Page 32 of One and Only

Slowly, I nodded. “Okay.”

With a deep breath, I walked straight up to him. He dropped his arms just before I buried my face into his chest and wrapped my arms tight around his waist. Beckett froze, arms out wide.

Oh. Oh yes. Okay then.

He smelledsogood. And he felt even better than that.

He was warm, so very solid, what with all the muscles and skin and muscles.

Maybe I could still get butterflies from a nice body, despite what I’d always thought.

“Greer?” He’d yet to drop his arms, and when I imagined what we must look like, I smiled.

“Put your hands on my body, Beckett,” I said calmly. “Because if you do that while she’s here, or if you look like I electrocuted you when I’m just trying to get a hug from the man I’m supposedly madly in love with, we are in a world of trouble.”

I had to fight the instinct to melt into his body because we hadperfectheight proportions. Without heels, I could set my head comfortably against his shoulder, my mouth only slightly lower than his.

If we were to kiss.

Eventually, we would, of course. There was no getting fake married without a little kissing, but we weren’t ready for that now.

There was a moment when I worried he wouldn’t do it, but then in the next breath, Beckett’s hands splayed wide along my back, smoothing along the length of my spine.

One palm came to rest along the back of my neck, and I blew out a slow breath to steady my racing heart. His fingers brushed the skin just under my hairline, and I could feel the hammering of his pulse where my forehead rested on his neck.

“Good,” I managed unsteadily.

I pulled my face back to look up, and Beckett’s face was serious. Full of questions. Full of intent.

“I didn’t think about this,” he admitted. His thumb brushed along the edge of my jaw. The movement surprised me, unprompted as it was. Like he simply wanted to know what my skin felt like. “And I should have.”

“Daddy?”

Her voice was hardly above a whisper, but it was loud enough in the quiet room that we both heard.

Slowly, I extricated myself from Beckett’s embrace, turning with a sheepish smile for Olive. She had a red brush gripped in her hand and a wide-eyed curiosity stamped all over her face.

“Hi, Olive,” I said.

Beckett’s eyes caught mine, color high in his cheeks. “Ready for your hair?” he asked.

She nodded, skipping over to a stool at the island. She handed him the brush, and Beckett handled it with ease, pulling it in careful strokes through her wet hair.

“Braids tonight, sweet pea?” he asked.

Olive nodded, closing her eyes, and I was absolutely destroyed watching his big hands maneuver her hair into two plaits on either side of her head. He pulled two small hair ties out of his front pocket and wrapped them deftly on the ends of her braids.

I had to roll my lips together because this was about the hottest thing I’d ever seen any man do, and I saw a Magic Mike live show in Vegas once upon a time, so that was saying something.

“Is that a butterfly on your pajamas?” I asked.

Olive’s eyes shyly darted up to mine, her fingers playing with the small white, gauzy wings that decorated her soft pink pajama dress.

“Have you ever seen a swallowtail butterfly?” I asked. “It’s got big wings with black on the edges and pretty yellow markings.”

Her eyes brightened, but she didn’t answer.

I pulled my phone out of my back pocket and started scrolling through my camera roll. Beckett watched me with careful eyes as he finished up her second braid.

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