Page 16 of Wicked Destiny

“Tell me more about the boyfriend.” He scrolls through my phone. “I don’t see any pictures.”

“I deleted all of them.” I shrug. “Didn’t see any reason to keep him around.”

Beau raises an eyebrow.

“It wasn’t so bad at first. He didn’t leave when she got sick again. Owen was good at the caregiving part. Eden was gone all the time so he drove with me and her to appointments. Sat in the waiting rooms. Held my hand through the scans. Everyone commented on what a rock he was.” I manage to recount the most humiliating part of my life without breaking. “In retrospect, it was all performative. He didn’t want to deal with how crushed I was once there was nothing left to fight for. Behind closed doors he chastised me for crying. Told me I wasn’t fun anymore. Complained he was too young to be around someone who was so sad.”

Beau folds his hands in his lap. “I want to call him an asshole, which fits. At the same time, I probably was him back in the day. I didn’t have much consideration for anyone but myself. I’m sorry, Elodie. I wish he’d been more understanding.”

“Yeah…well. The asshole broke up with me a month before she died.” I suck in a breath. “I’ll tell you a secret. Part of me was relieved because it meant one less person I had to be okay for.”

I’ve never confessed the Owen story to anyone besides my best friend. Now that Beau knows the truth, I’m having a hard time keeping it together.

He puts an arm around me. Nothing he wouldn’t do for one of his friends. I lean against him automatically. He’s warm, solid, and smells like clean laundry. He’s the first person who’s heard the whole thing and hasn’t needed me to make it easier for him.

My body melts into him like it’s been waiting all week for the excuse.

Then I start to pull back because I don’t want him to feel uncomfortable, but he holds me in place. His hand comes up to the back of my neck, under my hair. Not pulling me in. Not pushing me off. Comforting me. His thumb begins to move slow, along the top of my spine.

His gentle strokes ignite something explosive within me. One drag of his thumb under my hair, and every nerve in my body picks up the signal and sends zings to my nipples. My pussy pulses with arousal.

“Don’t stop.” My voice doesn’t sound like mine. “Please. Keep touching me.”

Beau stills. I can feel him calculating the potential ramifications. He’s a man at the edge of a cliff deciding whether to step off into the abyss.

It’s now or never. I can’t let him think for a moment longer. I turn my head and press my lips to his.

And oh, holy hell, he’s ready and willing and this is what everyone has been going on and on about.

The man kisses the way he does everything, unhurried and certain, like he’s got nowhere to be and nothing to prove. His mouth is soft and his stubble rubs me raw. When a small, broken sound escapes out of me he answers low in his chest and uses the hand on my neck to tip my head back and kiss me deeper. My whole body arches into him instinctively.

I slide my hands under Beau’s shirt, up the hot skin of his back and then down. Brazenly, I press my palm flat to the front of his jeans to find his cock rigid, thick and straining against the denim.

Knowing I’m the reason he’s hard makes me feel reckless and powerful all at once.

Beau catches my wrist.

“Elodie.” He pulls back an inch, his breathing rough. “We can’t. This is wrong. My daughter is older than you. I can’t be the man who takes something precious from you when you’ll spend the rest of your life wishing you’d kept it for a man who loves you.”

“Jesus. I’m not a virgin, Beau.” It’s out before I can make it graceful. “I’ve had sex. With three different guys, but I’ve never had an orgasm. Not even on my own. I can’t seem to figure out what to do and it’s frustrating. For a while, I thought I was broken. Until I met you. Now, every single night, I dream of having sex with you. I wake up so horny and I try to rub myself…”

He goes still.

“I’m not a kid. I’m a grown woman who buried her mother and pays her own rent and is not ashamed of who she desires. I want you. I trust you. I’ve never been drawn to anyone the way I am to you. I’m asking—no begging.” I move his hand from my wrist, set it on my bare knee and, holding his eyes, slide it up under my skirt. “Show me. I know you can get me there. Please.”

Whatever restraint he has left, is gone. “I’m going to hell for this.”

“No, you’re gonna take me to heaven.” I open my leg to give him more access.

Beau’s mouth drops to my neck. He sucks at the skin under my ear, hard enough to pull a gasp out of me as his fingers hook the crotch of my panties and he drags them aside. Sliding through my wetness, he groans into my throat like a wild animal.

“Christ, Elodie,” he rasps. “You’re soaked.”

I am. Embarrassingly, gloriously drenched with desire for this man. He drags a finger up and over my clit and starts to circle, slow and certain, and the sound coming out of me is like nothing I’ve ever heard.

My God, Beau is good at this. Two fingers work up into my channel and curl toward my front wall. He finds some sort of magic bundle of nerves and suddenly I’m writhing. Then screaming with a kind of pleasure I never imagined was possible.

His thumb takes over working my clit as his fingers plunge in and out, dragging maddeningly over the spot. His mouth stays fixed on my neck.