Chapter Twenty
LIZZIE LEFT BLUE in the kitchen packing up his things and went down to the basement to tape her show. She stood at the bottom of the steps, eyes closed, arms wrapped around her middle, and contemplated running back upstairs—Stay with me. I’ll stop making the videos. Just love me, Blue. Love me and let me love you.
She opened her eyes and turned, catching a glimpse of Madison’s picture hanging on the wall. Her eyes shifted back to the stairs. Two years, Blue. It’s only two more years. A night was too hard for him. Two years would be impossible. She had to let him go. She was used to putting herself and her feelings last. This was just another thing she needed to do. She pulled her shoulders back despite the tears slipping down her cheeks and headed for the bathroom.
Fifteen minutes later, dressed in a pair of heels and her trusty apron, blond wig in place, thick frames perched on her nose, she stood in front of the computer and tried to fake a smile—and failed. With a groan, she tried again, pacing, trying to work off the nervous energy that was turning every nerve to ice. She didn’t feel sexy or seductive. She felt like she’d hurt the only man on earth who mattered. Forcing herself to look at Maddy’s picture again, she cleared her throat, pulled her shoulders back for the millionth time, and told herself that she could do anything for forty-five minutes or an hour.
One minute at a time.
She turned on the camera and did her best to turn the heat up in her voice.
“Have you missed your Naked Baker? Because I sure have missed you.” I can do this. I can do this.
She waved a hand over the baking supplies. “Today I have a special surprise just for you. We’re going to make nipple cupcakes.” She narrowed her eyes and winked at the camera, feeling sick to her stomach. “That’s right, just the right amount of frosting for you to settle that dirty little mouth of yours over and enjoy.”
Over the next few minutes she struggled to push the hurt and stress of the day to the side, to push past the love she and Blue had shared, the tenderness of his touch as he bathed her, the look in his eyes when she’d said she had to tape her show—This is for Maddy. I can do this. I have to do this—and she concentrated on doing what she’d been doing twice a week for what felt like forever. For better or for worse, this was her life.
BLUE STOOD AT the top of the stairs unable to tear himself away from the seductive voice traveling up from below. Even here, standing in Lizzie’s home and knowing that she was downstairs dressed in an apron, filming the show, he couldn’t reconcile that feigned seductive voice with the woman he loved. He didn’t know what drove him down the stairs—morbid curiosity or jealousy—but he walked down quietly, stopping when she came into view. He’d seen her on the video wearing the blonde wig and thick dark glasses, but it still shocked him to see her in the getup right there in person. The apron she wore outlined the swell of her breasts, wrapped around her hips, and barely covered her private parts. His gut clenched when she turned and he saw she was wearing a skin-colored thong that covered absolutely nothing.
He watched her in silence, taking in everything she said as she moved around the kitchen, removing one tray from the oven as she put another in, all the while narrating each step and dropping seductive lines like teaspoons of sugar. Blue couldn’t help but be mesmerized by her, because he wasn’t seeing the blond beauty everyone else saw, the woman who was working meticulously to perfect frosting on cupcakes. No, the woman he saw was the one who was hiding beneath the costume. The woman he held in his arms, and in his heart, who’d taken the time again tonight, when she was upset and worn out, to go to the cemetery to pay homage to people she didn’t know. The woman who, despite the way her life had been upended, despite the fact that it was almost midnight and she had to be exhausted, still came down here to film a show so her sister wouldn’t have student loans.
The woman he loved, admired, and worried about, in equal measure.
A part of him still felt the videos were demeaning. She was a strong, intelligent businesswoman, with radiance that lit up a room and a heart of gold. She was the woman who was making him question all the things he believed to be true about people and trust, loyalty and lies. All the things he believed to be true about himself. She was the woman he loved, and he wished there were some way he could help her achieve her financial goals without putting her in such a compromising position. But what he realized was that while he worried the videos were demeaning, she’d obviously been able to overcome that aspect for Maddy’s sake.
Didn’t he feel like a fool? He’d never known anyone who put others first the way she did.
Blue quietly retreated upstairs, not wanting to disrupt her. He gathered his things and drove home, trying to figure out how to reconcile the situation in his mind with the one in his heart.