Page 84 of Worth Every Risk

My chest tightens, and I desperately want to reprimand him. To tell him not to roll his fucking eyes at me, but I hear Barney’s voice in my ear again.Your son is a wreck.

“You gonna make me spend the rest of the summer in the office doing work experience, like last year?”

I take a gulp of my beer. “We’ll see. You could do tennis camp or—”

“Yes. Tennis. I’ll take that over the office.”

“Fine. I’ll get Aries to book it for you.”

My thoughts are drawn to her, lying back on the carpet in the moments before Charlie came home.What’s she doing now? And more importantly, how the fuck are we going to keep sneaking around, now there’s a teenager in the house?

Last year, Charlie found his mum in the kitchen with a man he didn’t know, doing things he should never have seen. I can’t do that to him. I can’t take a chance that he’ll come into a room and find me with the nanny… it doesn’t bear thinking about. I shudder involuntarily at the thought. This evening, we were so fucking close to that exact thing happening.What the hell am I doing here? Are these risks worth taking?

“What?” Charlie says, clearly perturbed at my withdrawal.

I force myself to focus on my son. “Nothing. Let’s finish up.”

After I’ve helped Charlie to his room with his belongings, I hear Aries in the basement kitchen, talking to Alec. They’re laughing, and envy spears holes in my chest at the sound. There are no barriers for them to overcome… Aries can relax with Alec in ways she never could with me... in public too. They could go out to restaurants, go on dates… have a normal fucking relationship.

The two of them stop talking as soon as I step into the room. Aries sets down her cutlery. Alec’s made her something for dinner, and the vision of the two of them together is so intimate, sodomesticated, that the piercing sensation in my chest only increases. I can’t be with this woman in my own home the way this man can.

Not that it matters because I’ve come to a decision.Better pull the fucking plaster off quick because this one is going to hurt.

“Aries, can I have a word?” I say.

She nods and slips off the stool, still in that over-sized t-shirt without a bra. I pace up the stairs and she follows me to the study. I close the door behind us.

“Sit down,” I say, gesturing to the chair.

A look of alarm passes over Aries’ face as she lowers into the chair. I’m emotionally closed off; I can feel it. I’m not even doing it on purpose, but I can’t handle the guilt of what happened earlier. Charlie coming home, me with Aries still on my face. I cannot risk getting caught with her by one of my children. Tonight, the call was far too close. Next time, we won’t be so lucky.

I sit behind the desk, opposite her. “I want you to book Charlie into tennis camp.” I open a drawer and pull out the flyer and put it on the desk between us. Aries presses a finger to it and drags it towards her. “Book the whole summer, except the ten days that we’ll spend on the boat. You’ll have to make sure he gets there. To camp, I mean. He can walk himself, but I don’t trust him not to play truant. Make sure he goes.”

Aries nods, her features hardening. She doesn’t like my professional demeanor, and although I can tell it pains her, I can’t always be what she wants me to be.

I take a deep breath, run my tongue over my molars, and keep my eyes on her.She’s gorgeous.“You need to wear a bra to work.”

She flinches.This wasn’t what she was expecting.“What?”

“In the house, you wear a bra at all times. I have a teenage son.”

“Of course,” she says, but the dejection on her face tears at my heart. She crosses her arms over her chest.

“I’m sorry.”

She looks directly at me. “Why? It’s your home. You make the rules.”

She sounds as cold as I do, and I don’t like it.Christ, this is difficult.I swallow hard before I speak. “I don’t mean to insult you.”

“I’m not insulted. If you wanted me to wear a uniform, I’d wear a uniform. You’re the boss. It’s your prerogative. Besides, I know you’re only asking because you want to keep these”—she briefly cups a breast in each hand—“all to yourself.” Her delivery is toneless, but there’s a shimmer to her gaze that tells me she’s trying to reach me through this façade I’ve put up.

I want to reach across the desk and grab her, and whisper in her ear that she's absolutely right. She'smine, and the idea that my teenage son might be attracted to her would torment me if I gave it space to grow.But I can’t indulge her on this. “It’s not about the bra. I mean, it is. But not just the bra. It’s about us.”

Aries’ lips part the tiniest bit, and she draws in shallow breaths. Her eyebrows lower, her green eyes darkening as she awaits whatever I’m about to decree.

Until this moment, we’ve never had a conversation about us. Not properly. Not about what we are or might be or where we might go.

“Now that Charlie’s home, we can’t keep this up,” I tell her flatly, but I don’t miss the flare of hurt that blazes across her face. She douses it fast, and I’m ridiculously grateful for that. “I can’t risk him finding out about us. It’s not fair. Not after what happened with his mother.”