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Chapter 16
William
I could all but feel Beatrice’s eyes boring into the back of my head, and I gritted my teeth. This had been happening off and on since the dinner with her parents, the frequent stares, and my patience was flagging.
We’d already talked everything out, so why did she still look wary?
Fig lay between us on the living room floor, content with the occasional pats Bea offered him. He’d probably make his way to my seat at some point when she stopped, but right now I couldn’t really focus on that.
No, all of my attention was for Bea as she yet again stole a glance my way. If she was shooting me bedroom eyes I wouldn’t mind, but this was beyond uncomfortable. To make matters worse, after Devin got back yesterday, he looked at me as if suddenly he was worried about Bea and my relationship.
Had their father’s feelings rubbed off or something?
I’d told Devin I wasn’t going anywhere, and he should know me enough to believe that. A tiny flash of hurt pinched in my chest and I buried it just as fast.
Now wasn’t the time for that.
When Bea looked at me again, the fifth time in as many minutes, I scowled. “If you’re going to stare at me can it at least be with lust?”
She jerked, heat climbing over her cheeks as she averted her eyes and said. “I’m not exactly in an amorous mood.”
I couldn’t help it, I snorted. “Was it the failure of dinner with your parents yesterday or something else that killed your libido?”
Her face darkened, and a flash of guilt bit into me. They were all really close, and most women in her place wouldn’t even bother fighting for a relationship that her parents were against. She could have walked away from me entirely and washed her hands of it, but she hadn’t.
The least I could do in return was not throw up the rift I’d caused.
Sighing, I heaved myself up off the couch and sat next to her instead. She felt small next to me, almost fragile, and I nearly laughed at the thought. Bea was many things, but fragile was not one of them.
Shaking that to the side for now, I curled an arm around her shoulders and spoke.
“I’m sorry, that was uncalled for. The way you keep looking at me is driving me up a wall, though.”
Another wince from her and she rubbed her neck, still not leaning into me like she usually did.
“It’s my turn to apologize then, because I didn’t realize how often I was doing it.” She bit her lip, looking up at me with open uncertainty.
“Something has been bugging me since yesterday though, and I’m struggling on how to bring it up.”
Immediately dread pulled at the back of my spine and I stood up, not wanting to get into this again. “I thought we already talked about everything after we got back from dinner?” I asked, trying to redirect the entire conversation before it could go downhill.
She’d already proverbially opened me up and poked around, we’d dealt with the entire kids issue, and it was put to rest. Couldn’t we just leave it now?
Apparently not, because she followed me, one of her hands gripping my arm as she shook her head.
“I know we talked about a lot last night, but there’s one other thing I think we need to talk about.”
The set to her brow told me I was not going to like this, so I did what I always do when faced with something potentially life-altering, I closed off and avoided it.
“I’m still exhausted from yesterday’s chat. Can we just not do this right now?” I grit out, wanting more than anything for her to agree and drop the subject. I’d talked more in the past few days about ‘feelings’ and stuff like that than I ever had before.
I didn’t want to go over anything else.
Something about the question pulled her up short and she considered me for a moment, her stare taking on the same intensity as the one her father lasered on me yesterday at dinner. After a few seconds of silence, she stepped back with an almost blank expression.
“Alright.”
I nearly jerked back from surprise. She’d…agreed? I thought for sure she’d fight me on that. She certainly had yesterday, after all.
