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He drags his palm over my stomach, thumb brushing the underside of my breast because we’ve already established that he loves my boobs. A lot.
Goose bumps cover my flesh when he murmurs, “You sore?”
I nod, rolling toward him. “In the best way.”
“Want me to make it better with a little bit of vitamin D?” he counters, tugging me closer. His morning wood nudges my calf, needy as a golden retriever. “It’ll only take me three minutes.”
That makes me laugh. “Wow. What a lucky girl I am.”
Before he can negotiate for four, a sound from somewhere in the house has him pulling away. A door. Feet.
“Or not.” He swears softly, affectionate. “Anddd that’s my cue.”
“Dad duty,” I say, trying to sound breezy and not like a person whose heart is currently beating out of her chest. “Go be a hero.”
He kisses my forehead—a sweet, unguarded press that hits too deep—and swings out of bed. He yanks on his sweatpants and a tee, gives me one backward look that’s a promise and a question and a thousand things I’m not ready to name, then pads into the hall.
I grin into the sheets. Exhale.
The grin slides away. A thought, clear and cold as a lake, floats up and sits on my chest: I need to leave.
It’s not that I don’t want to stay. It’s that I do. Way, way too much.
The wanting—I’ve always been good at ignoring it. Pushing it down until it evaporates. But he makes it easy to want. Easy in a way that feels dangerous for my heart.
Leave Before It Hurts, my brain is screaming.
Leave Before You Accidentally Fall In Love.
Leave while I can still call what’s happening between us delicious and not a huge mistake I’ll carry around like a tender bruise.
He is a dad.
A Dad!
That fact sits like a lighthouse in every room of this house. Little shoes by the door, tiny socks inside the couch, pencil-smudged worksheets under a TV remote. Everything tidy and a little chaotic, exactly the way love is when it’s lived in. He doesn’t get to make reckless choices just because I want to be reckless with him.
And I do.
Faintly from the kitchen, I hear the sound of his voice blending with Benny’s—a low rumble, a bright chirp.
I catch fragments: “want waffles” and “did you finish the packet,” then “you said I could wear the K-pop sneakers,” followed by a young girl’s groan.
I smile. They’re both so freaking adorable.
They are a team. Hayes and Benny against the world.
My heart aches even as my ears strain to hear more of their conversation. A pan hitting the stove. A cabinet opening and closing.
Yes, I need to leave tomorrow.
But first: I should call Faith.
Closing myself into the en suite bathroom, I sit on the closed toilet and hit FaceTime. An early riser, she answers as she stuffs the first bite of a breakfast sandwich into her mouth, hair knotted on top of her head.
“Thank God you answered.”
She rolls her eyes. “I always answer.”
