by Sara Whitney
“Are we supposed to ring the doorbell, or will that wake the baby?” she whispered.
He shrugged. “Newborn etiquette is a mystery to me.”
“We’re a terrible pair,” she said with a laugh.
“Nah. We’re a great team.” He slid an arm around her waist, and something warm ignited in her chest when he grinned down at her. “You’ve got my back, and I’ve got yours. If things get pukey in there, we bail.”
“Deal.” She smiled back, overwhelmed at the idea that they’d become a team. But before she could analyze the big scary swirl of emotions the idea generated, Dave solved the knock/don’t knock dilemma by throwing open the front door.
“Friends! Come on in.” He looked exhausted and elated at the same time, and his Ramones T-shirt was covered in a number of mysterious stains. “Lucille just woke up from her nap.”
They followed him inside, and it was immediately clear that although this was her first visit to the house, Aiden was a frequent visitor.
He tied the balloons to the staircase banister and wobbled one of the rungs on the railing. “I still need to fix this.”
He spoke more to himself than to Dave, whose lids had drifted shut as he leaned against the wall in the hallway, yet the father of three immediately jostled into motion and said, “Sure.” Thea couldn’t tell if it was a response to what Aiden had just said, but Dave pushed his fingers under his glasses to rub his bloodshot eyes and said again, “Sure.”
“Okay, buddy. Let’s meet the kid.” Aiden took Dave by the shoulders and steered him down the hall toward the family room, where a glowing Ana cradled a tiny scrap of humanity in her lap and the two other Chilton kids were busy pelting each other with Legos.
“Hi, guys!” Ana spoke softly, her hand cupping the baby’s head. “This is Lucille.”
Thea walked directly over to the baby, who was almost too small for her to contemplate. “She’s beautiful!” She reached out a tentative finger and stroked it along the baby’s soft cheek.
“She really is.” Ana looked down at her daughter with such focused love that Thea might as well have ceased to exist for a moment. Then her friend looked up and offered her a tired, radiant smile. “It’s good to see you. And him.” She nodded meaningfully to where Aiden was crouched to examine the Lego structure that Zeke and Dara were building. “Who knew he had it in him?”
“Right?” she said. “I almost hate to disturb them, but I brought gifts.”
At the word gift, two pairs of kiddie ears perked up, and they abandoned their plastic bricks to crowd around her. She handed over two wrapped packages, and the pair whooped as they opened their oversized sketchpads and marker sets.
“Okay, you two,” Dave ordered. “Let’s keep it quiet for your new sister.”
He and Aiden herded the two oldest kids out of the room, leaving Thea with a big wrapped box of ruffle-butt baby clothes for the newborn. Ana patted a spot on the couch next to her.
“To be clear, I wasn’t surprised to see Aiden talking to the kids; he does that all the time when he’s here. I was surprised to see you two together.” She cocked her head. “Funny that the guy with a different blonde every night settled down with a brunette.”
“Heh, yeah.” Thea shifted uncomfortably on the couch, both at the lie she was perpetuating with Ana and at the idea of Aiden gravitating back toward blondes again soon. “What a contrast, huh?”
“Oh. I didn’t mean it like that.” Ana rubbed a hand across her eyes. “Sorry, nuance escapes me when I’m only sleeping three hours at a time. What I mean is, I’m glad he realized what a catch you are.”
Thea’s lips started to shape a hasty denial, but she bit it back. Ana and Dave weren’t in the loop on their arrangement, but at this point Thea herself wasn’t quite sure what their arrangement looked like anymore.
While she was sorting through her confusing thoughts, Ana changed the subject. “How’s the station doing while Dave’s on paternity leave?”
From one unpleasant subject to another. “Fine. Mabel’s a good solo host, but the station’s kind of boring without Dave around.”
The station was kind of boring, period. Not for the deejays of course; their jobs were dynamic and engaging. And the ad reps had endless meetings and copywriting tasks that always seemed fun. But answering the phones for people doing far more interesting things was definitely not her idea of exciting. Then again, she was a lady with a mortgage now, so she couldn’t exactly go hopping from job to job. Her professional future stretched in front of her as one long slog of taking messages and watching other people do cool things.
“Would you mind?” Ana deposited the newborn into Thea’s arms and stood. “I want to get a fresh bottle started.”
“Um. Okay?” She nervously cradled the breakable little human in her arms, looking around the empty room for help. But it was just her and the kid. “Let’s just be cool till they’re back, little Lucille. Don’t choke or cry or anything, all right?”
The baby blinked up at her, and Thea tentatively rocked her back and forth a fraction of an inch in each direction, holding her breath the whole time.
“Such a natural.”
The gently amused voice pulled her attention away from Lucille’s round little-old-man face. Aiden leaned against the doorway, watching her with a lopsided smile. Then he strolled across the room and sat down next to her, helping reposition the baby into a more comfortable position in her arms. Once that was done, he brushed his fingers over the downy black hair on top of Lucille’s head with such gentleness that Thea’s ovaries vibrated.
“I thought you didn’t do babies,” she said quietly.
“Don’t have much experience,” he said in an equally soft tone. “Didn’t say I don’t appreciate them.”
Oh no. Aiden Murdoch liked babies. How was she supposed to survive this? It was enough to give a girl ideas, even if that girl had no interest in long-term relationships. But watching him with a baby, knowing that he preferred to eat his pizza crust first, recalling how his breath caught in his throat right before he came, it was too much intimacy for this fake/not-fake relationship. Things could spiral out of control if she didn’t keep reminding herself that they had a mutually agreed-upon breakup looming just down the road and he had his player ways to get back to.
As Thea was being bombarded by inconvenient musings about the man on the couch next to her, Lucille proved that she’d inherited her father’s comedic timing by widening her big dark eyes, opening her rosebud mouth, and spewing a thin white trickle of vomit all over Thea’s hands and dress.
“Aggh!” she cried as Aiden threw back his head in laughter.
“What happened to teamwork?” she hissed.
His only answer was to pluck Lucille from her hands. He gingerly slung the baby over his shoulder. “I got this now that she’s all puked out. You go ahead and—”
Then his eyes widened as another stream of vomit poured from the baby’s mouth down his back, and now Thea was the one doubled over and laughing.
“Teamwork!” she wheezed.
When Ana returned with a bottle, Aiden swiftly handed over the baby, and they said goodbye to the Chiltons a short time later, leaving in a much stickier state than when they’d arrived.
“Looks like we both have some laundry to do,” she said.
“Yep.” He twisted to check out the damage to the back of his shirt as they headed to his truck. “I should probably head home since I’m technically still wearing yesterday’s clothes.”
“Mmmkay,” she said as neutrally as possible.
“Or…” He held open the passenger door and gave her a boost.
“Or?” Her pulse picked up.
“Or we swing by my house so I can get a change of clothes, and I finish painting your bedroom while you lounge around naked and shout encouraging words.”
She pretended to think about it. “Is this just a trick to get me to wash your clothes?”
“Obviously. I’m using you for laundry service.”<
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She shrugged. “As long as we’re on the same page. Let’s do it.”
Twenty-Three
“Okay, I’ll admit it. I was wrong.”
Aiden leaned forward and cupped a hand around his ear. “I’m sorry, what was that? I couldn’t quite hear you over the gentle lapping of the water.”
Thea scooted closer to him on the bench seat of Trip’s boat to poke Aiden in the ribs. “I was wrong! Boating is incredible.”
It was the Sunday of Memorial Day weekend and three weeks since he and Trip had made peace on the way back from Chicago and he and Thea had agreed to be an “us.” He and Trip were getting along better than they had in months as they collaborated on new systems at the office, and the work on Thea’s house was essentially done. Life was good, particularly with Thea sitting next to him, vibrant and laughing and thoroughly kissable.
He captured her hand and brought it to his mouth, nipping at the tip of her finger. “No, you’re incredible.”
She just laughed him off, but he meant every word. She was fucking phenomenal, reclined against the boat railing in nothing but cutoffs and a yellow polka-dot bikini top, aviator shades hiding her eyes, and her dark hair whipping around her face in the late May breeze. She turned and laughed at something Ashley said as Trip steered the Hammerhead in a lazy loop around the Illinois River.
“Hey, watch it!” she called up to Trip. “If you don’t snorkel to the narwhal side, your starboard port’s gonna mess up the rigging!”
His brother burst into a loud guffaw, and Aiden draped an arm around her shoulder. “I don’t know how a woman as good at everything as you are is so bad at nautical terms.”
She leaned back with her elbow on the railing. “I can’t be good at everything.”
“Bullshit!” Trip said good-naturedly. “Did Aiden tell you that Gil McConnell’s hiring us to redo his bathroom?”
“For real? That’s so great!” Then she tapped a finger to her chin. “But I do believe I was promised a finder’s fee…”
Aiden hauled her onto his lap and kissed her thoroughly, loving the sun on his back and Thea snuggled against his front. And he loved it even more when she murmured against his lips, “Sorry, I accept cash only.”
When they hit a wide section of the river a few miles outside of Beaucoeur, Trip killed the motor on his Catalina 34 and moved away from the helm to sit next to Ashley.
“Um, don’t you need to, like, steer?” Thea asked nervously.
“Nah,” Trip said. “If we had the sails out, the wind today might carry us all the way to Chicago before we could stop it, but without them we’ll just drift. I’ll flip on the motor if we get too far off course.”
Ash draped her legs over her husband’s lap. “This is a time-honored tradition. Find a wide part of the river, float along, and make out.”
“Don’t make a boat-orgy joke, don’t make a boat-orgy joke, don’t make a boat-orgy joke,” Thea intoned under her breath to laughter all around.
“No, boat orgies happen on Thursdays,” Trip said.
Thea threw back her head with a delighted snort, and in that moment, all the pieces of Aiden’s heart snapped into place. Things at work were humming, his brother was making jokes, and Ashley and Thea had spent most of the afternoon chattering away like old friends. His fake girlfriend was apparently the glue he’d been needing to fit all these bits of his life together.
Now if he could just convince her to remove the “fake” part from her title. He’d been trying to show her how good a life together could be, and he hoped like hell the blissed-out expression on her face meant she was feeling it too.
“Okay, what’s it gonna take to get you to come work with us?” Trip asked.
“These guys could use the help.” Ashley looked up from the cooler, where she was rooting around for her preferred flavor of seltzer water. “I heard all about how amazing you were at the home show too.”
Thea’s laugh mingled with the warm May air to brush across Aiden’s skin. “You’re far too nice. I didn’t do anything anybody else couldn’t have done.”
“Not true. You’re great with customers,” Aiden said.
“And you’re a hell of a lot better than I am on the phones,” Trip added, but she just waved away their praise.
“You guys want somebody who’ll stick around for the long haul, and that’s not me.”
The words echoed in Aiden’s head—that’s not me—as Thea turned her attention to Ashley. “You’re a teacher, right?”
“Third grade. Buncha cute monsters.” She snuggled against Trip’s arm, a La Croix in one hand and a cookie in the other. “They’re about to head out on summer break and forget at least a quarter of what they’ve learned this year.”
“Oh!” Thea brightened. “My best friend, Faith, runs a tutoring program that could probably help. They work with kids over the summer to fight off brain drain. I’m sure she’d put together a packet you could send home with your students for summertime learning activities.”
“Yes please,” Ash said immediately and tilted her head toward the cabin where they’d stashed their phones. “Shall we go exchange some info? And when we do, can you also give me the recipe for those divine cookies?”
“Absolutely,” Thea said as they disappeared belowdecks. “Dark chocolate and dried mango’s a powerful combination.”
Once the women’s voices faded, the only sound was the slap of the water against the hull of the boat and the pounding of Aiden’s heart in his ears. Surely Thea was making light of her checkered work history and not obliquely warning him about the shelf life of their relationship.
“When’s the last time we were out on the water like this?”
At Trip’s question, he shook off the frisson of unease gripping him. “Gotta be at least two summers ago, right?”
“At least.” Trip ran his eyes over the grassy riverbank at the edge of the water. “We should make this a regular thing.”
“We should.”
“Oh, I checked out the website for that project-management software. Seems like not the worst idea. Thea’s, I assume?”
Aiden laughed. “How’d you know?”
“Because I’m starting to think she only has good ideas.” He lowered his voice. “Seriously, how can we get her to come work for us? She’s exactly who we need to replace Mom.”
“I’m not sure we can.” The unease returned, and it must’ve shown in his expression because Trip’s face darkened.
“Wait, you’re not thinking of dumping her or some bullshit?”
“No!” Aiden’s gaze zeroed in on his girl, laughing as she emerged from the cabin into the sunlight. “If anything, the opposite. But you heard her just now. I don’t know how to make her stay.”
“Be honest with her,” Trip said, reaching for another cookie. “Lock that shit down, man. These chocolate mango thingies are the bomb.”
Hours later, Trip docked the boat and they all piled off in a laughing group. Thea’s face glowed pink from the sun, and her hair was a gorgeous tangle around her shoulders. She’d never looked more beautiful.
“This was so much fun! Thank you both!” she shouted at Trip and Ashley as they went their separate ways in the marina parking lot. Once they were in his truck, she saluted. “Where to now, commodore?”
He responded with his list of priorities for the rest of the night: “Your place. A shower. Some solid food. Sex until neither of us can move. And tomorrow after Belly’s graduation party, I’ll tackle the roses in the front yard.”
Thea chirped, “Aye, aye,” and that this is so right feeling surged in his heart again. Lee Blackwell had taught him how to care for roses, and now he’d use those lessons to tame the bushes the man had planted at the house that now belonged to his daughter. Aiden could barely put the immensity of that into words.
When they reached her house and headed inside hand in hand, he took in all the work they’d accomplished since her move in March. Exterior grout redone. Gutters cleaned and resecured. Gle
aming, refinished wooden floors and walls stripped of their ugly paper and painted with warm neutrals that embraced her cozy furniture. Gorgeous modern kitchen. Non-life-threatening balcony. He’d helped her make this house a home, and to his shock, the only thing in the world he wanted was to have a permanent place in it.
“Shower first or eat first?” She started to head toward the kitchen, but he snagged her wrist and pulled her back to him.
“Sex first.” He nipped her ear.
She shivered—fuck, he loved the way he could make her shiver—and lifted her arms to run her fingers through his hair. “I’m baked to a crisp.”
“Not a problem from where I’m standing.” He tilted his head, reveling in the scratch of her nails along his scalp.
Her fingers moved down the front of his shirt, undoing each button she encountered until she slid it off his shoulders. “You’re pretty crispy too.” She pressed a kiss just below his ear. “This isn’t a problem for me either.”
In the end, they didn’t make it out of the hallway, and he didn’t even manage to get her all the way out of the bikini top that had been tormenting him all afternoon. How could he even think about stopping when she shimmied out of her cutoffs, turned to brace her hands against the wall, and looked over her shoulder at him with such blatant invitation? He was pressed against her moments later, plunging a hand into the neckline of her shirt and plucking her nipple through the stretchy swimsuit material. His other hand moved between her thighs, and he hissed when he found her already wet for him. He stroked one finger into her, then two, and she groaned and slid her hand between their bodies to creep down the front of his shorts so she could grip his dick. She squeezed and stroked him while his fingers moved over her clit and her breast, and they breathed together until he made her come and she made him come right back.
When their heartbeats had slowed afterward, he brushed her hair aside to kiss up her neck to her ear. “It’s never been hotter than with you.”
She tossed a wicked little smile over his shoulder. “Ditto. But now I have to let Blueprint out, and you have to feed me.”
