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But I didn’t.
I couldn’t forget that he didn’t want this to be real. He’d made it clear on the side of the road that even if I somehow managed to make him happy—though I still wasn’t quite sure what to make of that confession—this was going to end.
He was doing what he had to do so his dad would leave him alone about finding someone, all while helping me do the same with my family. Nothing more, nothing less.
Stepping out so he could leave, I tried not to take his hasty exit personally. Then I went back into the bathroom and closed the door behind me, leaning up against it with my forehead pressed into the cold wood.
* * *
The next morning, I woke up in a panic, totally forgetting where I was. Then it hit me like a ton of bricks and I shot out of bed, scared that I’d slept through… something. I didn’t even know what. But since I was here for a reason and not for leisure, it felt like I needed to get out there and make sure I was doing what I came here to do.
I pulled a hoodie over the tank top and shorts I’d slept in, then opened the door and was immediately met with the smell of fresh coffee and bacon. My feet carried me through the hall and into the living room, and a genuine smile popped onto my lips the second Louis looked up from the newspaper he was reading.
“Good morning, sunshine,” he said. “How’d you sleep?”
“Great, thanks.”
And I had. I’d slept surprisingly well on the probably-twenty-year-old mattress. I’d expected to toss and turn all night without the familiarity of my room at home. My bed. My sheets. My pillows. The soft glow from my twinkle lights that hung around the edges of my bookshelves or the sound machine I sometimes used when I had too much on my mind.
“Glad to hear it,” Louis replied. “You hungry?”
Normally, I didn’t eat breakfast. I was rarely hungry right when I woke up, and I needed two cups of coffee just to focus on a new day. But I couldn’t deny the rumble in my belly at the mention of food. Beau and I had gotten here so late that we’d gone straight to bed, and even though we’d grabbed a quick bite on the way in, I’d been too nervous to eat much.
“I am, and it smells amazing,” I said, looking toward the kitchen where I could see only a sliver of Beau’s torso between the low-hanging cabinets and the counter.
He was at the stove. Was he the one cooking breakfast?Shoot. I loved a guy who could cook. In my books, obviously.
“Ah, that’s my boy, probably showing off,” Louis said with another one of his laugh-coughs. “I’m not much of a cook. That kid’s been making my food since he was about… ah, well. Long time.”
He didn’t have to say it. I already knew. Beau had probably been cooking for his dad since his mom died, which was hard to imagine. That was practicallyGrayson’sage.
Even though my nephew had also lost his mom, he’d been three when it happened. He didn’t remember much about her as far as I knew, but if he’d lost her at this age? I pictured his sweet face, and my chest grew heavy. The idea of him going through something so horrible made me want to run from the room.
But I stopped myself, because Beau didn’t need me to have another emotional outburst like I’d done on the way out here. He needed me to put on a show for his dad.
And now that I knew more about him—about how he’d not only lost his mom at that tender age, but also his brother—it felt just as important to help him as it felt wrong to do so.
“Yeah, you never could get the timing of a full meal figured out, huh, Pops?” Beau asked as he walked out of the kitchen with two plates of food in hand. I hadn’t thought he could hear us over the fan above the stove.
Louis harrumphed.
“But thankfully you know how to make the basics and just survive on those, right, old man?”
I heard the words coming out of his mouth, but I couldn’t focus on their meaning. I was way too busy staring at the way his biceps flexed when he put the plates on the table and reached out to straighten the silverware beside them. He wore a simple white tee, stretched tight across his broad chest, and the sexiest pair of gray sweatpants I’d ever seen in real life. Turned out, that whole trend on TikTok book review videos about gray sweatpants being hot wasn’t limited to fiction.
Why did this man have to be so dang perfect?
Okay, no. Beau wasnotperfect. But dang it, he was flawed in that ridiculously perfect way, where you couldn’t help but want to hit him for being such an idiot and also hug him for everything he’d been through. It killed me.
“Yeah, I get by. Anyway, let’s eat.”
Louis’s words brought me out of my tailspin, and we all moved to the table, then I pivoted and pointed to the kitchen. “Coffee?”
“Have a seat, I’ll grab it,” Beau said with a wink. “How do you want it?”
This man and his winks. Knock it off already, Devereux.
Oh, right. The show.
