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After getting dressed for the day, I took Kona out to the yard and got a bowl of food for her. We had a supply of food on hand for all our dogs in case they ever needed to stay late or got sick and needed to eat in the middle of the day.
When I got back to my new room, I realized there was a note sticking out of the top of my backpack. My tummy fluttered as I pulled out the note and read it.
I hope you and Kona slept well. I’ll be back at around six. If you need me before then, please call. I can be there in five minutes. -Axel
I checked my phone and realized it was ten minutes to six. “Okay, Kona. Daddy will be back in a few minutes. Let’s get cleaned up before then.” I grabbed my toiletries and went to the bathroom for a very quick shower and to brush my teeth.
When I came back out, dressed and ready for the day, Axel had a box of bagels and shmears set out along the counter. “Oh, hi.”
“Good morning, Billy.” Axel looked at me with the same adoring eyes he’d always reserved for me. “Did you sleep well?”
“Yeah.” I pushed down my fears and insecurities and pretended like the embarrassing parts of last night never happened. “We both passed out and just woke up a few minutes ago.”
“I’m glad to hear it.” He waved toward the bagel spread. “I brought breakfast.”
“They look delicious.” And if I didn’t hate eating in front of people, I would have devoured at least two, but I couldn’t handle the judgment that I always felt when eating. “I’m fine for now, but thank you.”
“Why?”
I was about to turn away and get started with my morning routine when Axel’s question stopped me short. “Why what?”
“Why don’t you want to eat?” He cocked his head, giving me the same firm stare that I’d seen Tony and Harris level their boys with. “If you did sleep through the night, like you said, then you should be hungry by now.”
Well, shit. I couldn’t tell him the truth, but I’d never been good at coming up with lies on the spot. “Um, it’s just that… Well, I had a big dinner so I’m still full from that.” It was at that moment that I remembered that I didn’t eat dinner at all. After my dad trashed my food, I was so focused on getting out of there that I didn’t even think about getting anything else. And then…the whole situation with Axel happened. Unfortunately, my stomach seemed to also remember that it was empty and chose that moment to growl angrily.
“Billy.” His tone was different now that he’d caught me in a lie. “Why don’t you want to eat?”
Dammit, he knew. And he was going to make me say it out loud. “Okay, I’m a little hungry, but I’m trying to cut back on carbs.” That was mostly a lie, but if he was going to continue to look at me like that, I definitely needed to figure out how to drop thirty or fifty pounds. I would never look like Axel, but maybe I could look less like…me. “I’ll get a salad for lunch. That should be fine.”
“Nope.” And just like that, he tilted the tray of bagels up so I could see them. “Plain, everything, or blueberry?”
“Um, plain.” I really was hungry, so if he was going to make me eat, at least I was going to have what I liked. “With plain cream cheese.”
“Okay, then.” He opened the bagel and smeared a generous dollop of cream cheese on both sides and then handed the top half to me with a napkin. “Have one half first. If you’re truly full after that, you don’t have to eat the other half. But if you decide you do want it, it’ll be right here for you.”
I took a bite of the bagel and couldn’t help the way my eyes fluttered closed in pleasure. It was so good. “Mmm.”
When I opened my eyes again, Axel was grinning. “Glad you like it.”
“Thank you. It’s really good.”
He merely nodded and made a bagel for himself while I got started with the morning setup. By the time Jason and Jesse arrived, Kona and I were already playing fetch outside, and Axel was on his way to work with the promise of stopping by around lunch time to check on another delivery he was expecting.
I believed that he was coming back for something related to the job he was hired to do, but a tiny part of my heart wondered if maybe he was coming back to check on me. To make sure I was still okay and see if I needed anything. No one had ever done that before, but it felt like something that Axel would do for people he cared about.
What my brain wasn’t completely ready to believe was that I could be one of those people too.
NINE
AXEL
I wasn’t sure what to expect when I showed up at the daycare with bagels. But what I didn’t expect was for Billy to refuse to eat. At first, I wondered if maybe he really was full from a big dinner, but that didn’t track if what everything else he’d said was true.
And when his stomach growled, I knew he was lying.
Honestly, that hurt. It shouldn’t have. I had no right to demand answers from him, but I did. And he kinda gave me one. Not the real one or a complete one, but I believed that he did feel some insecurity about his body or his weight and wanted to diet.
What he didn’t understand is that I fucking loved his body. He was soft and round in all the right places. Exactly the way I liked my boys. Just because I spent hours in the gym and had a body-builder’s physique, that didn’t mean I was attracted to that body type in others. I wasn’t. Not at all.
