Rule Breaker (Mixed Messages, #1)

by Lily Morton

“I can’t,” he gasps urgently. “I can’t stop now, Dylan. I know all the arguments I’ve used in the past off by heart. You work for me, and I’m not what you’re looking for. But I can’t stop this anymore. I need to be inside you so badly, it’s all I can think about. Maybe we can fuck this feeling away.”

“Say it again, but make it your office voice.” He stares at me. “You know the one. It’s two parts incoherent rage, to one part bewilderment.” He gives a great guffaw of laughter. “Fuck you, Dylan.” He looks puzzled for a second. “I think that might be the first time that I’ve laughed during sex.” “That just means it was never good sex. All good sex comes with a side order of inappropriate laughter.”

“Usually it helps to envision your assistant naked. It combats the desire to throttle them.” “I think you’ve taken the whole seeing your audience naked in order to negate their power thing, wrong,” I say tartly, and he stares hard at me, before something mysterious floods his face and he shrugs.

The knowledge comes to me slowly at first and with no initial fear, seemingly a part of this dreamlike shower. I’m in love with him. For a long second, I try out the knowledge for fit, and it does. It fits and fills all the parts of me, stretching out perfectly until I can feel it in my bones. I love this grumpy, irascible, yet sometimes tender man. How could I not? I see now that all the rage he sometimes fills me with is the flipside to this feeling, the other side of the coin.

“What are you looking at?” I whisper, and the strangest expression crosses his face. I thought I’d seen them all over the years, but this is new. It’s a little bit shy and almost awed. “I’m looking at you,” he whispers back.

He’s a conundrum, this man. Doesn’t want to hurt me, is worried about it so much, and then does it every time.

I kiss him lustily, and then pull away to whisper in his ear, “Don’t say that you’re my boss.” He shudders wildly at my breath in his ear and looks at me quizzically, so I nod emphatically. “Mum has some really seventies ideas about bosses exploiting the proletariat.” I catch his eye and smile. “Seriously, she’s one donkey jacket short of a protest march most of the time. Now come and meet her.”

He has the biggest smile on his face that I’ve ever seen. It makes his tanned features glow, and I swallow hard. I’ve never seen him look truly happy and engaged until now, and I feel something snap and settle in me. It’s the last piece of my heart, falling for him without any input from me at all. How could I really resist him? I ask myself wryly. Who could resist the damaged, beautiful man that he is?

“What are their names?” I struggle to get my mind back into gear, and then grimace. “Cersei and Jaime.” He looks puzzled. “Like the Game of Thrones characters?” I nod slowly. “Yes.” I hope he’s going to let it go, but he stares at me. “Why?” “Er, because they’re brother and sister,” I say quickly, and then finish lamely, “And they like licking each other a lot.”

He laughs, and I stare surreptitiously at the stranger in front of me. There’s no sign of the perfectionist boss now. He looks rumpled, his cheeks red from the cold and his eyes bright. His hair is a windswept mess, and the bright red scarf he threw on earlier compliments his olive skin. However, it’s his open, almost happy expression that really marks the difference.

“Sometimes we think that a certain path in life is the way we have to go. We see other routes, but we avoid them because we’re so insistent they’re not for us, that we might get lost or hurt. Then sometimes fate sets in, and someone takes your hand or waves you over. You step off your chosen path, and find that although this one is new and scary, somehow your feet know the way to navigate it. You might even find that it leads you the way that you were always meant to go.”

It hurts to know that fate has given me the perfect person for me to love, but has failed to make it reciprocal.

“No, I’m sorry, but it can’t change anything, Henry. Thank you so much for telling me. It explains a lot, and in some ways, it makes the way that we parted easier to deal with. But at the end of the day, the only person that can change anything is him. I could go to him now and demand something from him, knowing that he might need it, but you know him, Henry, he wouldn’t take it. He’d close up tight like a clam, and probably say something poisonous to send me away. We said enough poisonous things the last time we saw each other. It was pretty clear that it was fully over for him.” I sigh. “And my heart can’t take that again.”

“Most men would give chocolates or flowers, he just wanted to give me another dick to play with.” “Henry said he’s tortured by what he did.” “But he still did it though, didn’t he?”

I open my eyes and grab his hand, making him immediately still, and his eyes close as if he’s in pain. “I am not going private, Gabe,” I say firmly. “I’m staying with the NHS. It was fought for by my ancestors, and we need to support it.” “Your ancestors were farmers,” he says smoothly. “They were likely digging up turnips, so we will do what my ancestors did instead, which is pay for good service and complain when we don’t get it.”

“How are you feeling, sweetheart? You look so tired.” For a brief second, I let myself arch into his touch, and avoid mentioning his endearment. I’m injured so it shouldn’t count. “So do you, and what do you mean about being attracted? I irritated you for years.” He shakes his head, his face gentling and making me stare at him. “Never. You’ve never irritated me. You’ve challenged me and made me laugh, but irritation is far too bland an emotion to fit the range of the ones I have for you.”

I lie there for a long time, watching him and marvelling at his stillness. It’s so rare to see him still, and I wonder what thoughts are filling his head tonight. Then I see the trailing wire from his earphones and realise that he’s listening to something on his phone. It can’t be work, because I’ve never seen him do anything work wise and not be upright and energised. Tonight, he looks almost like he’s dreaming, and suddenly my heart is filled with so much love and affection flooding through it, like an icy puddle cracking in the thaw.

“The truth is that I will always need you more than you need me. It’s also the truth that I’m not a good bet for someone as vital and young as you. I’m bad tempered, a perfectionist who is too serious, and too used to being on my own. You could go out tomorrow and find someone better for you, but the truth is that no one will ever need you like I do.” He pauses and then says firmly. “No one will ever love you like I do.”

I remember that day in Verbier when he’d nestled against me, and I’d made him look up into the sky, sharing that moment together as the snow cascaded down around us. Realisation hits me that this is how life will be with him – dizzy, unpredictable and sometimes a bit off-balance, but always safe and just simply more enjoyable with him. I smile. I can certainly live with that.

He always smiles at everyone, being one of the sunniest and most gregarious men that I’ve ever known. However, he has a special one that seems to be only for me, and I hoard the sight of it like a miser with gold, because it’s happy and so full of love.

I’d wondered what it would be like to share my space, because I’d been so protective of it after years in care, but it’s amazing. It’s like having my best friend with me all the time. Sure, we argue and shout, and Dylan has proved to be quite the door slammer. Sometimes needing space I’ll retire to my study, or he’ll go out running, but we’re getting better at knowing when we need our space and giving it to each other.

I’d wanted him for so long, but despite my efforts, we got closer, and that was torture too, because then I knew when he was seeing people. I could stand next to him and smell the scent of his apple shampoo, and be close enough to touch, but never allow myself, and know that someone else had that freedom. It was like the Greek myth of King Phineus who could never eat the banquet laid before him every day. Every time he met someone I would torture myself with the idea that this would be the one, and then sag with relief when it wasn’t.

I suppose what he does best is to encourage me to be the best, because he loves me. Maybe at its finest, that’s what love should be.

I’d thought that I’d have to tread carefully and avoid any references to relationships, the way that I had when we started. Instead, he revels in our commitment. Whenever we’re out, his hand finds mine, he introduced me as his partner at work as soon as we got back together, and he makes no secret of how much he loves me. In love, this once cold man is warm and funny, and somehow everything I ever wanted.

I’m interrupted by a tiny whine from the kitchen. “What’s that?” he immediately asks. “Nothing,” I say quickly. “Now go and wait in the lounge.” The noise comes again, but louder this time. He stares at me, as the whine becomes a positive howl. “Are you killing our dinner now? Didn’t we buy meat earlier in Sainsbury’s that was already dead?”

No one should ever look to me for love advice because I have done everything wrong that could be done. Yet still, I have ended up with this wonderful man who will walk by my side for the rest of our lives. Maybe my luck has changed. I don’t know about that, but what I do know, is that I will spend the rest of my life treating him properly and making him keep trusting me. I will spend the rest of my life with him.