Give & Take (Redbeard Cove #2)

25. Lana

Chapter 25

Lana

C lose to the end of the movie, I can’t hold on anymore—I have to pee. I get up, telling the kids it’s fine, there’s no need to pause. I could use the emotional reprieve anyway. These stupid movies always wreck me.

When I come back, I freeze, taking in the scene. The girls are now sitting next to each other, Aurora snuggled into her sister. She’s pulled Raph’s hand onto her head in some kind of comfort move.

Raph, meanwhile, is sprawled out like a starfish, mouth slightly agape.

He’s completely passed out. The girls giggle as he lets out a little snore before tilting his face sideways. He’s been tired the past few days, I could tell, but a Raphael version of tired. A kind of doggedness that only seemed to hit when he slowed down. So he just kept going.

Until now.

Raph sleeps right through to the end of the movie. As the credits roll, the girls and I lift up his legs so he’s lying sideways on the couch. Nova lays a blanket on him and Aurora even gets him a stuffy—a little penguin she calls Barbara.

He sleeps through Bob from Animal control coming by along with Fred. Bob says he doesn’t think the cat will be back after the frankly traumatic afternoon it had, but insists I take precautions and call him day or night if I’m concerned.

Raphael sleeps through my phone ringing, me talking to Chris, and her insisting on taking the girls off my hands for a while. He sleeps through the girls squealing when they find out, and again when she shows up.

I try to keep them quiet as they gleefully reenact what happened outside with exaggerated hand gestures and roars.

They finish with “An’ now, Raph is passed out on the couch because he wrestled a cougar!”

Chris has to look away to keep from laughing at that.

I narrow my eyes. “He actually wrestled a cougar,” I tell her with an elbow to the ribs.

“You know,” she says, stepping out onto the porch, where I usher the girls outside to get their shoes on. “Dolly says he’s at the Bean Scene almost every night, working on his laptop. All day most weekends, too, when he’s not carpe-ing the diem with Cal. You know they parasail together? Cal’s never done that with anyone else. Says no one else can keep up.”

I frown as we head down the stairs to get Aurora’s booster out of my car. “Really? ”

It’s not the parasailing thing I’m surprised at. The girls have mentioned that to me. It’s hearing that Raph spends most of his time at the coffee shop that’s surprising to me. He never talks about his dissertation. But clearly he’s been working on it. It explains why he stays up so late too.

I feel a certain amount of guilt lift off of me I didn’t realize had been sitting there. Ever since our conversation about quitting things, I’d been worried he was going to quit his PhD. That I had him working too hard.

“What did you think your nanny was up to on the weekends?” Chris asks, quirking her lips as she takes the booster from me.

“What?”

“You’re nothing if not observant, Lana.”

I usher the girls into Chris’s car, making sure they’re buckling up.

She’s still waiting for an answer when I come out again, shutting the door.

“I don’t know,” I say. “I thought he was busy doing…young guy things.”

“Like dating?” Chris asks. She’s nothing if not direct.

A prickle of jealousy crawls over me. “He’s allowed to date.”

But the words feel bitter. He did date and I hated it. But we never talked about him not doing that. Because we’re not a thing.

Chris smirks. “Mm-hmm. Well, just so you know I’m going to keep these girls out past their bedtime.”

“Chris!” I look around, as if the neighbors are watching. Clearly even contemplating has me worried about what people are going to think. I blush furiously. “It’s not like that.”

“It should be. You deserve to have some fun.”

But that’s the thing. My feelings for Raph have ventured beyond just fun.

I’m in so deep I can hardly breathe.

“You sure you’re okay with taking them?” I ask again. My voice is higher pitched than normal. I’m trying to be bright. She’s going to see right through me.

Luckily Chris has refocused on the girls. “Please. They’re my favorite people in the whole world. I like them more than you some days. Mostly because they tell me everything.”

I smile, though my molars are clenched. I’m not fooling her.

In the car, Nova knocks on the window. “Let’s go!” she says, muffled through the glass.

“You don’t have to stay out late,” I say, like I’m desperate to have an excuse for things not to go where I know they’re heading with Raph. “I know you train in the morning.”

Chris walks over to the driver’s side. “Not anymore. The Asshole has chosen Monday morning as his favorite training time. It’s my favorite training time! Can you believe that?”

“Why don’t you give him shit? You’re good at that.”

Chris rolls her eyes. “I’ve tried. He’s never once taken off his helmet to give me the time of day. He just stares at me and takes off. Anyway, whatever. The point is, I’m free now, and I can sleep in tomorrow morning. Fuck that guy.” She gives me a smirk, pointing her chin to my front door and whispering, “And you should fuck that guy.”

“Chris!” I exclaim, glancing down to the girls. But they’re behind glass of course, and deep in some kind of clearly important argument.

Chris cackles as she gets in the car.

After waving them off, I go back inside and lean my back against the front door.

You should fuck that guy.

I swallow, my stomach a jumble of nerves. Just because he’s in my house, alone, doesn’t mean anything’s going to happen.

I look at him. His long form remains sprawled on my couch, one arm high, the other on his chest. I can’t help think of how good he looks there. So at home under that afghan my mom made me years ago, his feet sticking out the end he’s so tall.

I can’t help but think of how safe he made me feel today; how he still makes me feel, even when he’s asleep, just by being here.

Tears clog my throat once again as I think of this morning.

I blink them away.

I could wake him up, tell him he’s free to go home. But honestly? That’s the last thing I want.

Instead, I lay another blanket over his exposed feet, then pull the first one up over his shoulders.

He mumbles something, slinging his hand out until he finds mine. He tugs me toward him. “ Sunshine,” he mumbles. Then kisses me sleepily on the back of my hand before resting it on the pillow next to him.

I’m not even sure he woke up there.

My chest squeezes. Something else squeezes too as I look at the way his stubble stretches down his jaw. How his hand, with its long fingers, tapered nails, and couple of rings stretches over his chest. He could cup a lot in that hand.

Lest I do a repeat of the other night and do something inappropriate while he sleeps, I quickly go upstairs. It’s too early to eat, and I’m not hungry anyway. So I run a bath.

He might wake up and hear it, and come investigate. And if he does?

A tingle runs through me. Then he does.

Or he might sleep through it. He’ll probably sleep through it.

I don’t know if it’s the warm water and Epsom salts or the healthy-sized glass of Cab Sav I brought with me, but the moment I drop my clothes and slip into the nearly scalding water, I let out a long, blissful breath.

Sometime later, my phone buzzes.

Chris, probably.

But when I reach for it on the shelf next to the bath, I see it’s not Chris.

RAPH: Where is everyone?

My heart thumps. Outside, rain begins to prick against the window.

I tell him about Chris taking the kids out. I’m tempted to tell him I’m out too, just so he can go home and we can pretend everything is totally normal. That he didn’t just see me sob through a whole movie, or leap out of a second story window to save us.

Or that all I’ve been able to think about for days… weeks …is him. And what I want to happen right now.

With a whirring in my stomach, I text him back:

LANA: I’m upstairs.

RAPH: What are you doing?

LANA: I’m in the bath.

Three dots pop up. I can barely breathe.

They disappear.

Then:

RAPH: Are there bubbles?

I laugh. The feeling unspools me almost as much as the risk I’m taking in basically issuing him an invitation to come upstairs.

LANA: Yes, Raph, there are bubbles.

RAPH: Great. Can I join you?

My stomach does the kind of move I imagine it might when launching into orbit.

But before I can respond, Raph writes again.

RAPH: Not in the bath. Just to talk.

I let out another breath, disappointment cooling me slightly. I shouldn’t be disappointed. This is much smarter.

What if he wants to set boundaries this time? Especially because I invited him to trample all over mine? What if?—

“You can say no.”

The voice startles me so much I slosh wine into the bath. I set the glass down, hand trembling.

I drop down into the bubbles. “Raph? What are you doing?” My heart patters against my ribs.

“I brought a chair.”

I let out a laugh of disbelief. “Oh, okay, you brought a chair. So… you want to just come on in and hang out with me naked?”

What the hell am I doing? Didn’t I want this? It’s like I’m trying to sabotage myself. One last shove to keep the door to my heart—to my desires—firmly closed.

Raph’s voice comes through the door again. “Lana, that’s ridiculous. Why would I be naked?”

I cover my eyes with my hands, fighting a laugh.

“I mean I could be, if you want me to.”

“Raph!”

“Lana, I promise no funny stuff. Unless you want funny stuff. Like jokes. And other stuff.”

I’m laughing audibly now.

“I’m coming in. Say no.”

I don’t say no.

The door pops open a crack .

I cover my face with my hands, embarrassed. “Come in.”

“That’s not the part people usually cover up when they’re naked, Sunshine.”

I throw a tuft of bubbles at him. “You’re ridiculous.”

“You’re the one wearing only bubbles.”

I do a surreptitious check that the bubbles are doing their job. Thankfully, they’re still thick and cover the whole length of the tub.

Raph, true to his promise, has brought a kitchen chair up here. He twirls it around as if it weighs nothing, and settles on it next to the tub, facing me. His eyes trail from my face downward, over the bubbles to where my toes stick out at the other end. He can’t see anything, but suddenly I’m sure he’s picturing what’s under there. When his eyes land back on my face, his eyes seem to darken as he takes in my flushed cheeks, my slightly parted lips.

I swallow, shifting in the tub as I try to relieve the heaviness that’s settled in my lower half.

Except Raph’s eyes move to the bubbles again. I’ve lifted a knee. We both watch as a glossy drip of bubbles slides down my thigh.

“Lana—” he says. Croaks, more like.

My mouth is dry. I feel suddenly completely exposed. As I should.

I drop my knee. “Maybe this was a bad idea,” I blurt out.

He snaps his gaze back down to me. “No.” Then frowns. “Wait, which part? Me being in here with you? Or you hiring me in the first place? Or something else?”

A breath slides out of me, which blows a tiny fluff of bubbles from the heap at my chest. “Both. I should have hired some elderly Scottish lady. Someone with rumpled pantyhose and excellent pie-making skills.”

“I can make pie.”

I close my eyes. Jokes are good. I can do jokes. “No you can’t.”

“I mean I’m sure I could if I tried.” He’s back to his normal, confident self.

“Anyone ever tell you you’re incredibly self-assured? Some might call it cocky.”

“Nonsense.”

“What do you mean, nonsense?”

But then Raph skims a finger through the bubbles. Whatever it was I did that gave me the upper hand a moment ago—that put him at a loss for words—it’s gone. I can hardly breathe as he drags his finger in a cleaved path through the bubbles, only a scant few inches above my body.

It could be a lazy gesture that doesn’t mean much. Except when I look at Raph, his eyes are on me. He’s smirking, just a little. Yet he looks…mature. Like he’s making all the jokes, but he’s the one who’s firmly in control here.

A tingling heat runs through me, right under where his finger trailed a moment ago.

“Well,” he says, and I realize he’s answering my question, about him saying nonsense to me calling him cocky. “Every single human is amazing, don’t you think? All of us. We’re living, breathing manifestations of divinity. Or stardust. Whatever you believe. The chances of us even existing are 1 in 10 to the 2,500,000th power. Or something close to that.”

“Is that right?”

“Statistics don’t lie.” His eyes twinkle as he looks at me.

My stomach twists. But it’s not just my stomach. It’s my chest, too. I feel…too happy around this man.

This much younger man leaving at the end of the summer.

I’ve tried so hard not to think about that. Not when I’m trying to let myself relax; to fall into whatever this is because fighting it is just too hard.

His eyes don’t leave mine. “You okay, Sunshine?”

I shake my head. “No,” I whisper.

Raph studies me a moment, then brushes a strand of wet hair from my temple. His finger leaves a wet path across my skin that somehow feels like sparkles. Like he’s left that stardust he talked about there. I want to commit the sensation to memory.

“What’s wrong?” he asks. Not in a confused way, but in a way that tells me he wants me to lay it all out. To list out all the things that are wrong with what we’re doing so he can negate them one by one.

And I want him to. God, I want him to.

Suddenly I feel like the younger one here, the more na?ve one. The more vulnerable one. I’m certainly the one with more to lose.

“Nannies don’t normally come into the bathroom with their employers. That makes their employers very bad people.”

“Do you think you’re a bad person, Lana? ”

There’s no innuendo there. It’s a serious question. But it still sends a spark of something through me. Something dark and forbidden.

“No,” I say tentatively.

He strokes another strand of hair from my face and I take a stuttering breath at his touch. I close my eyes, tipping my face toward his hand.

Raph lets his thumb trail down over my cheek. It brushes, softly, against my lip, and I feel heat gather heavy in my lower half.

Then with one last brush of his fingertips, his hand is gone. “I want to read you something.”

He shifts in his chair. Is he readjusting himself?

“Read me something?” I repeat, a little stunned.

“Yup.” He reaches into his back pocket. The motion twists his t-shirt across his torso, revealing a firmness to his lean form. That heaviness feels acute. An ache blooming between my legs.

“Raph,” I say.

He pulls out the worn, yellow-edged paperback, settling his forearms on the back of the chair as he cracks it open. “Do we have time?” he asks, sounding completely unrushed.

If he didn’t have the book open, I’d think it was a broader question. Do we have time to do this? Or be together the way I so desperately want? Or is he talking about the summer—our time together?

“Today,” he specifies. He must see me spiraling.

I pin my thoughts, forcing myself to breathe. It’s funny, he sees me freaking out, but he’s completely unconcerned. Another man might worry I’d spook, that he’d lose his chance to get laid.

But not Raph. It might be that cockiness, but I don’t think so. It’s like he knows me, and doesn’t mind my waves. He keeps the boat steady each time I try to rock it.

Through it all, he stays.

He stays.

“Yes,” I whisper. “We have time.” Right now, we have time.