“Do you want me to do it again?”

“If…if you want to.”

I’m out of breath and Keaton knows it, but the wonderful man that he is still rubs an agonizing line across my thigh with his beard, humming and teasing, “I might.”

We’ve been at Keaton’s house for the past three days lying in bed.

Touching, kissing, and breathing in each other completely.

We were both so wrapped up in ourselves, our wants, our needs, and now all we can do is satisfy the others’ wants, needs, and desires while we try to make up for lost time, both in the years we were never together but also in the days we weren’t talking after we fell in love.

The only breaks we’ve had since he carried me over his shoulder from the theater where I confessed my love for him and back to his house have consisted of him dropping by the shop he owns to check in with the part-time teenage employees. According to Keaton, those pesky kids somehow have, in fact, not burned the place down. Due to this, I’ve only had a few moments of silent editing before Keaton was bursting back through the front door with that handsome dimple showing through his beard and a handful of the shop’s cookies as a treat.

Having not been in too many relationships up to this point, I’d say I prefer makeup sex to almost anything. Maybe even documentaries. Blasphemy, I know. My poster of Tarantino would be shaking in his boots.

It’s the way Keaton teases me, finding every inch of my body to explore, to worship. Even parts I didn’t know needed exploring.

No, not those. No, it’s simpler things like the place where my buttock meets my thigh, the smooth area right below my inner knee, and the dip right above my collarbone.

Keaton is very good at finding these areas and homing in sharp. A man on a mission to please his woman.

His woman.

I swoon at the thought.

But after three days of touching, sucking, biting, and finding all the new ways Keaton is absolutely disastrous to my innocence in bed, he gives me a sweet kiss on the thigh, muttering, “Alright, foxy lady, let’s go out in the world again.”

“Wait, I thought you were going to…you know?” I say, looking down between my thighs and back up at him. “Again?”

Keaton grins, lifting an eyebrow before bending back down, brushing a tender kiss across my inner thigh and removing the warmth just as quickly as he gave it.

“I have to go check on the shop again,” he says.

I glance to my laptop where the final edit of my movie begs to be worked on. And although it’s tempting, this man is even more so.

I think Keaton understands where my mind is at because he smiles and pats my leg. “Come be my shop girl. Let’s get you out of the house.”

I twist my lips to the side, “Hmm, you know I think shop cats or shop dogs exist, but not shop girls.”

“Nah, gotta have a hot shop girl,” he says. “How else will the milkshakes bring the boys to my shop?”

I giggle. “Fair point.”

So away we go, strolling down Main Street of Foxe Hill thirty minutes later, hand-in-hand and toward the sandwich shop he owns.

It’s both odd and delightful that we’re here. Me, in my hometown being a fool in love with the one man I wanted for far too long. And who, coincidentally, wanted me and I didn’t even know it. The spring birds chirp in the crisp morning air and a humid breeze rolls in, a sign of summer yet to come.

Keaton and I reach the edge of Main Street, looking up at the entrance to his shop. He opens the door for me, guiding me in right as the teenager behind the counter dully bemoans, “Welcome in.”

Though, when he sees it’s his boss, he gives an equally lazy smile that matches his tone and takes off the gloves he was already preparing for a potential incoming customer.

“Please tell me you’re here to let me leave early?” he asks.

Keaton checks his watch. “Yeah, Katie gets here in thirty, right? You can head on out.”

The teen fist bumps the invisible angel that is looking over him and bolts for the door, only backtracking twice to both clock out on the computer and to get his car keys.

“I remember being young once,” I reminisce once the bell over the door chimes announcing his third exit.

Keaton strolls behind the counter. “Were you that desperate to leave your part time job?”

I feel my face flush at the memories of us working the theater together.

“Nah,” I say. “There was a hot guy there.”

“Oh ho, is that right?” he asks, lifting an eyebrow as he moves down the aisle behind the counter.

Let me tell you, if you haven’t seen a man run a shop of his own, then you haven’t lived, ladies.

It’s the confidence in his movements, the way he has a rhythm to the way he works. From examining the area behind the counter, checking around the oven, jerking it open and flexing those biceps of his…

What’s even more odd is how I’m getting turned on from it all.

A distraction is in order, so I lean against the counter, tilting my head to the side.

Keaton grins, that wonderful dimple poking it’s way in. “What are you thinking about, Vi?”

Ah, the age-old question. Keaton’s modus operandi. It’s something about the way he asks it, like he can’t imagine another thing more important than the silly thoughts running through my head. Like whatever is going on inside my brain stems from a curiosity that won’t be satiated until he knows.

“Show me something,” I say, glancing over the counter.

“What?” he says, exhaling a laugh through his nose.

I shrug. “Anything. I wanna help. Tell me how to make a sandwich.”

“This feels like some sexist trap.”

“Nah, it would be if you demanded I learn while also wearing heels.”

“I wouldn’t exactly protest you in heels making me food.” He grins. “Well, only heels.”

“I can’t cook to save my life.”

“Thankfully there isn’t a lot of cooking when it comes to sandwiches.” He opens the swinging side door to guide me. “But, please, be my guest.”

I walk in, bumping my hip against his before standing at the end of the line where the breads are, still teeming with flavor. I can practically taste the warm notes baked in. Honey, oatmeal, raisins… I’ve seen him knead the dough before, the muscles in his forearms flexing as his fingers curl in and out, melding the flour with the…other stuff.

Yeah, I’m not sure what really goes into it exactly, but it is very erotic, if you ask me.

Even now, he’s wearing the same plain black tee he always wears on days he goes into work. I love the way it stretches beautifully across his chest, how it settles over his dark denim jeans, pausing to admire…

“Violet?”

His eyebrows are raised, a hand roaming across his cheek to scruff his beard and smiling as if that wasn’t the first time he’d tried to address me.

“Sorry, what did you say?”

“Is my sandwich shop turning you on?” he asks.

I choke out a laugh but still do not answer.

But, what in the world so you say to that?

Uhh, yes? Wrap me up in a tortilla and take me to town?

Keaton bites his inner cheek, looking this way and that before nodding slowly as if considering for a moment.

We don’t speak in that time. We just take each other in as well as the space between us. That’s just how we are, though. How we’ve always been. Absentminded conversation with sprinkles of silence. But the good silence. Silence you can only get with an equal-minded partner. I like Keaton’s silence, like maybe he respects the need for it.

My eyes trail over his trimmed beard, the way his hair curves so elegantly so that strands flop over the shaved sides. And his eyes—their hazel tint staring back at me, as if daring me to move first. But once I glance at his dimple, I know it’s not a dare at all. But an appreciation that I will be the first to talk because that’s how our dynamic is. I prefer it that way.

He’s the silent lumberjack.

My silent lumberjack.

“What types of meats do you have here, sir?” I ask, jutting my chin toward the array of ham, turkey, salami, and various other selections under the glass case.

Though, let’s be honest, I’m not here for the sandwiches. I’m here for the man who makes them.

Keaton’s thick eyebrows lift, and the edge of his lips move to a gentle smile.

“Well, ma’am, let me show you our selection,” he says.

Although the words are bold, I can still see the flush run over his cheeks. He is bold, but he’s also sweet, caring, and devastatingly modest.

His arm extends out, displaying the way to the swinging door leading the back. It bands across the opening, pushing it slightly, allowing me through.

I’ve never been the back of the shop before. It’s small, but not crowded. If anything, it’s immaculate. And when I twist on my heel to glance around, I’m instead face to face with the dimpled hunk from the front.

My dimpled hunk.

I step forward, extending out my hand toward him. He knows where I’m headed because his arm reaches out and gently curls around my tiny wrist. The sheer size of his hand over mine is daunting but exciting.

“Vi…” he says, trailing off, backing me up slowly before my butt hits a large gray enclosed area. When he reaches around me to pull a handle, I step to the side and realize it’s the store’s freezer.

“Do you plan on killing me?” I ask, squinting.

He chuckles. “A fantasy I don’t know about?”

“Villains can be…hot.” Even as the words leave my mouth, I feel awkward saying them.

Keaton shakes his head, placing his hand on the small of my back and escorting us both inside. He shuts the door behind us, and instantly I’m struck from the cold. It bites harder than I expected.

“I kind of thought you’d be biting me rather than cold,” I say.

“Funny,” he says, nodding toward me. “Off with the shirt, missy.”

I tilt my head to the side with a smile, “You’re serious?”

“What, do you think I’m joking?” he asks, grinning.

“No,” I say, biting my lip. I can feel the smile fighting its way to the surface.

And yet, I find myself slipping my arm into the sleeve of my shirt and pulling it over my head, tossing it to the floor.

When in Rome… When in freezer…

Keaton takes a step forward, sighing. “You come into my shop, wanting to help out… so let’s see what you’ve got.”

“Big boss man.”

“Hands behind your back.”

I do as Keaton says without question as he takes another step forward. I take an equal and opposite step back until my shoulder blades hit the wall. It’s striking, almost so cold it stings. But it does exactly as he wants, which is make my nipples stand directly on end.

His smiling dimple is borderline mocking me.

Keaton’s hand trails down my stomach, unbuttoning the top of my shorts and dragging the zipper down until my stomach is exposed the cold now. But I’m only shivering for a moment before his hand covers it. And not just there, but his mouth kisses the tip of my nose before dipping down to my chest.

The warmth of him, the heat of his breath against my exposed breasts, it’s intoxicating. Liberating. Unfounded.

Keaton dips his hand into my pants, stroking a line with his middle finger over the soft cotton of my underwear until he reaches the one place he knows I want him. When he finds it, it’s like lightning, sparking out in waves as he strokes in delicate circles. Even with the layer of cotton between us, the motion is maddening. I know he can feel how turned on I am through the fabric.

The cold bites at my back, my calves, and arms. The only warmth is his mouth on me and his other hand pressed against the curve of my waist, gripping me tighter and tighter as his other hand rolls quicker and quicker.

He moves up, nipping at my ear, kissing down to my neck and then to that area just above my collarbone, licking across it.

“Oh—” I start, closing my eyes but before I can even finish my statement, his finger presses harder against me, the circles running faster, his mouth making its way to the peak of my breast, covering it with his warmth.

I know I’m close, but I can’t bring myself to say anything—do anything—except let out an exhalation of breath, a warm respite to the cold, a breeze of relief that only has the cold tingling at my lips once more, a greedy thing that only spurs the sensation further.

And just when I think it’s too much, Keaton’s hand removes from my back and lands on my opposite breast, leaving my back exposed to the cold and my nipple warm and hard.

The juxtaposition almost sent me to an early grave.

I can feel the tension releasing between my thighs, melding up to my stomach. The nerves in my chest shoot down. It heats my back, my cheeks, my chest as my orgasm releases in a puff of cold air exhaling from my mouth.

Then, the next thing I know, he’s placing a chaste kiss on the peak of my breast, then up to my collar bone, and over my warm cheeks and to the tip of my nose.

I’m blinking back the surprise, the thrill of it. I honestly shouldn’t be. Keaton has been adventurous before. Heck, our first time was on the hood of his Jeep. But this was eager, insatiable.

“What are you thinking?” he asks me, grabbing my thrown shirt on the ground and lifting it over my head, shimmying it down my sides with a chuckle as it catches on nose, causing me to let out a muffled plea.

“That I was supposed to be helping you out,” I say, nudging past him to exit the freezer. The fluorescents of the kitchen almost blind me upon exit. I hadn’t noticed that, for a fridge, it was mighty cozy.

“You did,” he says with a chuckle. “I feel so much more relaxed. Don’t you?”

Keaton lets the heavy door fall behind us then places one hand on either side of my waist. The gesture sends back flashing memories of just moments ago when he held me in place with desperation. I long for the same touch.

He backs me against the stainless-steel countertops.

“No, really, what are you thinking, Vi?”

I pause, genuinely considering his question.

That I can’t believe I just messed around with my brother’s best friend again? That the man I’ve dreamed about since I was a teen is touching me? That I’m living some upside-down fantasy where somehow this is my life and he’s the sandwich shop owner in shining armor I always wanted yet never expected to get?

So I say exactly that.

“You’re my sandwich shop fantasy.”

Keaton’s head rears back as he lets out one of the happiest, most genuine laughs I’ve ever heard from him. This quiet man of mine. All mine.