Business Casual (Lovelight, #4)

by B.K. Borison

“You gonna come for me again, pretty girl?”

NOVA: Hard to be jealous when I can still feel you every time I sit down, Charlie. CHARLIE: Fuck.

I take up too much space, I want to tell her. I’m loud and sometimes I don’t know how to stop talking. I’m a lot and I know that. I can’t figure out how to make myself fit, but I’m trying. I promise I’m trying.

Being here makes me feel like…like the edges of myself that are too sharp everywhere else can be sanded down into something tolerable. Like I don’t have to put on a show.

He winks and goose bumps erupt across my skin like a shower of sparks.

“Has anyone ever told you that you’re a stubborn woman?” “With alarming frequency and incredible detail,” I volley back.

I nod. “Yes. I thought my intentions were obvious. It’s why I’ve been so cranky this morning.” “It was not obvious, and you’re usually cranky.”

I have no right to be possessive over him, but I am, and I think he likes it.

My body is suffused with tiny pinpricks of light. A sunbeam shot through cracked glass, rainbows spinning out across the room.

“You got a migraine, baby?”

Maybe I made a mistake when I told Nova I could keep it casual. Because not a single thing I’m feeling right now is casual.

I don’t want anyone else to look at her. Mine, a voice in my head shouts, except she’s never been mine at all.

Even when I’m the one controlling her pleasure, I’m on my knees for her.

He’d look good with tattoos over his big hands. I imagine dark lines decorating his fingers as his hands hold me in place, the way they might move when he squeezes my thighs. I have to take a second to compose myself.

I like him jealous. I like him greedy. I like the wild, unrestrained version of him I got in the back office. It feels like he’s finally possessed with the same sort of mindlessness I’ve been carrying around this entire time. I like him honest.

I think I just like him. More than like him, actually.

“Because I said I trust you, Nova. And that doesn’t have qualifications.” “But it’s permanent.” He blinks once. “And I trust you,” he says, the ghost of a grin brushing across his mouth.

Charlie, despite my best intentions and probably his as well, is the person I care about most. And I’m not nearly as scared of that as I used to be.

Forget-me-nots were always my favorite, and—well. You’re kind of my favorite too.”

“I’ve never been anyone’s favorite,” he whispers. “Well,” I say, feeling defensive. “You’re mine.”

“Nova,” he whispers, somewhere against my mouth. “I don’t think my feelings are business casual.” I sigh into him. I hold on to him wherever I can reach. “I don’t think mine are either.”

I took her home after the studio last night and backed her up against the floor-to-ceiling windows in the guesthouse, hands shaking, desperate to soothe the buzzing in my chest. I peeled her out of her clothes until it was just Nova in the moonlight, the flowers on her skin a match for the one she drew on mine. I wrapped her legs around my waist and fucked her against the window until I couldn’t breathe, couldn’t think, couldn’t see anything but her.

I roll my eyes and grab the can of whipped cream, topping off my coffee with enough to send me into a sugar coma. I add sprinkles on top because I’m a grown adult man, then slap Nova on the ass, urging her over to the table.

Thing feels too small of a word for the overwhelming sense of panic and adoration that sweeps over me every time Nova so much as looks in my direction, but sure.

You don’t have to be lonely anymore. Not when you’ve got me.”

“I want you to tell me what you want, Charlie boy.”

Mine to have and mine to keep.

He’s been spending more and more time down here because he wants someone to ask him to stay.

She steps farther into the room, hands raised like she’s trying to calm a deranged bear. It’s me. I am the deranged bear.

Beckett shifts on his feet. “Is there a reason you didn’t feel the need to tell me you have feelings for my baby sister?” Charlie shrugs. “Didn’t think I was good enough to.” Beckett scowls. “Well, that was fucking stupid of you.”