One more question. One more slip. And it’s over.
I let the silence drag, heavy, calculated. Then I lean back in my chair, voice flat steel.
“She works for me. That’s all.”
Kate studies me, like she wants to call bullshit. Like she’s daring me to blink.
The clock ticks loudly in the silence. My heart doesn’t. My pulse is a predator’s—steady, ruthless, waiting for the strike.
Finally, Kate shrugs, pushes off the counter, and grabs her glass. “Fine. Keep your boring little secrets.” She smirks. “I’ll find out eventually.”
Her footsteps fade down the hall. A door slams.
The kitchen goes deadly quiet.
I turn my head, lock eyes with the girl still frozen beside me. Her chest heaves. She looks pale, guilty, destroyed.
“You nearly fucked it all up,” I say, voice low, dangerous.
“I didn’t?—”
“You did.” My knee presses harder into hers under the table, cruel now, punishing. “One blush. One stammer. She saw it.”
Her lips part like she wants to argue, but the words die in her throat.
Good.
Because if Kate had pressed harder… if she’d put the pieces together right here at this table…
I don’t know if I’d have stopped myself from dragging her up against the counter and showing my daughter exactly who she belongs to.
The moment her footsteps fade, I’m on her.
Fingers at her jaw, tilting her face up to mine. Her pulse slams against my thumb, eyes wide like a cornered rabbit.
“You think you can blush and stammer in front of her and walk away clean?” I hiss. “One slip, and she’ll know everything.”
Her breath shudders. “I—I didn’t mean to?—”
“Didn’t mean to?” My voice sharpens. I push my knee between her thighs under the table, dragging a whimper out of her. “You like it, don’t you? The risk. Sitting here marked up like my filthy little secret while she’s in the next room.”
Her lips part, a desperate little sound escaping, and I almost snap—I almost take her right there on the counter, fuck the fallout.
The door creaks.
We spring apart just as Kate wanders back in, still barefoot, still smirking like she owns the room. My jaw locks, my hands gripping the mug to hide the violence simmering within me.
She eyes us both, slower this time. Suspicious.
Then she sighs, dropping onto a stool with her juice. “I don’t know if I should even stay here,” she mutters, like she’s talking to herself but making sure we hear. “There’s… something I should probably go home for. Something that needs my attention.”
Her words hang there, loaded. A test. A warning.
I force my face blank, sip my coffee like I didn’t just have my hand on her throat seconds ago. Beneath the table, my knee pressed against hers, daring her to twitch or betray me.
“Everything alright?” I ask, voice so smooth it feels like glass about to shatter.
Kate shrugs, swirls the juice in her glass, eyes narrowing. “I’ll figure it out.” She glances at her, gaze dragging slowly, suspiciously. “Unless you two think I should stay?”
