LIVELY POV

"What was that, Liv?" Sadie asks eagerly, trailing along out of the kitchen, forgetting her loaded cooler.

"What?" I chew my inner lips, grappling to keep a straight face and my feelings in check, but it's impossible. A huge part of me wants to jump and squeal at the fluttery sensation in my stomach, while another part wants to let go of this trolley and run away with Bubble as fast as possible.

The latter option is wise, but the immense portion of me that delights in the scent of the only man I've admired forayed into the tiny bits of intelligence left in me. I don't want to run; I want to hang around and experience this side of Aaron Wallace, where he could be nice to me and gentle to Bubble. It's a rarity in our first season.

"Did Aaron Wallace follow you to the kitchen and fuck stared at you?" Sadie blurts out without a filter. It's what actually happened, but hearing her say it makes me realize that everyone in the crowded kitchen saw it.

"That's not what happened," I defend against the truth in my head rather than to her.

"Oh, please," she rolls her eyes, overtaking me and walking in backward so she can face me, "ask everyone. That man had never been to the kitchen; none of the Wallace family had. They have people for that. Let alone babysit a child. What's happening? Did my prayers from yesterday get answered? Because I swear he's interested in you. That's what pretty girls do to these rich families," she chortles.

"Don't overreact; it was nothing."

"Nothing? I don't think you and I were on the same level of ground. Yesterday you were supposed to be fired, but here you are. Then the first grandson of the Wallace, who smelled like an artifact that should be guarded with drones in a museum, followed you to the kitchen full of sweaty servants of his family and stared at you without blinking. Maya might have swallowed her soul from envy."

I laugh at how she says the last line, but I don't forget that she knows about what happened yesterday, which means the whole main clubhouse knows. I wonder what they think about me, and now Aaron had to follow me and make it worse.

"You're so pretty and unaware, Liv. I know you'd turn some heads, and your missteps will go unnoticed," she earnestly adds, flattering me. I stop with a faint smile. "We don't know for sure yet," I assert and twirl her back toward the kitchen. "Get back to work before Maya reports to Carol for negligence." I playfully give her back a light push while she laughs.

"Savage. She will do anything for real," Sadie laughs harder, walking away.

My smile fades the moment I am alone. Those unreal hazel eyes that are impossible to say no to would dump me into another phase of pain, I know for sure. I shake my head at the thought and exit to the patio to deliver the eclairs to Aaron's female cousins.

They are so preoccupied with their chats that they don't notice my presence while delivering. I'm grateful for that.

When I return to the corridor where I left the food cart with the orders from the Wallace section, I take in a deep breath, mentally preparing myself for Aaron's mom and aunties to treat me even more poorly after how he addressed my case earlier. I unlock the door and push into the luxurious place.

"What are you doing?" Those refined and cultured voices flow gracefully around the chilled room.

"What am I doing?" There's that noble, charming tone of Aaron's voice, which I studied too well. He is supposed to be in the kitchen with Bubble. My heart thuds with worry about where he left him. What was I thinking, trusting Aaron to babysit a child?

With careful haste, anxious about going after Bubble before he panic, I take the corner, and the three women come to my view, crossing their ankles or legs by the lodging seater and analyzing Aaron, who is standing in front of them with barely concealed annoyance, emphasized in his intense jaws.

The room behind him was a private arcade and Bubble was standing by the cracked open door, unaware of my presence and innocently watching the four people.

Aaron didn't abandon him. A stream of relief warms my chest.

"So while you're about to take responsibility for the family aviation company, you suddenly added babysitting to your resume?" Kathleen Wallace shapes insult with sophistication.

"What is that supposed to mean?" Aaron asks, sounding annoyed.

My head remains down as I go about my job with stings in my heart, setting down their orders in front of them, feeling their deprecating gaze on me and Aaron's piercing stare towering over me. I know to whom their conversation was directed, and that warmth in my chest turns to actual flame, scorching. I need to get out of here, but I have to make two more trips back to the cart.

"Your aunt talked about the girl you hang out with. I want to meet her while we are all here together. We will speed things up," Aaron's mother says, instilling an obvious reminder in my head while I grab two dishes at the same time. My eyes flicker to Bubble; he has seen me but he seems contemplative about crossing over to me. He does that when he's nervous in a foreign place.

Just great! I had to go and put him in this situation. I should get him. It's almost time for his medication intake.

"Besides you're educated, and your father is handing control over to you after the holidays, what else will you want if not a family of your own? It's your grandfather's only wish right now."

"The family needs a next-generation heir," another of his Aunty agrees with his mother's statement as I set down the dishes in front of them and straighten back to get the bottle of their family wine. My eyes uncontrollably brush Aaron's squinted eyes while passing. I take my gaze away instantly, given this crowd isn't the employees in the kitchen; these are Aaron's family, who own this place and clearly are already having an issue with my job here.

"Mom! Aunty!" He sternly warns them, and a relief expands in my chest with a shudder, leaving my mouth. My hands are shaking at the intimidation their presence exudes; I grab the bottle, and luckily, it's open. I wouldn't have to mess up popping it where my nerves are everywhere.

Stooping while I serve the wine in their cups, his mother authoritatively says in elegant collectiveness, "Set up a family meeting with the girl, Aaron."

"Ruby and I have nothing serious. Matter of fact, I texted her we were over." Aaron affirms, his tone pissed and enraged. I'm done serving; I could leave now and let his family have their private conversation.

"Well then, your aunties and I will start searching for a girl worthy of your dignity from our business partners,"

I signal for Bubble to come over. He complies, given I'm closer to him now. Reaching his small hand with one hand, I push the cart with the other, exiting the door while I distinctly hear Aaron saying, "I don't suppose you want to get on my bad side, Mom. Aunties, stay in your lane."

Once again, I am reminded of why the Wallace family shouldn't be glorified. They possess no empathy lineage unless it comes to their superiority.

Batting away the tears in the back of my eyes so Bubble wouldn't notice, I squat before him in the corridor and playfully kiss his smooth cheeks.

"Ma midi—sea," he reminds me of his medication in between his laughter. He's so beautiful.

"I am aware, big man. I will never forget." Smiling at him and twirling him onto my back, I carry him on there and get up, pushing the cart.

A discernible click of the door came from behind us.

"Lively?"

My eyes close. I almost added speed, wanting to leave without having to look Aaron in the eyes, but I stopped, maybe because he was my boss or maybe because I mainly couldn't walk away.

Now his footsteps are getting closer. Terrified is how I feel inside, but I swallow, spinning around with an expression that is nothing but a lie. He stops right in front of me, his scent weakening me. His eyes are soft compared to the intensity that lived inside them earlier, but they are narrowed with confusion.

"Why did you take him when work could be easier for you with him being looked after?" he asks me, shaking his head as if he forgot I was in the room when his mother and aunties mocked him for babysitting.

"It was a wrong idea..." I start, but he doesn't let me finish; he steps up to me, his proximity causing me to pause.

He looks over to Bubble, who is looping his arms around my neck, and his eyes come back to me. His throat shifts.

"Look, I am once again sorry about my family and what you had to hear. It has nothing to do with you though," he smiles convincingly, but at the end of the day, I know when I am hinted to stay in my lane. That was what his family was doing.

"They were right, a child shouldn't be brought over to work," my voice is barely above a whisper, caused by his presence.

"You can bring him over as much as you want," he emphasizes, his nostrils slightly flaring as he breathes. "I dare someone to stop you," he grits.

Why is he suddenly mad?

"Mister Aaron Wallace," I swallow, averting my eyes to his clean shiny shoes, "what are you doing?"

"Telling you I am here."

He went and said it, and a shiver ran down my spine.

"Exactly." I look up to him with confusion in my eyes that is bigger than this world. "You are suddenly doing everything for me. Carol gave me five thousand in tips this morning; she said it was from you. You sent me a chauffeur to my door, and now you're going out of your way to care for my brother and defend me for breaking rules that were made... What are you doing?" I won't survive another wreck by him this time.

A muscle in his jaw ticks, and he closes the last inches between us, snatching Bubble from me and into his arms; the boy doesn't oppose.

"Have you ever regretted something?" he asks me.

"Yes," I nod, glaring into his eyes, which illuminate the reoccurrence of our history and the risk of its resumption to repetition. "I did."

"Do you know how it feels?" he asks.

Indeed, I know.

"A persistent stinging and relentless mind questions, for why did I do it? The longing to go back and change things, and the hit with the realization that what's done is done. I was an idiot."

Do not cry in front of him!

There was silence as he studied me, and then he said something hard to believe. "I feel all those right now."

There is no way Aaron Wallace will. "You?" I scoffed, trying not to sound disrespectful and lose his only shield at this job, even though I wanted it to. Because right now, while my body deciphers his, my mind already knew him and had hated him for years.

He didn't take offense at the mockery. His look was merely pain, confusing to my mind that I lost perception of what was around us. He gave my body the response it was looking for; he brought his hand to my face. This was the first skin-to-skin contact, and it awakens a chapter within me from six years ago. My heart dropped, not in an awful place, but in a dangerous pit that I fear it will be lost forever.

"If I could go back in time, I wouldn't have talked at all," he muttered, pinning my gaze and all of me in his custody as his face neared mine. Too stunned to speak, too fragile to breathe. He took my shock for an opportunity to continue. "I would have done things differently; I would have done this," he whispered, his warm breath hitting my face, and I felt a slick surface latch onto my lips.

Blankness, deafening quiet, rapid heartbeats in my hearing, tender touch against my face, mints on my tongue dripping down my throat as I swallowed, blood rushing to places within me, exploding sparks in my stomach, and a mesmerizing foreign spice in my nostrils; they all lasted for a minute. It was the most graceful minute I've had in a while.

"You remember me!" I gasped into his mouth, and he devoured my mouth again with hungry eagerness. Then I heard him smile, his thumb running across my bottom lip.

"It happens you've got a nature that's impossible to find a replica of all over the world. I do remember you, Lively Kelby. How couldn't I? You cursed me to perpetual agony the last time we saw each other," he whispered with a smirk and kissed me deeply again, nibbling on my lower lip like it was his last food for the day. I thawed. My hands were weak, and so were the entirety of my bones.

"Mister Aa..." I murmured, but he swallowed it, shaking his head against mine, tapping our tongues together in a sensual rhythm. He tasted like gold, exciting but even more, he had a delicious flavor inciting a tornado in my core. "We are done with the formalities," he panted in between kissing me, "call me by my name," he let out, hoarsely.

I pulled back a little, and he stared at me like I committed a traitorous crime, holding my face with one hand. It was an internal battle between myself not to lean into his healing touch. He won, my eyes closed at the nicety he provided.

"You should know nothing changed about me; I am still the underprivileged girl, you know." I am not a fit for his family; he is blue blood, while I am barely even red.

"Yet it is you I am asking to give me the privilege of a second time."

"Aaron, I am telling you, I am a risk, remember? I am no one. I have no high school diploma," I rush out.

"It doesn't change how highly I see you now. If a certificate is what measures you up to my criterion, then I will tell you my head printed copies of thousands watching you right now. I made a mistake before," he said with unblinking hunter eyes observing mine.

"No one wanted me! There is no gain in wanting me, Aaron." He will leave me at the end of summer once again.

"Even good for me! So you've only been mine this whole time!"

"How do I convince you I'm scared of your hues?"

"Everything you got, throw it at me. Test me. I will prove to you that this time there is no ending to us. That I messed up, and I am taking accountability for it."

"Livy, midi—sea."

"Oh, goodness," I closed my eyes, embarrassed. Bubble heard and saw everything.

"And maybe, maybe... you will see me as you did the first time," Aaron charmingly said, not caring this isn't a child-friendly discussion.

The problem was that I didn't see him the first time; I just wanted him. And when I finally got to see him for who he was, it was too late. I didn't tell him that, though; it was a truth only for myself. So, I smiled just as his phone buzzed in his pocket, interrupting us, and he had to check it. His hand dropped from my face, leaving me with a sense of vacancy, so I busied myself taking Bubble from him.

"I didn't forget," I whispered in his small ear and stroked his soft hair, leaning his head on my shoulder.

When I looked back at Aaron, he was staring at his phone screen with lines on his forehead and he heaved a sigh.

His eyes flew back to me as he shoved his phone back into his pocket. "I need to go now. I will tell Carol to get someone to be responsible for Bubble while you work, and when you are done, Keenan will take you back home." He looked down at his wristwatch. "We are not done with this conversation though because I want more of those kisses," he said flirtatiously, making my cheeks burn.

This shouldn't be happening in front of Bubble, or even at all.

I smiled with my head down, chewing my lip, and nodded.

"Good," I said in agreement, and then he brushed back my hair from the side of my face, revealing more of me to him so he could kiss my lips again, this time without tongue. It was more of a departing kiss, but it still excited the butterflies in my stomach.

"See you, little man!" He held out his knuckle to Bubble, and Bubble cautiously bumped his small one against the giant one in front of him.

For the rest of the day, with the help of Sammie, the man who cared for Bubble, I could focus on work. The Wallaces didn't stay in the country club for long either, but while they were here, none of them acted any more rudely than the normal behavior of people of their kind. Aaron's aunties, who were second to last in the family to leave, likely to prove a point, asked their escort to tip me a thousand, which, on my part, meant everything. I thanked them wholeheartedly as they left, and they only waved it off. I ended up hovering over the last two cousins on the patio, Dane Wallace and the pretty young lady I knew from my frequent Wikipedia searches for the Wallace family, Emersyn Wallace, Mason Wallace's elder sister.

The two chatted and laughed while I stayed around to see if they needed anything, until Emersyn dismissed me, saying they were leaving soon too. Since there was still time ahead until my shift was over, although it didn't matter given the Wallaces left earlier and I was free to leave too. I, however, decide to stay and got Carol to give me a golf cart key, joining Sadie on the course, helping sell beverages until five.

Keenan got Bubble and me home as ordered by Aaron, and just like earlier when he came to pick us up, the neighbors were curious about the lavish car parked on our street, something very irregular to happen. Commonly, if we saw cars like this, it was to pass through the street, using here as a shortcut passageway, but they never stopped until Wallace's vehicle, which literally had the name imprinted on the license plate.

I thanked Keenan and grabbed Bubble inside, and since we couldn't stop for his chicken nuggets given I wasn't driving, when we got inside the house with all the chores done from earlier, I was really grateful for the food mom preserved in the fridge. All I did was warm some for the two of us; Bubble had some and fell asleep watching PJ masks as usual.

And all I did given I have all night to myself was feel my lips and face where Aaron touched, grinning like an insane woman alone in the silence.

My eyes closed at the thought of Boyd Clarkson High School, my high school, to the day Aaron Wallace's school team arrived. They had everything prestigious, their perfect white bus, unlike the typical yellow bus that every school here has. They came down from the ride in their private school sports tracksuit, a mix of black, white, and red. Aaron was the last on the bus to come down, as he's the captain. Chaos and noises broke from the crowd at sighting him, but it was all muffled in my ear to extreme quiet. He had a baseball hat on, crooked eyes that were unnaturally charming, and a smile to all the girls which broke my heart.

The next day, Dad took Bubble to daycare, and I left on my bicycle to the country club. There was a lot of work in the Wallace section, and stupid me looked for Aaron among the Wallace family, but he was not there.

Maybe his family was too revolted; they had hands placing a space between us before, so it could be anything. Or maybe he regretted what happened between us and decided to leave Lake Oswego. I had to convince myself that I was stupid for dreaming of the possibilities of fixing the impossible when truly I couldn't. And then I wore back my armor of hatred for Aaron Wallace because it's the only defense I can let myself have against other emotions I feel for him, which he doesn't deserve.