Page 72 of His Own Heaven

Toby chuckled softly as Lucy nuzzled against the base of his throat. “You all done now?”

Lucy nodded.

“Good. Want to tell me what that was all about?”

Lucy shook her head. She felt like an idiot. “Why are you dressed?” she asked quietly, her uneasy tone grating on her frayed nerves.

Where was Toby going. And why?

It was too early for work.

Toby kissed the top of Lucy’s head and circled his big hand against her back. He’d done that the previous night too and it felt nice, soothing. She liked it. But then, she always liked the feel of his hands on her body.

“I have to pick up Charlie. Dad texted last night. He wants us to visit Rafe at the hospital,” he explained. “He’s refusing to leave Jane’s bedside. Dad’s hoping we can convince him to go home for a bit, get some sleep and eat a proper meal.”

“Oh,” she mumbled, feeling foolish for jumping to conclusions. “Why didn’t you wake me?”

“Because it’s only five o’clock,”—he kissed her forehead—“and you were finally sleeping peacefully.”

Lucy shivered. Thanks to her anxiety, she’d always been a light sleeper, but after Michael died she’d suffered terrible nightmares which in turn resulted in long bouts of insomnia. For years she’d feared closing her eyes, because every time she did she relived the gut-wrenching horror of losing her brother all over again.

Over time she’d learned to deal with it, but talking about her life, talking about Michael, opening up and exposing her innermost shame to Toby, had reawakened those nightmares.

More than once she’d awoken in a fright and cried out for her brother, only to find Toby instead, waiting with open arms, offering her comfort. Then he’d held her until she’d dozed off again, kissed her cheeks, her mouth, stroked her hair. He’d been tender and kind and she’d clung to him like a freaking limpet.So needy. She hated feeling needy.

Lucy didn’tneedanyone.

“I was going to leave you a note,” Toby said, “but I guess I don’t have to now.” Then he rose to his feet, grabbed his car keys from the bedside table and unclipped a smaller set of four keys. “You’ll need these to open the nursery and the office.”

Lucy stared at the keys as Toby set them beside her phone on the bedside table. “Me?”

Toby smiled. “Of course you. You’re my office manager, aren’t you?”

Right. Of course she was. It was only her second day on the job with a new system she was only just learning to use, but sure. Why not? It seemed Tobias Bennett was intent on pushing her boundaries both in and out of the bedroom.

“When will you be back?” she said, getting to her feet. She felt small beside Toby most of the time—a novel feeling for a woman of her size—but standing in front of him naked while he was fully dressed, just added a level of sexiness that was hard to beat. Especially when it helped pull her out of her funk and back into the land of the living.

“I’ll be back this afternoon,” he said, shoving his wallet in his back pocket. His phone buzzed on the bedside table. Reaching around her, Toby grabbed the device and stared at the screen, his lips flattening as he shook his head.

“What is it?” Lucy asked, her chest tightening with fear for Toby’s family. Had something awful happened? “Is everything okay?”

Toby showed her the screen.

It was a text from Charlie.Stop fucking Lucy and hurry the fuck up!!! I want to hit the road before we hit traffic.

A bubble of laughter escaped Lucy and the tightness in her chest eased. Then another message popped up on the screen that brought the tightness roaring back with a vengeance.

Also, Isobel called again. We can’t keep avoiding her.

“Who’s Isobel?”

Toby snatched his phone away and glared at the screen, then clicked it off and shoved the device in his pocket. “No one,” he said, his voice flat and tinged with anger. But who was he angry at? Charlie for sending the message, Lucy for reading it, or himself for letting her see it?

Lucy straightened her spine and stared Toby down. His mouth had thinned and the blue of his eyes had turned ice cold. “Who is Isobel?” she asked again, her voice made stronger by Toby’s attempted deflection.

Her lover glared at her for a moment longer before blinking slowly and letting out an even breath. He ran his tongue over his teeth. “No one you need worry about.”

“Which is exactly the type of thing you should say if you want me to worry,” she said, folding her arms across her chest, refusing to back down.

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