Page 11 of Best Kept Secret

"I'm going to work from home today," Beau informed me. "I wanted to ask you, do you have everything you need? Do you need to go shopping?"

With what money?

"I'm good."My underwear might be three years old, but the elastic still holds. Go, Victoria's Secret ten for thirty-dollars sale.

"Pari need anything?"

I shook my head. I'd made sure Pari had everything she needed, maybe not the most luxurious brands, but I was happy to splurge when it came to her.

"What is your plan for the day?"

I knew he was being curious, but it felt like an interrogation.

"After breakfast, Pari and I usually go out for a walk or to the park to play. I try to tire her out so she'll nap after lunch."

"There's a swimming pool if she likes to swim." Beau leaned back in his chair. He watched me intently, and it made me uncomfortable.

And horny!

I was equal parts fascinated and horrified that Beau was evoking such feelings inside me. I'd been waiting to be attracted to a man, and the time had come, and it was a wholly inappropriate male specimen my pheromones were going gaga over.

"She loves to swim." I'd taken her to the gym where Asha had a membership for baby swim classes. "But I don't have any floaties with me."

I'd left much behind at Asha's house, taking only what I could quickly gather—just the essentials for Pari and me.

"I'll make sure you have them." Beau held up his coffee cup. "Can you make me another, darlin'?"

His request evoked such a feeling of domesticity that I decided not to question his arrogance in assuming I was there to serve him.

"What do you do, Beau?" I turned on the coffee machine. "I mean…for work."

"I run a tech company."

I made a sound of assent and folded my arms as the coffee machine gurgled.

"You didn't know?" he inquired.

I shook my head.

"How did you know where I lived?" he asked.

Again, with the curiosity that felt like an interrogation

"I got your details from Asha's phone," I told him. "I wanted to call you…but I wasn't sure what you'd say, and as I told you yesterday, I was desperate, so I decided to show up and hope that you'd be home on a Sunday."

I brought his coffee to him.

"Thanks, darlin'. I'm glad you came here…actually, I'm grateful you did. If not, I wouldn't have met her." He looked at Pari with such longing that it broke my heart a little. Asha had been unfair to Beau. I didn't understand her reasons, and now we'd never know—but she'd been wrong to keep Pari away from her father, one who wanted her.

Beau was a decent man; that was something Asha and I had agreed upon. He was also a bit of a manwhore, but when he was with Asha, he treated her decently. And me as well. Except for the time when I had, to my chagrin, caught Asha and him having sex on the kitchen counter (yeah, I had to clean that with Lysol several times before I could cook), Beau had done nothing for me to be suspicious about. Though, if he'd been shady in any way, I'd have simply run with Pari. I'd just go to Mexico withher, and we'd live there. I'd be a criminal, but the hell with it. There was no world in which I'd let my parents, and especially my father, get anywhere near Pari. Mexico had been my Plan B. I hadn't needed it. Beau's kindness came through, and thanks to how fucked up my family was, my bullshit detector was honed. I could identify a creep from miles away, blindfolded.

"Beau, I'm really sorry that Asha did what she did." I put my hand on his to comfort him.

He turned his hand, so instead of my palm on the back of his hand, we were palm to palm. He interlaced his fingers with mine, and my heart thundered. The electricity between us was palpable. Did he feel it, too? Or was it just amething?

"Darlin', a doctor will be here today to take a DNA sample from Pari. Also, I want her to speak with a child psychologist."

I tried to snatch my hand away at that, but he wouldn't let me.