The Trophy Wife by Evie Baxter
Twenty-Three
It was after 6pm when we got back to Tori’s house. She undid the car seat fastenings but stood back to allow me to lift Isla’s tiny body and carry her into the house.
“She will sleep through until the morning,” Tori whispered to me. “Follow me, I’ll show you where her bedroom is.”
We went upstairs and down a hallway that had a window looking out over the long back garden. Tori pushed open a door of a room painted a light, chalky blue, with a castle shaped play tent in the corner that had toys spilling out its entrance. I lowered Isla down onto the small child sized bed and Tori swiftly removed her shoes and shorts without Isla waking at all.
Tori disappeared for a moment and came back with a washcloth which she ran over Isla’s face and hands before tucking her under her covers. She leant over and kissed her daughter’s forehead with a reverent love that touched something inside me. I wanted that. I wanted to give that unreserved love and receive it back.
Never had I had a fervent desire for children until that very moment. I always knew I wanted them, but in some vague distant future. I looked at Tori as she had one last moment looking at her child before rising to leave the room and I pictured her heavy with child. My child.
I wanted that. I wanted a future with this woman.
I followed Tori downstairs and into the kitchen where she reached for a bottle of Malbec on the counter and raised her eyebrows at me, silently asking if I wanted a drink.
“I can’t, thanks. I’ve still got a drive ahead of me.”
She studied me pensively for a minute, her eyes huge in her face.
“You could stay,” she suggested, then before I could reply her face flooded with colour and she added on, “In the guest room. I’m – um – not ready for that yet.”
I smiled. I could live with that, seeing as she said yet and hadn’t rule intimacy out altogether. My girl was slowly coming around to the idea of me being in her life.
“The guest room is fine, and I’d love to stay. Are you hungry? Shall we order in something for dinner?”
That got a short bout of laughter from Tori. “Where do you think you are? Order in. Good one. We have the fish and chip van that comes to the village on Wednesdays and parks on the green. And on Friday nights there’s a local chap who delivers pizzas, but you have to order in advance. You’re not in London anymore, Bastian.”
I scrubbed my hand through the hair at the back of my head sheepishly. “Can we knock something together without too much effort?”
Tori shrugged and then opened the fridge door looking at its contents. I moved behind her and looked over her shoulder. There was a half used packet of bacon and I could see some mushrooms in the veggie drawer. “How about I make us omelettes,” I suggested.
“You can cook?”
“I’m 35 years old and have been living on my own for almost half my life. It would be a pretty sad state of affairs if I didn’t know the basics of how to feed myself without the aid of a takeaway menu.”
Tori opened a drawer and pulled out a corkscrew, which I summarily removed from her hand and reached for the wine bottle to open it myself. She moved on to a glass fronted cabinet and pulled out two wine glasses and placed them by my side, then started removing the necessary ingredients for our dinner from the fridge.
There was a comfortable atmosphere between us as we chatted about the day, sipped wine and Tori sliced mushrooms while I cooked some bacon rashers. We moved with a synchronicity that belied out short acquaintance, like we were two puzzle pieces that fit together so well. It only went to further cement my belief that this was the woman meant for me.
An hour later, the dirty dishes were in the dishwasher and the kitchen immaculate again. Tori let out an almighty yawn, despite the still relatively early hour and I couldn’t help but smile at how much she reminded me of Isla. They were two peas in a pod, and it was such a gift to her that no part of Isla seemed to resemble Robert.
“Come on, let’s get you to bed,” I said, placing a hand in the small of her back and urging her towards the stairs. Tori’s eyes flew up to mine, misreading my meaning. “You to your bed, me to mine. Nothing happens until you’re ready, baby. Nothing.” My cock gave a whimper of protest, but I was playing the long game here. There were far more important things happening than instant satisfaction.
Tori stood outside her bedroom door, looked down for a prolonged moment and then took a visibly long, deep breath as I watched her. “Can I kiss you good night?” she asked in a barely audible voice. I knew how much it took for her to gather the courage to ask me that.
“Of course you can, lovely. You can kiss me any time you so desire.” I stayed still, allowing her the opportunity to decide how this went. If she kissed me on the cheek, then I would be thankful that she felt capable of making the first move. I fully believed that in time she would offer more.
She turned more fully to me, raised up on her tippy toes, and just when I thought her lips were going to skim over my cheek as I expected, she floored me by brushing them over my own slightly parted lips, causing reactions of seismic proportions that I endeavoured to keep her unaware of.
Her soft breath whispered across my skin as she said, “Good night, Bastian. Thank you for a truly wonderful day.” Then she kissed me again, albeit as brief as the first, forcing an expulsion of air from my lungs as her proximity overwhelmed me.
“The pleasure was all mine,” I told her. “There was nowhere I would rather have been than with you and Isla. Sleep well, baby. See you in the morning.” I controlled every instinct I had to press my lips back to hers, part hers, slide my tongue into the heated depths of her mouth, take a nip of her full lower lip, claim her with my actions.
I used the toothbrush Tori had given me in the en suite to the guest room, and stripped down to my boxer briefs and lay on the covers, my body too over heated to have a duvet over it. Palming my hard on I willed it away. There seemed to be something fundamentally wrong about jerking off thinking about Tori when she was separated from me by only one wall. Wrong to satisfy my urges when I wanted her so much, but wanted to wait until she was ready to come to me.
Maybe I would think differently in the morning when I was in the shower and morning wood refused to be ignored. I let out a heavy sigh. God, I wanted her so much. The scent of her clung to me despite not having had her in my arms. I breathed deep and willed myself asleep, happy to be in Tori’s home.
Morning came all too soonin the form of a jet propelled four year old who launched herself onto the bed and on top of my chest, causing me to let out an undignified oooommph when she landed on me.
“Bastian!” she squealed in ear splitting volume. “You stayed! You can have breakfast with me. This is the best thing ever.” I loved how she embraced life and found joy in everything and how everything was the best thing ever.
Without further ado, she squirmed under the covers with me and tucked herself into the crook of my arm, head on my shoulder like she did this every morning of her life. My arm instinctively tightened and pulled her closer, loving the feel of her warm little body cuddled up to me.
“Isla!” Tori appeared in the doorway that Isla had left wide open. Clad in a pair of sleep shorts and a little tank top, she was a delectable sight to wake to. “I told you to let Bastian sleep.”
Isla ignored her.
“Bastian, why do you have drawings on your skin?” One little finger traced the swirls on my tattoo.
“Because I like them. And they reflect my Scottish and Viking roots.”
“What’s a Viking?”
“Vikings were people who came to Britain from Scandinavia long ago. My parents are from Scotland, but my grandfather on my mother’s side was from Sweden. Do you like my tattoos?”
Isla poked at my shoulder. “That’s a dragon. And there’s a sword. That looks sort of like the crosses we see in church. I love your ta- ta- skin drawings. I’m going to get some too.”
Tori still lingered at the door, avoiding stepping further into the room. “You can have all the tattoos you want, after you’re eighteen,” she informed her daughter.
“That’s not fair. I want them now.” The little girl’s lip pouted out.
“Life isn’t fair. Get used to it,” Tori informed her prosaically. “Remember the rule we have. Always find some happy in everything. Now you have fourteen years to plan what you want tattooed on you.”
“Fine,” Isla huffed, and it made me smile even broader.
“Hey,” I said to her. “It took me four years of drawing until I knew I wanted this tattoo. Why don’t you go downstairs, and you can draw me a picture of what you think you would like when you’re allowed.”
That’s all it took to swing the little girl back into a good mood. She leapt from the bed, almost taking my bedcovers with her, and baring my upper body to Tori in the process. I felt her eyes on my skin as Isla dashed from the room shouting something about a rainbow butterfly tattoo.
“Come here.” I beckoned to Tori to move into the room. She did, but stopped well shy of the bed. “Closer,” I whispered.
She did what I asked, stopping only when her legs met the edge of the mattress.
“Have you got a good morning kiss for me!” My voice was gruff with hope.