Nate(31)

Not this night, not our first night all of us were here.

My breath was short. My chest was rising. I felt my nipples harden as I took him in, all of him.

He was in only sweatpants. No shirt. No socks. Just his pants.

The moonlight hit him in the exact right light, showcasing defined shoulders and arms. His chest. The shadow tapered down over his stomach, and I couldn’t see it. That was in darkness, but his side showed not an ounce of fat.

Feeling a breeze that moved over the back of my neck, I lifted my eyes and almost gasped again. He’d been watching me watching him, and a whole other awareness passed between us.

Lust filled his gaze, and it was hungry.

I felt it match a need inside of me. My mouth was suddenly dry. My throat parched.

Then it was his turn.

His eyes trailed down me, over my tank top, lingering on my skin, my breasts. My shirt was made of soft material and it bunched at my waist, showing my sleeping shorts’ waistband. The side of my stomach was exposed and then he moved further, his gaze going over my thighs, my knees, my calves, my feet, and back up.

I felt touched by him.

I should’ve been repulsed.

I wasn’t.

A throb had started and it only intensified as his eyes went to my lips, up to my eyes. He held my gaze, then dipped back and stayed on my mouth.

That same lust was washing through me, hitting my insides like angry waves against a cliff’s edge. It felt violent, but desperate at the same time.

My breath hitched.

I licked my lips.

I sat and watched him. He sat and watched me.

Neither of us spoke. Neither of us moved. Not an inch.

But I wanted him.

Then Nova rolled over, a snore left her, and it did nothing to break the mood.

I still wanted him, but neither of us did a thing about it. That night was a truce in our war.

We’d go back to hating each other in the morning. Hating, but needing.





20





Quincey





I wasn’t sure what I had expected, but over the past three weeks, it wasn’t what happened.

And that was a big nothing.

Nothing happened.

There was no drama.

There were no more police visits.

No calls from my father.

No emails.

Nothing.

I had expected some drama with Nate, but there was zilch on that front, too.

He seemed to sense when I wanted time with Nova—when I wanted to feed her, hug her, play with her, change her diapers, chase after her. And the times when I was tired, he sensed that, too. He stepped in, and even as I would start going to her room, I’d hear his low croons, which were usually followed by her laughter.

Nova was generally a happy baby, thank goodness. Then again, that should’ve been expected if I was just going off Valerie.

Val was the happy one. Not me. If Nova had come from my loins, that kid would be screaming more than not. And judging by Nate, well, I couldn’t judge that. He’d been an alpha dick when I first met him, and I had to give him credit. I understood.

Yet since I moved in, he was the opposite.

I hadn’t expected him and his people to step up how they had.

They took up my fight. I guess it was his fight, too, but it still seemed as though they had rallied around me. Especially Aspen.

Logan, too.

Before he left, he told me to call him if my father made any moves. I wasn’t totally sure what he meant because I was getting a sense he wasn’t just talking about legal moves, but I let it go. After Aspen and Logan left, Emily started up again. Nate mentioned his Miss Sandy was an option as well, but I liked the schedule we had.

Once Emily started, things really did settle down.

She and I already had a schedule sorted. We both helped with feeding Nova. When she went down for a nap, I began using Nate’s pool house as a dance studio. There was hardly any furniture in there since he’d just moved in, and the glass doors and mostly floor-to-ceiling windows felt eerily similar to my old studio.

After a long dance, I came back to the house and helped Emily with feeding Nova again.

It was the afternoons when I started to get restless.

Emily left around five or some days at six. We both traded off just being around Nova.

It was nice, and I knew it wasn’t a normal situation.

Nate had started spending more time in his office. Then he began leaving for business meetings. In his file, Carl had noted that Nate came to the city for investment properties, so I assumed Nate was off doing that sort of work. If he was around during the day, he spent time with Nova, but he was usually around in the evenings, and that was when he really stepped in.

He fed Nova.

He played with Nova.

He held her, sat with her.

He was obsessed with her.

I understood.

So, since I got her during the day, I started giving them time in the evenings.

And because I had the time, I’d go back into the studio.

I was used to dancing for hours, on and off, all day long. And then the shows. Sometimes, we did two shows a day. Sometimes. Not always.

I missed those days.

“Have you thought about returning?”

I was stretching, my head by my toes, when Nate spoke up.

Startled, I whipped up. My heart leaped up in my throat, but then I relaxed when I spotted him. He was in the doorway, holding Nova. Both were quiet and watching me.