Page 75 of The Boyfriend Experience

Then wonder… how did that happen over a weekend?

“Ten minutes,” he says, walking back over to kiss me again. “Don’t keep me waiting.”

I watch him leave the bedroom. I wonder if he knows how hot he is. He doesn’t act like it. He doesn’t have a stuck-up air to him. Even though he’s rich, handsome, and smart. Which is like the stuck-up trifecta.

But Lawton is a guy who comes from nothing. I can’t forget that. He’s got it all now, but if that new tattoo on his arm is any indication, it was a long journey to get here.

I can hear him downstairs as he goes through my kitchen cabinets looking for things. A frying pan. A spatula. I hear the fridge open and close several times. Getting out eggs and butter probably.

“Five minutes, Oaklee!” he calls from downstairs.

But I stay in bed a little longer. Thinking about how nice it is to have someone else in this penthouse for once.

That comes with a bunch of feelings. Mostly about loss, and sadness, and pain. And not all of them can be attributed to the fact that my father used to live here with me and now he’s dead.

Some of them, I admit, come from the fear of failing. That I might fuck up this new beginning and it’ll all go away.

Because—I swing my feet out of bed, my hands flat on the mattress, my head bowed—because I’m pretty bad at relationships. I’ve never had a long-term one. And maybe I tell myself that it was Hanna who stopped me from falling in love. That I was always afraid she’d try to take what I had. Always be there waiting to kill anything good that came into my life.

And that’s partly true, I guess. Because she is a sneaky bitch who is way too obsessed with me and my life. But it’s not the whole truth.

The whole truth is… I’m just very bad at relationships. I don’t take orders. It’s hard to put the needs of others first. It’s a challenge to consider other people’s opinions instead of just my own.

But I don’t feel that way with Law. I like considering him. And he’s not really a bossy guy. At least not outside of sex. Then he does have a bossy side.

“Two minutes, Oaks!” Law yells. “Get your ass down here!”

And apparently that carries into breakfast.

But it’s all so hot, I don’t care.

“Coming!” I yell.

I pee, pull on my shorts and t-shirt from last night, and walk down the stairs, kicking myself for not getting down here immediately, because I can see those back dimples as he flips French toast at the stove.

I walk quietly over to him and wrap my arms around his torso, pressing my face into the back of his shoulder. “Delicious,” I say.

He turns his head just enough for me to see him smile, then looks back at breakfast. “Go sit. I’ll bring it to you.”

I back off. Reluctantly. And take a seat on the barstool up against the island where he’s set a place for me.

He plops two pieces of French toast onto a plate, pours some syrup over them, then sticks his fingertips into a bowl of powdered sugar and sprinkles that over the top.

When he sets it down in front of me I feel… special?

Yes, but no. That’s not it.

“Eat,” he says.

“Aren’t you eating?” I ask, my fork already cutting into the bread.

“I never eat breakfast,” he says, bending over so he can place his elbows on the counter and lean forward. He just smiles at me. Like serving me a homemade breakfast is the perfect start to his day.

Cared for?

Yes, but no. That’s not it either.

“Me either,” I say. “But for you I make an exception.”