“What am I doing?” I ask my reflection.
She, unfortunately, doesn’t have an answer.
And the hussy between my legs, the one that’s pleasantly sore, that wants more, that is all but demanding I go back out there and fuck Leo’s brains out isn’t helping.
I need to be careful.
Smart.
I bend and splash some water on my face, the cool shock enough to settle the worst of the need.
Enough for me to focus.
I need space and time to think, and I need to prep for the dinner I’m catering tomorrow—all of which I can’t do here.
So, I shower quickly and dress even faster, tiptoeing through my bedroom and slipping into my closet to snag a pair of jeans and a T-shirt, socks and my comfy sneakers that mean my feet will ache a little less at the end of the day.
I run into a problem when it comes to my jeans, though.
As in, I can’t button them.
Panic starts to creep into the edges of my vision.
Because shit is getting real.
I take a breath then push down my jeans and step out of them, folding them and setting them aside, starting a pile that’s no doubt going to grow as time goes on.
Today my jeans. Tomorrow…
“Well, let’s hope it’s not my leggings,” I whisper, snagging a pair from the shelf and wrestling them on. They’re tight, but they’ll do the job for the next little while.
Though I suspect that maternity clothes are soon to be in my future.
Shoes and socks on, hoodie snagged from the hanger, I slip from my room, sparing a look to the bed and exhaling in relief when I see that Leo is still asleep.
I don’t think about the yearning that’s coiling through my middle, tempting me to toe off my shoes and crawl behind him.
I don’t think about the way he’d looked at me last night, touched me?—
Like I was important.
Like I meant something.
Because…
Danger.
So, I just quietly get the hell out of there.
I’m dicing onions—and doing it wearing a mask because the aromatic still makes me want to puke when it’s raw but makes nearly every savory recipe of mine delicious when it’s cooked, especially with its other partner in crime for my morning sickness, garlic—when the bell in the front of the shop rings.
I set my knife down, wipe my hands on my towel, but before I take so much as a step toward the swinging door, it slams open, Leo striding in. “What the fuck?” he snaps.
I blink.
Then scowl, temper spiking. “First, don’t talk to me like that. Second”—I toss my towel onto the stainless-steel table—“what the fuck what?”
“You left.”
