Starting Over (Paradise Place Book 3)

by Natalie Ann

  Not when she was pulsing and he was going to slip inside of her and feel it surrounding him.

  He put the condom on as fast as he could, then gathered her in his arms and moved into her wetness. Into her softness. Into a place he’d been dreaming of for weeks.

  “You feel so good,” he said, wondering how he had the energy to even voice those words. He’d barely started to move and felt drained. Then all of a sudden there was a burst of power he’d never felt before.

  His hips started to move, her legs came up and wrapped around him matching him thrust for thrust.

  The two of them were moving at a speed that told him she was going to come again. That she was going to make this night just as fabulous as he hoped.

  His hands moved under her hips, pulled her close and held her there while he slammed into her repeatedly. This time she opened her legs up wide and took everything he had to give.

  And when his body didn’t have anything else, when he felt himself tighten and then release, she was there holding him and calling out his name. Then that rainbow he’d seen earlier, there he was sailing over it and landing next to the pot of gold with Blair by his side.

  Blair had never felt so relaxed before. She’d been waiting for this night for what seemed like forever.

  She and Philip had been dating for over a month. Way longer than she’d been with someone else before they’d made love.

  And that was what this was. It wasn’t sex. It wasn’t fast and furious racing to the end of a release.

  It was sharing a moment—a memory—with someone that she’d never done before.

  Did she think sharing it with Philip meant something more? She did.

  She wondered if that was why he’d waited so long now. That he wanted her to know it meant something more to him than two people doing the dirty tango.

  He did have a child to think about.

  She’d been doing a lot of thinking herself lately. That her father kept his romantic life so private from her. Jake was really the first person she ever got attached to. She’d known her father dated other men, she remembered looking back now and meeting his “friends,” but that was all they were to him back then.

  Her father was the best dad a kid could ask for her in her eyes. She’d seen a lot of those same traits in Philip.

  And maybe she was reading more into it all, but deep down she wondered if he was losing his heart to her as she was to him.

  17

  Wake Up And Wonder

  “So are you starting to feel like you are actually living in paradise now?” her cousin Hannah asked her a few weeks later.

  “What?” Blair asked. She was at her grandmother’s for dinner on Sunday, sitting on the deck, with her father and Pops, Aunt Beth and Uncle Miles, her cousins Brina and Hannah over too. Funny how they were all single.

  Even her Uncle Steven, her father’s brother, and his two sons Brady and Luca were single.

  Well, she wasn’t single anymore but didn’t really talk much about it.

  “She asked if you were floating in paradise in your backyard,” Brina said, laughing. “You’ve got googly eyes like I’ve never seen before. You actually let yourself fall?”

  Blair snorted. “I’ve never stopped myself from falling. And how do you know?”

  “Guess your father has been sharing some information with Nana and my mother,” Hannah said. “Unlike my sister over there, I hope I find someone next.”

  “It’s not that I don’t want to find someone,” Brina said, “it’s just that I don’t care one way or another. If I do, great. If not, then I’ll get my kid on my own.”

  Blair rolled her eyes. “I’d rather have it the old fashioned way.”

  “But what if you can’t?” Brina said. “What if you can’t conceive? You’d adopt, right?”

  “I haven’t put much thought into it,” Blair said. She knew she’d have a baby of her own someday. She’d dreamed of holding her child in her arms and therefore in her mind it was going to come true. She’d know if it wasn’t really her child and it always was in her dreams.

  If she told her cousins that they’d just walk in the other room though. No reason to ruin the family get-together.

  “How come you didn’t invite Philip over today?” Pops asked her. “I want to know when I’m going to meet him.”

  “You could come over any day you want and if he’s home I’d introduce you. I didn’t know it was an open invitation to invite him today.”

  “It’s always an open invitation,” Nana said when she walked onto the deck. They were all sitting in the shade enjoying the late August weather. Eighty and partially cloudy was perfect in her eyes.

  “Call him now,” her father said. “Have him come with Livi. I think everyone else might want to meet him.”

  Talk about putting her on the spot. “I’m not sure. He might have plans.” Even though she was sure he didn’t. They’d had dinner together last night, then sat on the deck and relaxed with a glass of wine while Livi played in the yard.

  That was after they’d walked over to the playground as a couple, Livi running ahead of them. Talk about an instant family. When she’d been looking for a house years ago, she’d kept in the back of her mind she wanted kids someday and hoped to find a great place to raise them.

  Now she thought she had a great guy making her wonder if that future dream would come true. Someone she could open up more with than she had in years.

  She’d even managed to voice her concerns about her dream a few weeks prior to Philip. She’d been afraid to, but her guard had been let down and she gave it a whirl, telling him about the one where he was kissing another woman.

  “You aren’t seeing anyone else other than me, right?” she’d asked him. It’d been hard for her to say it, but it was eating her alive to know. To double-check with him. To see if what she was feeling so deeply was worth exploring even more.

  “Of course not. What would make you ask me that?”

  “Don’t laugh, okay? I mean a lot of people laugh at me when I say these things so I really don’t anymore.”

  “You’re starting to make me nervous,” Philip had said back.

  “I have dreams and they tend to come true.”

  He laughed at her even when she told him not to. “You’re joking. Do you dream of lottery numbers? I wouldn’t mind you sharing those numbers with me if you do.”

  She held her smile in place when it wanted to drop, but many people had that reaction to her. “I wish. But no. I just have these weird dreams and bits and pieces of them come true. Not all of them, not everything but enough that I wake up and wonder.”

  “Okay. So what are you wondering about then? Something with me? Is that why you asked that question?”

  “Well, yeah. A week ago or so, not sure when. The night I was in my shop working. I’d woken up and was upset. I dreamed you were with someone, in your office maybe, I couldn’t tell. But you were kissing another woman. Or she was kissing you, but you were just standing there shocked over it. You weren’t participating, but you weren’t fighting her off either.”

  His face flushed and she wanted to jump and point her finger at him and say she knew she was right.

  “That’s really odd. I want to laugh at you again, but the funny thing is the next day when I went into the office one of my staff was coming onto me.”

  “Someone kissed you and you didn’t tell me?” she almost shouted at him.

  “No. She came onto me. Flirting. The first time I met her I could tell, but I didn’t encourage her at all. This last time I had Livi with me. She’d gone with Donna, my secretary, to get a drink and Chelsea came into the office.”

  “And what did she do in terms of flirting?” Blair had asked, narrowing her eyes.

  “Just invading my personal space. She helped me move a table that I didn’t want her help with. Bumped into me on purpose a few times and let out some annoying little giggle afterward.”

  “Do I need to come down there and make my p
resence known?”

  He’d rolled his eyes at her. “We haven’t really come out in the clear with Livi and you want to go to my office and do that? No.”

  That had only made her feel worse and almost like he was embarrassed to be with her. Hadn’t she experience that enough in her life? “Why don’t you want them to know you are dating someone?”

  “It’s not that. I’m just private. Besides Donna told me afterward that Chelsea is always like that. She’s one of those women who thinks she can sleep her way to the top. I’m not interested in anyone like that. Even if I were single, but I don’t consider myself now, I’m not buying what she is selling.”

  “That’s good to know,” she said and smiled. She felt a little better about it but still wished he wasn’t keeping it such a secret to everyone.

  “You really dreamed that?” he asked. “You should have told me you were feeling insecure about us. I would have reassured you.”

  “That has nothing to do with it,” she said.

  “I think it probably does. It’s just your subconscious telling you something. That is what dreams normally are.”

  She brushed it off at that point. No reason to go any further. Not everyone got it or believed her and she knew that by now. There was no reason for her to be upset over it and she had to get over it.

  For a minute she’d let herself forget that his career was all about science and facts. He wasn’t going to believe in something like dreams coming true.

  Philip was perfect in just about every other sense of the word though. He accepted her and her family and the amount of time she worked.

  He turned her on in a way that no one else had ever accomplished before.

  He was a great dad and she loved Livi.

  She got what she wanted with him and shouldn’t get greedy. Not over something as simple or silly as this.

  “Yes,” Pops said just now, reminding her that she had several pairs of eyes on her. “Call Philip and see if he and Livi want to join us for dinner. We’ve got an hour easily before we eat. Plenty of time.”

  “Time to make us uncomfortable. Livi doesn’t know about Philip and me.”

  “So?” Nana said. “We can all behave and not mention it. Right everyone? We can just act like they are friends.”

  Blair looked around and saw her aunt and uncle laughing. Then her aunt said, “It’s more than my girls have, so sure, I can play along.”

  “Thanks, Mom,” Brina said. “Nothing like putting the guilt on us. Maybe Hannah and I like being single.”

  “Or maybe not,” Uncle Miles said.

  “I’ll call Philip now,” Blair said to stop the fighting. She hoped her cousins thanked her later.

  Philip couldn’t believe he was on his way to Blair’s grandparents’ house in Latham. He’d wanted to say no when she just called him, but the other part of him really wanted to spend the time with her.

  Though he’d been back to the office for a week, classes were starting tomorrow and then the following week school started for Livi so he knew his life was going to be hectic. He didn’t want Livi to feel like she wasn’t getting his full attention, but he wanted to have some left over for Blair too.

  Sundays would be the perfect day for them, as neither of them worked. So when he heard she had plans he’d been kind of bummed.

  But even her call to meet her family didn’t cheer him up—though Blair assured him no one would mention their personal dating relationship.

  Then he worried if Blair was bothered by that.

  “I can’t wait to meet Blair’s family,” Livi said. “Is her father going to be there?”

  Oh shit. Both of Blair’s fathers were going to be there. How would he explain this?

  “Her father is going to be there. Her grandparents and aunt and uncle and two of her cousins. Ah, you know how you asked if Blair called her father Dad and Pops?”

  “Yes,” Livi said.

  “Well, it’s kind of confusing but Blair has two dads. One is Dad and one is Pops.”

  “Like Lexi back home. She had two dads too. Her dad and her mom married someone else.”

  “Sort of like that but not really.” He thought back to what Blair had told him on how her father explained he was gay and figured if it was good enough for Blair it was good enough for Livi. “When people love each other it doesn’t matter what race or gender they are. Do you know what I mean by that?”

  “I do. We learned that in school. Gender is male or female. Race is color. Right?”

  “Yep. Very good.”

  “And you can love another girl or another boy and you can love someone of any color. I saw that on one of my shows.”

  Okay, this was much easier than he thought. He should pay more attention to the shows she was watching and know she was learning these things.

  “Exactly like that. Well, Blair’s father has a spouse but his name is Jake.”

  “Oh. So that is why she has two dads. That’s kind of cool.”

  “Yeah, it is,” he said. “Why do you think so?”

  “Because then there are two men to shovel the snow and fix the leaks and mow the lawn. If there was another guy in the house, Daddy, you wouldn’t have to do it all.”

  He burst out laughing. The things kids think of. “I guess that’s true.”

  They pulled into the driveway behind Blair’s car. She was out front waiting for them. “Hi there. Sorry for the last minute invite. I hope it didn’t ruin your plans for the day.”

  “No,” Livi said running toward her and wrapping her arms about Blair’s hips. “We weren’t doing anything but sitting in the house.”

  “So much for you thinking I’ve got an exciting life,” Philip said.

  “Who needs excitement when you’ve got this?” she said as she gave his hand a little tug.

  “Yeah, who needs it?” he said back and prepared to meet the family.

  18

  On Your Own

  “That wasn’t nearly as bad as I thought it was going to be,” Philip said to her later that night.

  They’d stayed at her grandparents’ house for a few hours, ate and then left the same time. Her family was pretty tame after all. She’d thought for sure they were going to grill Philip, but it didn’t happen.

  Everyone talked like adults; they talked about their work and their lives, her shop. Her father and Pops had been wonderful.

  The best yet in Blair’s eyes was Livi when she was introduced to Pops, saying, “My Daddy said your Blair’s other father. I said that was neat.”

  “You think so?” Pops had asked.

  “Yes. I told Daddy if he had another guy in the house he wouldn’t have to do all the work. Even when my Mommy was alive Daddy did all the outside stuff. Now he has to do all the inside stuff too.”

  Everyone started to laugh over the “two guys” comment and yardwork. Philip flushed when Livi made the comment about everything her father did.

  “It’s not that much work,” Philip told his daughter. “And you do chores too. When you get older you can do more work.”

  “I had chores when I was your age, then got more in my teens,” Blair told Livi. “Lots of chores.”

  “Did you have to cook because you were the only girl in the house? Daddy isn’t a bad cook, but he isn’t as good as you.”

  “Thanks, Livi,” Philip had said and it just caused more grins around the deck.

  “No. Pops is the cook of the family. Dad is the handyman. We all have our things we are good at.”

  “And you’re good at baking cookies and cooking and flowers and candles and lotions. You even do your own lawn work,” Livi said frowning. “You don’t even have a guy around.”

  “I don’t,” she said. “And there is nothing wrong with doing things on your own, but it sure is nice to have help.” She looked over and winked at Philip and many caught that action, but she didn’t care.

  “I’m glad it went so well,” Blair told Philip just now. “I worried for nothing, but I know my family can be
a bit hard to understand. Livi was great with my father and Pops. It didn’t even occur to me that she would need to know ahead of time. I guess I just take it for granted.”

  “I wasn’t sure if I should say anything or not and figured it wouldn’t hurt to start out and see where it went. Kids are pretty understanding.”

  “They are understanding if they come from parents that help them understand. That don’t pass judgment themselves.”

  “That’s true. And I should get Livi in the tub, but I’d like it if you could wait for me.”

  “I’d love to,” Blair said as she went to get herself a drink while Philip went upstairs. Livi had already gone up to her room to put her toys away from where she’d left them before they went to visit Blair’s family. Livi had made a comment about Philip doing it all, but the truth was, Livi did a lot for a kid her age. She hadn’t even been asked to pick up; she just did it because she knew she was supposed to.

  Blair had looked around at her family tonight and wondered what it was that she wanted in life so badly that she couldn’t find. She kept telling herself that she wanted something traditional, but what was traditional anymore?

  It seemed to her Livi’s easy acceptance of Blair’s family made her realize that it was more important to be loved. An unconditional one that she’d always felt from her father—who wasn’t her biological father—the same kind of love she’d felt from Pops.

  They’d made her feel like she was number one in their lives…always.

  Cherished almost.

  Wasn’t that how Philip was with Livi? From the care he took of her. The way he learned to do her hair. The worry he had about how she might be viewed with only having a father and not a mother. How he was going to manage it all.

  The way he taught Livi to love and accept unconditionally too.

  Yeah, that was exactly what she wanted in a man and if they didn’t have a traditional relationship, did that really matter?