Page 74 of The Secret

It was six thirty-four a.m., I was wide awake and couldn’t fucking wait to see her, except she was having a well-deserved lie-in, so I was going to have to dig deep and find my patience once more. Not to mention my daughter would be up very soon and want her breakfast.

It took me less than seven minutes to brush my teeth, grab some sweats, put the coffee on and have a steaming mug in my hand while I warmed a bottle for Bell. It took me another hour to feed her, dress her, strap her into her Baby Bjorn, then walk down to the corner bakery and buy a selection of plain and chocolate croissants, along with muffins for breakfast, as well a couple of loaves of the best sourdough in New York to take away for the weekend.

I’d put Bell down for her morning nap and completed half of the crossword, filling the boxes to answer‘Diamond’for‘Hardest Substance on Earth’, when she walked into the kitchen, dressed in her uniform of yoga pants and tank, her face devoid of make-up, returning to the fresh, clean glow I was accustomed to. Her apple cheeks pinked as she spotted me, followed with an awkwardness I wanted to put an immediate halt to.

“Hey.” She bit down on her cheek and my dick thumped with plans to kiss away her shyness and bring back the loud, self-assured woman I usually met first thing in the morning. I gave her the biggest smile I could muster without coming across as a weirdo and jumped up from my chair.

“Hey, let me make you coffee. Come sit down. I got us fresh croissants from the bakery across the street.” The smile turned into a face splitting grin, “I can warm them up…”

The awkwardness dropped slightly as her face brightened with a smile which raised an even bigger thump in my heart. “You’ve been out already? I’m impressed.”

“I can’t compete with your baking skills, but the bakery gives it a fair go,” I teased, earning myself a twinkle of amusement in her eye. “How did you sleep?”

She looked away and busied herself rummaging through the bakery bags on the table, selecting a banana muffin. “Okay… how about you?”

“Not too bad.”

I placed her coffee in front of her and she picked it up in silence. That she wasn’t meeting my eye when she spoke wasn’t sitting well in my stomach. It only took the longest thirty seconds of my life, watching her mindlessly fiddle with the corners of the newspaper, to kick-start my resolve to face this head on.

“Kit. Look at me.”

She gave a heavy blink as she glanced my way.

“About last night...”

“Don’t worry, I got it,” she interrupted, bitterness biting at her tone.

My head tilted. “Got what?”

“That we were drunk and you want to take it back.”

I balked at the hardness of her expression, while my stomach dropped another degree as Rafe’s warnings started up in my ear again.

“I want to take back nothing,” I pushed on, willing her to make eye contact. “Is that what you want?”

The cheek chewing started up again.

“Kit? Is that what you want?”

She took a deep breath and began tracing her fingers around the edges of her mug. “Where did you go last night?”

“What do you mean?”

Now she looked up at me, but her usual warmth was missing. “Murray, I saw you leave in the middle of the night. I heard the door.”

“Did I wake you?”

She shook her head. “No, I was feeding Bell. Murray, where did you go?”

“I went swimming.”

Her narrowed eyes, jutted chin, and pursed lips did a good job of telling me she thought I was full of shit. To be fair, she had a point, but I still didn’t like the fact she didn’t believe me.

“I couldn’t sleep and needed to clear my head. I used to do it all the time, but haven’t done it in a while.”

“Where did you go swimming?”

“My club is open twenty-four hours.” I frowned. “Kit, where did you think I’d gone?”

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