Chapter Twenty-Four

Chelle

Chelle’s apartment was too quiet.

Sure, if she counted the sound of the dogs tag-team snoring, it was the regular levels of loud, but this was different. This was there’s-no-Nash silence, and she didn’t like it. Honestly, it gave her the creeps. She couldn’t even write, since part of her process was now blocking out the sound of Nash roaming through the apartment while he was on conference calls with his team, talking about Beckett Cosmetics product launches, sales figures, and potential distribution deals. The man could never work in a Panera, the staff would definitely kick him out for being disruptive.

It was true, but he was also her disruption, and despite having a mirror chat with herself about all the reasons why it was foolish—namely how this whole marriage of theirs was a total fake—she missed him.

She flopped down on the couch with a groan, and since she was already focused on the dumb things she was doing, she reached for her planner filled with all the details about the building Christmas party. She scanned the to-do list as her gut churned. Yep. It had definitely been a craptastic idea to suggest this. This was what happened when she decided that it would be fun to host a party. Eventually she had to actually have the party, which meant all of the work that went with putting on a party and—the worst part—actually interacting with people. Once she started chatting with her neighbors, it would be fine, but up until that moment, she’d be nothing but a ball of anxiety soaked in kerosene, standing by a lit match.

Note to self: never volunteer to put on a party ever again.

The dogs heard Nash’s key in the door before she did, snapping out of a dead sleep to bound off the couch and rush to the front door. She shoved her planner aside, jumped up from the couch, and had checked herself in the mirror to smooth her hair into place and make sure she didn’t have lettuce from today’s lunch stuck between her teeth before he even cleared the foyer.

Damn, woman, what are you, some nineteen-fifties housewife?

She should be giving herself a serious talking-to about being this excited to see her fake temporary husband, but she was too excited to see Nash to go through the motions. He walked into the living room, the dogs yapping happily as they circled his ankles. And when he looked at her, all of the nervous energy that had been zapping her since he’d left for an emergency trip to the office this morning melted away as if it had never existed.

“Hey, honey,” he said as he gave her a weary smile. “I’m home.”

She was about to tease him about almost being late for dinner when she realized his smile was only a single dimpler. That couldn’t be good. Then she looked closer at him, concern tightening her stomach. Nash looked exhausted—well, as much as a hot guy in a custom-made suit could. His shoulders were slumped, his tie was askew, and he had the thousand-mile stare of someone who had seen some shit at the office.

“Do you want me to take the dogs for a walk?” He set his briefcase down with a tired sigh and then draped his suit jacket over the back of the chair, rolling his neck from side to side. “I can run down the block to the deli on the corner and grab sandwiches for us for dinner tonight.”

“Dogs are walked and Uber Eats is already ordered.” She crossed over to him and wrapped her arms around his solid middle. “Rough day at the office?”

“It always is when I get called in during the company’s designated work-from-home time because that always means something went wrong—very wrong. We just closed a distribution deal with a chain of high-end and very exclusive boutiques in South Korea for months and things went sideways and—” He stopped and gave her an apologetic look. “Sorry, you don’t want to hear any of this.”

“Of course I do.” She nudged him to sit down in the chair and took a seat herself on the ottoman. “Tell me everything.”

He hesitated a few seconds, as though people didn’t usually ask him about his problems, and they probably didn’t. She’d met his family, and it wasn’t that they didn’t love him. They did. It wasn’t like they ignored him like her family ignored her so much as they’d accepted that his part in the family was being the fixer. The thing was, though, who took that role for him?

Before she could ask him, he started telling her about his shitty day. As she undid his shoelaces for him and slipped off his shoes, he explained how an overeager intern accidentally deleted the boutique’s orders from the system. Then everything went straight to shit after that, he told her as he wiggled his toes and let out an appreciative groan when she went to work rubbing the arches of his feet.

Chelle only got the general gist of things when he started using jargon and going into specifics about logistics. Then there was the part about skin serums baking out on loading docks because they’d been packed into regular shipping containers instead of refrigerated ones that sounded like a huge issue. By the time she finished his mini foot massage and the Uber Eats delivery driver rang the doorbell, he’d spilled about a million other fiddly little details that lead up to one pain-in-the-ass result—a trashed relationship with a distributor and a multi-billion dollar deal on the edge of disaster.

Their dinner order from Athena’s Garden arrived at that part in the story. He went and changed out of his suit into his gray sweatpants and an Ice Knights T-shirt while she plated their spanakopita and poured a beer for each of them.

“So what happened next?” Chelle asked when he came back out.

He sat down across from her at the little bistro table in the kitchen. “Are you sure you want to hear more?”

She narrowed her eyes at him. If he even thought of holding out now when she had to know what happened next, she was gonna slide her always-cold hands under his shirt and plant her icy palms on his abs. That would serve him right.

“The intern had just sent a company-wide email that said ‘Go tit!’ instead of ‘Got it,’” she said. “You can’t leave me waiting to find out what happened next.”

The double dimpler was back, and he continued the story, adding in little details about the people involved that made her giggle as he demolished the spanakopita like a man who’d missed breakfast and lunch, which by the sound of what his day had been like, he had. Without questioning, she got up and grabbed the two slices of baklava for dessert and put them both in front of Nash—they were medicinal at this point.

“Not only to everyone in the company but to the entire leadership team for the boutiques in South Korea.” He ate the last bite of the savory spinach pie and let out a happy groan. “It was a giant fucking mess, but I fixed it.” He shot her a cocky grin and started in on the baklava. “That’s what I do.” He let out a blissed-out sigh the second the honey pastry hit his tongue. “God, this is delicious.”

“And what about the intern?” she asked. “Did you fire him?”

“Nah.” He shook his head. “I worked with him on making a plan so this wouldn’t happen again and told him I’d see him back in the office after the new year.”

“You didn’t even write him up?”

“I could have, but the guy has a lot of talent and drive. He was overeager, that’s all. It happens,” he said with a shrug, as if 99 percent of the people in his position at Beckett Cosmetics wouldn’t have rained hellfire down on the intern without a second thought. “The important thing is that next time he’s going to reach out to his supervisors before clicking submit on the cancellation form. He’ll learn from this mistake, and hopefully, he’ll ask for help before making another one.”

“You’re nicer than a lot of people,” she said, meaning every word of it.

Sure, he still couldn’t help but mansplain his way into trouble, but like the intern, he was trying. Nash Beckett was a pain in the ass, but he was a really good guy. The kind of guy she wanted for the heroines in her books—not perfect but solid. Who would have thought she’d finally find someone like that when the relationship was about as real as the fictional ones she wrote about?

“But,” he said, interrupting the bittersweet turn of her thoughts, “not nicer than the woman who decides to organize a Christmas party for her whole building.”

“You mean a glutton for punishment who now has serious regrets?” So, so many regrets. The kind that had her gut twisted up in knots.

He let out a protective, rumbly growl. “I take it Suzanne and your shitbag uncle RSVP’d a yes?”

She nodded and took her last bite of the spinach pie, crunching down on the flaky phyllo pastry. “But I’ve got plans for us tonight that have nothing to do with Uncle Buckley, the witch of the building, or Beckett Cosmetics deals on the brink.”

His grimace transformed immediately into a cocky smile. “Does it involve getting naked?”

“Eventually,” she said with a laugh. “But first you have to experience my favorite routine in the world. It’s perfect for after a shit day.”

“Okay,” he said with an exaggerated sigh. “I’m game. What do I need to do?”

Chelle walked over to the couch and sat down. “Come sit down and put your head on my lap.”

He waggled his eyebrows at her like some kind of cartoon playboy as he joined her in the living room. “I like where this is going.”

Yeah, she kind of wished she’d come up with a different plan when he’d walked into the apartment looking like he’d taken on the entire world. However, she knew that this was what the guy who fixed everything for everyone else really needed.

“Keep your clothes on, Beckett.”

He pouted, but he did what he was told, stretching out on the couch so his feet were at one end and his head was lying on her thighs. The dogs, obviously sensing a prime napping opportunity, jumped up and tucked themselves between the side of Nash’s legs and the back of the couch.

After he had settled in, she used the home app on her phone to dim the lights and start the gas fireplace. Then she opened up her audiobook app and hit play on her favorite comfort read, Dead Until Dark by Charlaine Harris. Yep, the best thing for a rough day was a little old school vampire romance. The book’s opening lines came through the Bluetooth surround sound speakers.

“We’re gonna listen to a book?” he asked, sounding like she’d just told him they were going to apply leeches to their bodies and let them drink them both dry.

“Yep,” she said, not bothering to elaborate. “Now close your eyes.”

When he did, she started running her fingers through his hair, slow and steady.

It didn’t happen right away, but by the time Sookie started up her first conversation with vampire Bill during her waitressing shift at Merlotte’s, the tension had ebbed out of Nash’s shoulders. They sat there in silence for close to an hour, listening to the telepathic waitress’s and vampire’s story. It was so comfortable and so right that she sank back against the couch, her fingers tangled in his hair, even though she’d stopped dragging them through the strands and closed her eyes, too, soaking in the moment of absolute, perfect ease. Normally, it was just her and the pugs doing this, and it had always been magnificent. But with Nash? It was just better.

“I’m definitely going to hold this against you in the divorce,” he said, his eyes still closed even after she’d hit pause on the audiobook an hour later. “You’ve turned my bones to mush.”

“That’s called self-care.” She ran her fingers through his soft hair one last time because she was afraid if she didn’t, she’d miss being able to even more when he was gone after Christmas. “I’ll make sure to mention that in the divorce,” she teased, desperate to lighten the mood that was starting to feel so heavy on her shoulders. “Judge, I was forced to wait on him hand and foot and meet his many self-care needs.” This couldn’t be about emotions. It could be about desire and about mutual benefits, but it couldn’t be more than that. She wasn’t sure she’d survive that. “And I know something that’s going to make it even worse.”

“Oh yeah?” he asked, giving her a double dimpler that made her heart flip-flop in her chest. “I can take it. Does it involve getting naked?”

“Yes!” Orgasms were the perfect distraction from all of these feelings trying to work their way up to the surface.

He was up and off the couch so fast that Mary and Groucho started barking in surprise. She barely had time to blink before he was scooping her up and carrying her out of the living room and down the hall.

“Your place or mine?” he asked, looking from her bedroom door to his.

“Surprise me.”

And he did. Three gloriously toe-curling times.