Total pages in book: 162
Estimated words: 154728 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 774(@200wpm)___ 619(@250wpm)___ 516(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 154728 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 774(@200wpm)___ 619(@250wpm)___ 516(@300wpm)
Quiet. Such a simple concept. One so elusive those days.
I turned to find Kane in the kitchen, wearing only his boxers. Not for the first time—nor even the hundredth—I marveled at the washboard abs, the six pack that was the same if not more defined than when I first met him.
He was pure sculpted muscle.
I was … not.
Not that I’d spent hours in the gym in my prior life, but I was constantly on my feet, moving, lifting. I’d never been traditionally slim, but I was fit.
My body had regained somewhat of its previous shape thanks to breastfeeding and stress, yet I did not look the same. I was … less firm now.
Once again, I thought about my body and whether it made me less attractive to Kane.
“Chef.”
I blinked up from where I’d gone into a dreamlike existential crisis while looking at Kane’s abs.
“What are you doing?” he repeated his question.
“I’m making chocolate mousse,” I said, even though it was kind of obvious. I’d just finished whipping the egg whites and was folding in the melted chocolate.
My mother hadn’t woken during this process, which I was thankful for.
“Chocolate mousse,” he echoed. “At three in the morning. When you’ve had exactly one hour of sleep, and Mabel is going to wake up in another forty-five minutes for more food.”
It didn’t surprise me that Kane had calculated exactly how much sleep I’d had. He made it his business to catalog everything about me. How much water I’d drank, how much food I’d consumed, whether or not I was doing the prescribed sitz baths.
His little blue book was not just about Mabel but about her postpartum mother. He’d transitioned seamlessly into a caretaker for both me and Mabel.
And though I loved watching that with Mabel, it set my teeth on edge for me.
“I need to sleep,” I agreed, continuing to fold. “Because my body, my cells, my blood, my brain all need sleep in order to function. But my soul, my insides need this.” I gestured to the bowl with the spoon. “Need something else, need a reminder of who I am other than a mother who constantly feels like she’s failing. And I feel like a failure for saying even this, that I need something else. But I need to feel like I was before. Like I know what I’m doing somewhere. Here, in the kitchen, I know what I’m doing. I feel in control. I need that.”
Kane folded his arms across his chest. His muscles and tattooed rippled, and my mouth moistened, remembering those arms around me. Remembering sex.
I still hadn’t been cleared for that. I wondered if Kane would even see me that way when I was. He had his hands on me whenever he could. But it was that careful, caretaking touch. No fire.
“Okay,” he conceded, going to sit at the breakfast bar.
“What are you doing?” I asked. “Go back to bed. You need sleep.”
He nodded. “I do. I’ll sleep when my woman sleeps.”
“There is no room for chivalry in the newborn trenches.” I shook my head at his asinine notion. . “It’s every man for himself.”
“Not this man.” His tone told me not to bother arguing the point further. But I wasn’t functioning on all cylinders.
“What if she wakes?” I sighed. Or what if she somehow rolls over and suffocates in the mattress without either of us there? It was a thought I didn’t utter, but it pumped nausea through me. It didn’t matter that she didn’t know how to roll yet. Such morbid and terrifying thoughts were commonplace then. I tried to brush my concern aside but couldn’t. I almost abandoned my mousse to run up the stairs to check on her breathing.
“I got her, Chef.” Kane tapped the monitor I hadn’t noticed him carrying, as if he could see the terror on my face. “I’ll watch over her. You finish.” He jutted his chin to my bowl.
I gulped painfully, struggling to even trust the man who loved Mabel just as much as I did with her wellbeing, but I managed.
I went back to the mousse, forcing myself to make slow, practiced movements although I felt the overwhelming need to hurry through the steps like I felt the need to rush through everything else. Meals. Brushing my teeth. Showers where I heard phantom baby cries.
Measured calmness, that’s what was required. It used to be muscle memory. Now I had to grit my teeth, sweat dampening my brow as I compelled myself to be meticulous.
When the mousse was put in a glass dish and into the fridge to cool, Kane jumped up.
“Okay, Chef. We’re going outside to sit for a spell,” he said, holding onto my hip.
The simple touch grounded me. His scent, his naked torso. All of that awakened something deep inside me, that desire too tired to come all the way to the surface, though.