she fucking smiled. At me.
It was the most amazing smile I’d ever seen, screaming, yes, I want you.
Holy shit, she was actually walking to me.
For some reason, I panicked, worried I was reading the signals all wrong yet knowing I wasn’t. I took a step forward to meet her halfway, then stopped. No, this was her show. I’d follow her lead, wherever she wanted it to go, be it a casual, platonic, how’re you liking the new hat? greeting to a full-on make-out-session hello. She wanted to be close to me—in front of everyone. This was amazing progress.
And the progress part was what I told all my clients to focus on.
I beamed back at her, trying not to fidget as I impatiently awaited her arrival to see what she’d do when her father of all people appeared at my side and threw an arm over my shoulder before asking, “So who was the pretty blonde you were with at the gym last weekend?”
I watched Bella stop short. Her eyes widened in horror, ending the beautiful moment we were having together right in its tracks.
And everything went south from there.
“What!?” I swung to Mason with a horrified glance.
What the hell was he talking about, anyway?
With a knowing nod, he sent me a little smile. “Last Saturday morning,” he clarified. “I was driving by and saw her chasing you out the door of the fitness center so she could give you something.”
Oh...
El.
I blew out a relieved breath. “No, no,” I told him, waving my hand to set his assumption straight. And I glanced Bella’s way to make sure she wasn’t thinking the same thing her father obviously was. But when I saw that her face had drained of color, I nearly bawled.
No! She’d been walking over to see me, too.
This could not be happening.
My mother just had to make things worse by appearing out of nowhere and looking at me curiously. “Are you seeing someone, Fox?” she asked.
Idiot me, I paused over the answer because, technically, that was a gray area. But I definitely wasn’t seeing anyone who was blond, that was for damn sure. “She was just a client,” I tried to explain.
Mom furrowed her brow in confusion. “You meet clients at the gym?”
“I meet them anywhere they need to meet,” I explained, only for Mason to snort.
“This girl certainly didn’t need fitness coaching, Felicity, I assure you that,” he told her, only to lift his brows my way. “And she didn’t look like a client when you hugged her, either.”
Ah, fuck. I ground my teeth, wishing I could strangle Mason right about now. I’d only hugged El because she’d helped me figure out what to do with Bella, but I couldn’t tell that to anyone here.
Dammit.
“I hug clients who need hugs,” I bit out irritably. “And if she looked like she was in such good shape, it’s because I’m a damn fine life coach, thank you very much.”
“Someone hired you to be their personal trainer?” someone else asked in disbelief. I didn’t even bother to check who it was because another voice followed that with, “Why didn’t she just hire an actual personal trainer?”
When others had to chime in with their nosy-ass opinions and speculations, I scowled at the room at large, realizing Bella was gone. Nowhere to be seen.
“People hire me for whatever needs they have,” I defended. “I also helped her find a job, since you all are so damn curious. And yes, our relationship is nothing but professional, not that my confidential client’s issues are any business of yours, anyway. Now, if you’ll excuse me...�
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I pushed past Mason and my mother to go find Bella.
She definitely wasn’t in this room any longer. I checked the other sitting and dining rooms next. Then the kitchen. After glancing out the window to make sure she wasn’t in the backyard, I started snooping through all the bedrooms down the hall. None of Pick and Eva’s children lived at home any longer, but I could tell which room everyone had used as soon as I peeked inside. They were all still decorated the same way they’d been when they’d lived here as if just waiting for them to return.
Wow. I think Dad had turned my room into his personal office the second I moved out. Not that any of that mattered.
I finally found Bella in the back, master suite, pacing Pick and Eva’s room and muttering to herself.
“Just calm down,” she ordered sternly. “Stop overreacting. It probably doesn’t mean anything.”
“It doesn’t,” I promised her as I stepped inside and shut the door behind me.
Bella jumped and spun to face me.
“How much did you hear?” I asked, going to her. “You heard she was just a client, right?”
She nodded. “Yes. She’s who you leave me every Saturday morning to go see, isn’t she?”
When I nodded and took her hands, she swallowed loudly and nodded with me, squeezing back on my fingers. “I just—I never realized—I mean, you never mentioned that that specific client was a woman. A beautiful, apparently-fit woman who you hug all the time.”
“I don’t hug her all the—” I cut myself off, realizing from the expression on her face that I wasn’t helping myself with that line of explanations. So I paused, took a breath, and started fresh.
“She was cool about me taking off early last week to go to your place, and then I left my sports bag behind, so she ran it out to me, and I just—I hugged her in gratitude. That’s it, I swear. And I don’t talk about any of my clients—their genders or names or anything—to anyone. It’s just a courteous, confidential thing.”
“Is she as pretty as Dad made her out to be?”
I cringed, and Bella groaned before grabbing the front of my shirt with both hands. Then she leaned in to press her face against my chest. “At least tell me she’s vain and annoying with a bad case of halitosis or something.”
With a soft chuckle, I cupped her head in my hands and kissed her forehead. “Sorry, baby doll, but El is a total sweetheart. She’s probably my favorite client, too, because she’s such a special case. She had some serious issues when I first met her. I thought it was going to be a lost cause for sure. She was so fragile and afraid; I honestly wasn’t sure how she’d ever get over her hang-ups. But she’s made such great strides. Every time she’s had a setback, she’s just dug in and worked harder. She’s taught me what true strength and perseverance look like. But there has never—I repeat, never—been anything even slightly romantic or sexual between us. And I knew her maybe three or four months before you and I ever hooked up, too, so I had plenty of chances to make a move if I had actually wanted to.”
Bella blew out a long exhale, even as she looked up at me with sad eyes and said, “Okay.”
I furrowed my brow. “You believe me, don’t you?”
She couldn’t say anything aloud, but after a second, she gave a slow nod.
“You sure?” I asked. “You don’t look so sure.”
“I’m sure,” she told me quietly. “I believe you.”
She still wasn’t okay with this, though; I could tell. I wanted to assure her that I’d try to get my client assigned to a different life coach in the agency, but I couldn’t do that to El. El depended on me to be there for her.
Pressing my brow to Bella’s, I took both her hands into mine again and lifted them to my mouth so I could kiss her knuckles. “For a minute out there in the front room, it looked like you were coming to me.”
“I was,” she admitted.
“Yeah, but I thought you were actually going to come out and let everyone know we’re together.”
Lowering her gaze, she murmured, “No. Not yet. I’m sorry.”
When she looked up apologetically, I blinked in confusion. “You’re sorry? What? You have nothing to be sorry for. I’m the one who’s sorry that you had to hear everyone teasing me about another woman. That wasn’t right.”
“Yeah, but I wouldn’t have had to listen to them if I’d just let them know a long time ago that you and I are together.”
“We’ll publicize it whenever you’re ready, not a moment sooner, and that’s perfectly fine,” I assured her steadily. “Don’t feel guilty about that. Okay?”
“But if I could just get over this stupid insecurity and fear of commitment, we wouldn’t have this problem.”
“Shh.” I curled an arm around her waist and tugged her up against me so I could dip my face and kiss her lips once. “We don’t have a problem. After our talk, I’m okay with everything, and my opinion is the only one that matters in this situation. Alright? Don’t let this worry you.”
She nodded mutely, then rose onto her toes to kiss me back, curling her hands around the back of my neck and holding me close.
Our breaths mixed and tongues dueled. She lifted higher onto her toes and arched against me, her breasts pushing insistently at my chest. I groaned and clung to her mouth needfully.
Just when things were getting interesting, she broke us apart with a breathless laugh. “We really can’t do this here.”
“Just a little bit longer,” I begged, kissing the side of her throat and making her hum in appreciation.
“Fox.” She sighed as if she might give in, but then she pushed at my chest. “No. They’re probably opening gifts by now. And that’s why we’re supposed to be here in the first place.”
“I just gave them all a card full of money,” I argued. “I don’t need to be present to see them open that.”
“Money?” She cried in outrage. “Gah, you sound just like Gracen.”
“If you mean I sound like a normal man, then yeah, I bet I do.”
She grinned even as she backed evasively away from me. “We have to get back now. But we can’t go out together. People will suspect something.”
I nodded respectfully even as I wished we didn’t have to be discreet, that we could just openly be a couple.
“Go ahead and go first,” I told her. “You’ve been gone longer and would probably be noticed missing sooner, anyway.”
“Okay,” she agreed without an argument. Then she lunged forward to steal one last heated kiss from me before pulling away again with a grin. “See you out there.”
“Yeah.”
Probably from all the way on the other side of the room, but it was better than nothing. “See you,” I whispered, taking her hand and holding on loosely enough that she had to be the one to break the contact as she backed away from me.
Our eye contact held a second longer after our hands dropped back down to our sides. Then she turned and hurried away.
I set my hands on my hips and heaved out a breath.
Then jumped nearly out of my skin when a voice from behind me said, “Well, well, well. So our sly little Fox has been keeping secrets from us, has he?” A smirking Beau stepped from Eva and Pick’s private bathroom. “Or should I call you Warthog now?”
“Dammit.” Grinding my teeth, I hissed out a breath as I pressed both fists to my forehead, then dropped them and tried to turn the tables on him by saying, “Shouldn’t you be looking for my sister right about now?”
“Oh, he found me,” Bentley answered, stepping out of the bathroom behind her husband and crossing her arms over her chest as she eyed me with arched eyebrows.
“Ah shit,” I muttered, letting my head fall back on my shoulders. Now I had two people to keep silent, though to be fair, if one of them knew something, the other would soon enough, anyway.
“Beau was trying to console me when Bella blew into the bedroom, all upset and muttering to herself. We didn’t want to bother her because—”
“
Because you two were busy getting busy yourselves,” I finished dryly for her. “Yeah, I can see that.”
“We were not—”
I lifted a hand. “Maybe you should touch up your smeared lipstick and re-button your blouse the right way, sis.”
Bentley glanced down, then muttered a curse as she spun away to fix her shirt. Her eyes had been bloodshot too, meaning Beau had been consoling her.
And then they had no doubt gotten carried away, from that point on.
“Just so you’re aware. While you two were back here—not making out,” I informed them. “Ten was in the front room reading dirty stories to your kid.”
“Great,” Beau muttered with a sigh, while his wife whirled back around to scowl at me, her top back in order.
“Oh, don’t try to change the subject on us,” she accused, pointing at me. “This explains so much. I finally understand how she guessed I’d had a miscarriage. You told her.”
“And why she called me to go check on you after guys’ night,” Beau murmured with a considering nod.
“That was you? I knew someone had been in my apartment.”
Instead of answering me, he let my sister step forward and demanded to know, “Why have you kept this a secret, Fox?”
“Uh…” I lifted my eyebrows incredulously. “Did you not listen to us just now? Bella’s not ready for that yet.”
“But how can she not be ready?” Bentley shook her head, confused. “This is you we’re talking about. There’s no way in hell you’d ever hurt her; the rest of the family would murder you. You’re like the safest person ever for her to start a relationship with.”
“And that fucker Ethan broke something vital inside her when they split up,” I countered. “She’s not ready yet, okay? So all three of us are just going to keep our mouths shut and be mute until she is. You two are not fucking this up for me by opening your big mouths and pushing her into exposing us before she’s ready. Because you might just push her into running off instead. And I’m not losing her. Got it?”
“So not even Gracen knows?” Beau asked in shock.
“No,” I told him.
“Holy shit, wow,” he murmured. Then a grin lit his face. “Then I know something about his twin that he doesn’t. Oh, this is classic.” As he rubbed his hands together in relish, Bentley blinked and stepped toward me.
