AARON KNEW THE invitation was unwise even as the eager words left his mouth. ‘Would you like to join us for dinner?’
He and Charlie had bumped into Stella at the village shop and, try as he might, he couldn’t stop himself. She carried a solitary bottle of wine and they hadn’t had a moment alone together since he dropped her at home after they had delivered the Heath baby three days ago and kissed in the driver’s seat like horny teenagers.
‘We’re having meatballs and spaghetti.’ Charlie beamed, as if the menu might sway her decision. ‘It’s my favourite. But Dad forgot to buy the pasta sauce, didn’t you, Dad?’
‘I did.’ Aaron met Stella’s stare. He was so conflicted that he almost withdrew the invitation. But the deed was done. Charlie had recognised Stella the minute they’d walked into the tiny shop and it was only one home-cooked meal, hardly a grand seduction. It couldn’t even really be called a date.
‘Um...’ She smiled down at Charlie. ‘Do you have enough? I don’t want to deprive you of your favourite meal.’
‘We have lots,’ Charlie said dramatically, ‘but I’m only allowed three meatballs, because they are this big.’ He made a circle with his thumb and forefinger and looked to Aaron for confirmation.
‘We normally have leftovers, but it’s no big deal,’ Aaron eyed her bottle of wine, ‘if you have plans.’ None of his business.
Stella flushed. ‘My parents are out tonight. I was going to have a glass of this and maybe make some cheese on toast.’ She shrugged. ‘Actually, I’d love to join you for spaghetti, now that you have the sauce.’
They shared another look that made Aaron think they were both wary of the dynamics and of sharing too much. Was Stella, like him, also running out of resolve against the temptation?
Aaron’s cottage was a three-minute walk, door-to-door from the shop. Aaron quickly completed the partially prepared meal with the addition of pasta sauce, Charlie set another place at the table for Stella and she poured two glasses of wine.
‘See,’ said Charlie, pointing with his fork, ‘I have three meatballs, and you have three meatballs.’ He offered Stella his happy smile as he showed off his maths skills. ‘That makes six. It’s a double.’
Stella gave Charlie a high five and an impressed nod. ‘You’re a very smart young man.’
Aaron’s heart swelled with pride as he watched Stella interact with Charlie, even as the instant and easy connection between them caused a lump to press against his lungs and restrict his breath. Just like all the other wonderful things he had learned about her, he immediately knew she would make an amazing mother if she ever chose to have children.
He had an urgent and visceral urge to lean across the table and kiss her. In fact, he hadn’t stopped wanting to kiss her since that very first time their lips met.
He was so doomed...
She had been right. Delivering the Heath baby with Stella had brought up a sickening collision of his past and present. The wonder of holding his son. The love he’d felt watching Molly kiss his downy head. Then the shock and desolation of his wife, Charlie’s mother, being snatched away from them both.
When Abby’s baby had been safely delivered he’d clung to Stella in that moment of shared joy, wondering how he had become so desperate for her in such a short space of time.
Watching her now with his son, the answer was obvious. How could he not be utterly captivated?
‘What’s your favourite part of school?’ she asked Charlie.
Aaron stifled a laugh, knowing exactly what his son’s response would be. He often asked him that very question and usually received the same answer: lunchtime, with home time in second place.
‘I like lunchtime,’ said Charlie, predictably. ‘Today we had veggie pizza.’ He stabbed at a meatball with his fork and waggled it around like a cheerleader’s pompom, his ‘z’s lisped adorably since he had lost his first baby tooth last week.
‘Yummy—I like pizza too,’ said Stella, catching Aaron’s eye once more.
Acknowledgement and communication passed silently between them, as if they had been together for years and knew how the other thought.
In his fantasy, he imagined it went something like:
Stella: Your son is adorable.
Aaron: You’re so good with him.
Both in unison: It makes me want you all the more.
But the tightening in his gut reminded him to slow down his wild imaginings. Something out of his control was happening. That he craved her company, her smiles, her sharp wit was understandable. The physical compulsions made sense. But this new longing—that the affinity they had for each other extended to Charlie in Stella’s case—mystified him.
He was on dangerous ground, craving the cerebral connection as much as the physical, because Stella might have been specifically designed to his specifications.
Only she couldn’t be his, just as he wasn’t the man for her, neither of them wanting the emotional attachment that sometimes felt as if it was developing without their permission.
Aaron filled his mouth with food, giving himself more time to think. Except he was too out of practice to untangle his emotions, having spent years merely accepting the guilt he lived with and embracing his position.
‘Pizza is my favourite,’ continued Charlie, oblivious to the adult tension stealing Aaron’s appetite and the fact that only half an hour ago he’d declared the same was true for meatballs and spaghetti. ‘But Dad always makes the edges too brown and crispy.’ His son offered a withering look that spoke of his long suffering under his father’s culinary challenges. ‘Johnny’s mum makes nice, soft edges, like the pizza at school.’
Stella looked away from a sombre Charlie and pressed her lips together, Aaron assumed to hold in a smile.
‘Does he?’ She flicked a knowing look at Aaron. ‘That’s not good. But I have an idea. You could help him by setting a timer on his phone that will tell him when the pizza is ready to come out of the oven. I’ll show you how to do it after we eat our meatballs if you like.’
Charlie’s eyes went wide, impressed, no doubt delighted that he’d have access to Aaron’s phone. Like most parents Aaron constantly struggled to police screen time, but this was a practical, even educational skill, so he could hardly object.
His son’s face lit up, his dreamy gaze falling on Stella in a way that meant Aaron would likely be peppered with Stella-related questions for the rest of the week.
Aaron mouthed Thank you to Stella and gripped his silverware tighter, fresh guilt tightening his shoulders. For everyone’s sake, he couldn’t let them become too close. Because Charlie had naturally warmed to Stella, as if his life lacked the influence of a sage and wise woman, even if it was simply to ward off burnt pizza in the future.
The sigh Aaron held inside settled like a stitch under his ribs. Why could he see Stella fitting into their lives like the missing piece of a jigsaw? Was his guilt over Molly, the main thing that had held him back from seriously dating all these years, getting in the way of Charlie’s development? Did he need a female figure in his life? Had he prevented Charlie from building a wider circle of relationships with his overprotective fears?
Restricting his own life because he didn’t deserve another chance at happiness was one thing, but limiting Charlie’s life in any way was the opposite of Aaron’s intention.
After dinner, while Aaron loaded the dishwasher in contemplative silence, Stella kept her promise and taught Charlie how to set the timer on his dad’s phone.
‘Now you can show me how good you are with your numbers,’ she said, her fond smile for his son shredding Aaron.
Stella’s natural affinity with children and Charlie’s awe and trust forced him to admit something he hadn’t wanted to explore since the night they’d spent together.
He wanted more than one night.
He probably always had, instinct and the restlessness grumbling away inside telling him this with Stella had never been casual, at least not for him.
But had her desires changed? Perhaps her declaration that she still wanted him in the car had come with the high of successfully delivering the Heath baby. And could he risk exploring this further when Charlie’s happiness was at stake?
His feelings might end up putting him in an impossible position: wanting a woman who could disappear at any time and risking that Charlie’s feelings might be caught in the crossfire. His son had lost enough.
Charlie let out an excited squeal, alerting Aaron to a change in topic.
‘Dad, Dr Stella can ride a horse.’ He jumped up on the wooden rocking horse in the corner to show off his skills to their guest. ‘Have you got a real horse?’ Charlie asked, eyes like saucers. ‘I want a pony but Dad will only buy me this one, because it’s dangerless.’ His little shoulders sagged at his dire deprivation.
Stella shot Aaron an apologetic grimace. ‘No, I don’t have my own horse. They are very expensive and take a lot of looking after,’ she said to Charlie. ‘I’m just helping other children learn to ride.’
With the dishes done, Aaron needed to usher Charlie upstairs for a bath. Otherwise they could be here all night locked in a plead-denial cycle that they had travelled many times.
‘Can you stay a while longer?’ he asked Stella after Charlie had reluctantly mumbled goodnight and run upstairs making clip-clop noises. ‘I won’t be long getting him settled.’ She seemed comfortable enough to be here, despite Charlie’s energy and constant chatter. And he wanted some alone time with her, to figure out their next move, because his head was scrambled.
‘Sure.’ She nodded, her smile indulgent despite the lingering reticence in her eyes.
He poured her another glass of wine and took the stairs two at a time. Thirty minutes later, with Charlie bathed, put to bed and a bedtime story read, Aaron came back downstairs to find Stella sitting before the fire. She’d put on an old vinyl from the selection he’d collected over the years, and a pile of Charlie’s folded clean laundry sat in the basket on the floor at her feet.
‘You didn’t need to do that, but thanks.’ He grabbed his own wine left over from dinner and took the seat next to her on the sofa.
‘Is he asleep?’ she asked, tucking her knee underneath her so she faced him.
His head might be all over the place but his body had no hesitations. He took her free hand in his. ‘He will be soon. He’s exhausted. He didn’t even ask for a second story.’
‘He’s adorable,’ she whispered, her face catching the glow from the fire.
Aaron flexed his fingers against hers. ‘Did I do the wrong thing by inviting you over?’
She smiled, shook her head, no hint of wariness in her eyes. ‘Did I do the wrong thing with the timer on the phone?’
‘No. You’ve made a fan for life.’
‘You’re obviously very close,’ she said.
Was she thinking about her closeness to Angus? Aaron tugged her hand, pressed his lips to her temple and inhaled the scent of her hair.
‘We are.’ He cleared a sudden blockage in his throat. ‘We’ve had to be.’
Stella’s eyes brimmed with compassion and understanding. For the first time ever Aaron contemplated a different reality for his future. Could he try to have a relationship with someone wonderful like Stella? Someone who respected his and Charlie’s relationship but also fitted in as if she had always been a vital component?
‘I didn’t realise that he worries about me quite so much, you know, with the pizza thing and my concerns about the riding,’ Aaron said, scrubbing at his jaw as doubts rattled the convictions that had helped him to survive these past five years. How messed up was it that his young son saw through him and his attempts to provide stability. Safety. Aaron was the grown-up; worrying was supposed to be his job.
Perhaps he needed to back off. He didn’t want Charlie to grow up neurotic.
‘Children can be very perceptive and intuitive.’ Stella stroked his arm. ‘Don’t beat yourself up. If your worst crime as a parent is a bit of burnt pizza, he’ll be absolutely fine.’
Aaron took her hand, grateful that she understood his turmoil. ‘Clearly Johnny’s family set the gold standard when it comes to all things from procreation to perfect pizza.’
Stella chuckled, her fingers making a lazy path on his skin. Was she aware of how her touch inflamed him, held him captive, redefined how he saw himself? Not just as a father, but also as a man.
‘You’re a great dad,’ she said. ‘He’s just trying to make sense of his world.’ That she saw him so clearly was evident in her next statement. ‘It doesn’t mean he’s lacking anything or missing out.’
Aaron looked away, that persistent trickle of shame heating his blood. Of course Charlie lacked a vital part of his life: his mother. And if anyone was at fault, it was Aaron.
‘I blame myself,’ he said after a pause where Stella gave him the time he needed.
‘For the burnt pizza?’ she asked, her small, perceptive smile telling him she was kindly offering him an out clause from exposing his deepest doubt if he needed it. Wonderful, caring woman.
‘That too.’ He laughed, grateful for her attempt at levity, but trusting her enough to want to voice the fear he suspected would haunt him for ever. ‘But mainly for Molly.’
Her stare latched to his, unflinching. Holding. Communicating.
I’m listening.
‘We hadn’t planned to get pregnant with Charlie when we did,’ he said. ‘One night we ran out of condoms. Molly thought the ovulation maths meant we’d be okay, but I’m a doctor. I should have known better than to risk such an unreliable form of contraception.’
‘You wouldn’t be the first married couple to dice with the dates.’
He shrugged, futility a hollow space in his chest. ‘I guess not, but usually the story has a happy outcome, as ours did for a handful of precious minutes. But a part of me can’t help but wonder if things would have been different if I’d been more careful. Protected Molly better.’
‘What happened to Molly wasn’t your fault.’ Her tone was firm. ‘You know that she suffered a rare but life-threatening complication of pregnancy that could have happened at any time. It’s unfair and tragic and heart-breaking.’ She cupped his face, holding his gaze. ‘But not your fault.’
At his silence she continued, ‘Is that why you haven’t dated anyone? Because you feel...responsible in some way, because of the timing?’
He shrugged, nodded, sighed, all his ugliness spilling out. ‘Every time I look at him I wonder if I’m enough, if I’m doing a good enough job. If I can possibly be everything he needs.’
‘You are,’ she said without hesitation.
‘I’m not so sure. I watched the way he interacted with you tonight. It was lovely to see his confidence.’ He frowned. ‘I thought I was protecting him—he’s lost so much—but perhaps I’ve denied him a woman’s influence in his life.’
‘You’re doing your best out of love, that’s all any of us can do. Life isn’t a one-size-fits-all, nor are there any guarantees.’
‘That’s true.’ Stella was so easy to talk to, no doubt that was what made her a great doctor. ‘Then sometimes I worry that I’m doing too much, being overprotective, like with the horse riding.’
She shook her head. ‘My parents used to worry too. He’s the most precious thing in the world to you. It’s natural.’
He stared, awed by her calm insights and natural humanity. He couldn’t become reliant on her compassion and understanding. He couldn’t become reliant on her full stop. He needed to keep emotionally distant for his own sake, too.
Just because he’d glimpsed how well she would fit into their lives if she lived in Abbotsford didn’t mean that he and Charlie were what she wanted. She planned to leave as soon as she could, head back to her single life in London. His life, Charlie’s life was here, a place from which Stella still felt she needed to run in order to outrun herself, her past, her demons.
And he would wish her every happiness and success.
He and Charlie would be fine, but only if he stayed detached. He owed it to Charlie not to mess up again. That meant maintaining their status quo, their boys’ club of two, even if he had to forgo his own needs, which right now urged him to hold her tight...indefinitely.
‘I’m teaching tomorrow, at the stables,’ she said. ‘Why don’t you bring him along after my last class for a quick ride? I promise I’ll take care of him—I’ll have my hands on him at all times. We have riding hats and body protectors. I’ll choose our most sedate and docile pony. It will be as safe as possible.’
Her concern and reassurance overwhelmed him. He wanted to kiss her so badly he needed an instant distraction.
The song had changed to a nice, slow ballad.
‘Dance with me,’ he said, standing.
She frowned at his extended hand. Laughed nervously. ‘Really? Here?’
He nodded, recalling a pair of high heels and little black dress fit for a chic, city nightclub. Soon she would swap her riding boots for dancing shoes and their lives would return to being different.
‘You once invited me to go dancing.’
‘And you said your clubbing days were over.’ She placed her hand in his, eyes alive as she met his challenge.
He pulled her to her feet and into his arms. ‘Yes, but there’s more than one way to take a pulse.’ He caressed her inner wrist over her radial artery and then touched his fingers to her neck where her carotid beat like a drum. ‘This is my kind of dance.’
Falling serious because his senses were filled with her scent and warmth, he pressed her close, one hand gripping hers and the other pressed between her shoulder blades. He caught the soft sigh leaving her lips as she looked up at him from under those long lashes.
Fighting the urge to kiss her, Aaron moved them around the space between the fire and the sofa they’d occupied. This was the way he’d held her in the early hours of Saturday morning when he had willed away the first light of dawn, knowing it would bring their intimate time to an end.
She snuggled closer, dropped her head to his shoulder, reminding him how good they’d been together, how their passion had burned out of control until their reservations and differences hadn’t seemed to matter.
She’d admitted that she still wanted him. And now that he was touching her again, her heart banging against his ribs and her eyes filled with what looked like longing, Aaron struggled to find the strength to care that he was risking what he valued most: the predictable stability he’d built these past five years.
If only it was just his feelings at risk, he could live with the liability. How could he have what he wanted, more time with Stella, and protect both her and Charlie from growing too attached? His son would be ecstatic at Stella’s offer to show him how to ride, but could Aaron allow it, knowing the emotional risks?
Perhaps if it was a one-off...
‘I can hear your mind whirring,’ she mumbled into his jumper, her hand stroking his chest.
He released the sigh, tugging at the mental knots in his head. ‘I want impossible things.’
‘What things?’ Her finger traced his jaw.
‘You.’
She smiled up at him. ‘I’m right here, aren’t I?’
He nodded, holding her tighter because her presence back in his arms was everything he had craved since their night together. ‘I’m trying to protect everyone’s feelings...yours, Charlie’s.’
She nodded, her gaze softening, growing more enticing. ‘I’m a grown woman. I can protect myself.’
Without waiting for him to process her statement, she reached up on tiptoe, brought her mouth within kissing distance. His lips landed, soft but urgent. She moaned, angled her head, parted her lips to deepen their kiss. He gripped her waist, slid his hands up her back and tangled his fingers in her hair, losing another chunk of his restraint.
She sighed, her whole body collapsing against his chest as if she was exhausted, like him, from fighting this connection that had gone way deeper than either of them expected.
He held her face between his palms and parted from her with a reluctant groan. ‘Can you stay the night? Charlie normally sleeps in until seven.’ He poured his desires and the unspoken feelings he hadn’t yet deciphered into his stare.
How had he gone from content with their one night to being this heavily invested? How would he return to the way he’d been happy with his sexless existence before Stella invaded his world and showed him what was lacking?
Except it wasn’t just sex. If he could never sleep with her again he’d still want to see her, to work with her and be on her quiz team. She enriched his existence, and a part of him knew that, if life were different, she would enrich Charlie’s too, teach him things that Aaron couldn’t.
Her expression shifted through desire to unease. She shook her head. ‘I don’t want to risk confusing Charlie, but I can stay a while.’ She wrapped her arms around his neck, her eyes glazed with passion.
It was a compromise with which he could live.
This time they made it to the privacy of his bedroom, which was at the other end of the landing from Charlie’s room, before their passion became overwhelming and undeniable. They stripped in silence, their stares locked, as if both wary, both conscious of what was at stake but unable to fight temptation any longer.
In case this was the last time they would surrender, he commanded every kiss, his passion roaring out of control. He trailed his mouth over her neck, her collarbones, her breasts, every inch of her fragrant skin, learning all of the places that made her fist the sheets and bite her lip to hold in her moans.
Needing more of her, he abandoned her sensitive nipples, pushed her legs wide and covered her with his mouth. Her gasp broke free, her fingers tugging at his hair.
‘Aaron.’ She whispered his name, a raft of emotions flitting across her expression.
Aaron read every single one. He knew this woman. He wanted to bring her pleasure, soothe her every hurt, make her promises and never let her down the way she had been in the past.
Dangerous wants.
She shattered, riding out her orgasm with her stare lost in his.
He held her in his arms, kissed her, caressed her until she grew restless and needy once more, wrapping her legs around his hips and clinging to his arms, his shoulders, his back. With protection taken care of, she welcomed him inside her body, her passionate cries smothered by their kisses.
Something cataclysmic was happening. Something he couldn’t examine too closely in case it changed his life irrevocably.
Unspoken words clogged Aaron’s throat. This couldn’t be more than sex, no matter how it felt.
He knew that her internal struggles over their fling matched his. She’d been bitterly betrayed, robbed of her relationship with a little boy she had loved, had spent the intervening nine years protecting herself with only casual dating.
He wasn’t ready to forgive himself, to lay all of himself on the line in the search for wholeness, happiness. He had nothing to offer beyond his body and this violent connection they both battled. But a part of him wanted Stella to struggle to forget everything they had shared. As he would.
‘Stella.’ He gripped her tighter as his body reacted on instinct, driving them hard towards the point of no return. She entwined her fingers with his, matched his every move, alongside him on this journey.
They came together, so in sync it was no use kidding himself that he’d successfully managed to keep emotions at bay.
Exhausted and elated, he dragged her close, burrowed his nose in her hair and fought the temptation to ask her to stay in Abbotsford.
When he woke an hour later the bed beside him was cold. He rummaged for his phone, his heart sinking. He found her text, the screen illuminating the dark room.
I didn’t want to wake you. Had a wonderful evening.
He should be relieved that, as promised, she had been considerate of Charlie and so pragmatic that she’d slipped out into the night without disturbing him. There were no loose ends he’d need to explain to a curious five-year-old.
Instead, he was more hollow than he had been in years, as if he’d been robbed of something he hadn’t realised he cherished until it was gone.
He threw his phone on the bed, the mess of convoluted feelings inside telling him it was way too late for him to emerge from this unscathed.