“Drop it?” she asked in a squeaky voice.
“Drop it,” he confirmed.
“If this was anyone else, you’d at least suspend them—”
I knew she had a point, and suddenly I sucked in a breath, expecting the worse.
But all Dallas said was, “You’re right. But I’m not going to. You’ve been starting this mess with them, Christy, and we all know it. You and I already talked about this, didn’t we? I don’t want to suspend anyone, but if I do, it isn’t going to be them.”
Yeah, I could tell from the look on her face, she liked Dallas. And she liked Dallas a lot. “But you’re playing favorites!”
“I’m always going to be fair with the boys, but I will play favorites with everyone else who isn’t an active member of the team. Don’t put me into that position, because I know she”—he tipped his head toward me—“only bites when she has to, and I will always take her side. Are we clear on that?”
He would?
Christy’s cheeks puffed up with so much indignation, she literally squawked. Everything from her forehead down was red. “This is unbelievable. Fine! But don’t think Jonathan is going to be on this team much longer.” Her gaze stayed on Dallas for a moment, a dozen emotions flashing across her face before, just like that, she turned on her heel and disappeared into the crowd.
Why did I suddenly feel bad for her?
It wasn’t until then that I noticed half the parents of the team were sitting on the tables around the concession stand. What was probably half the parents of every other team playing in the tournament that weekend were, too. Great.
I cleared my throat and popped my lips. “Well, that was awkward.”
“I’m not a brat.” Louie was still hung up and outraged.
I pointed my finger at him. “You’re a tattletale, that’s what you are. Nosey Rosie. What did I tell you about snitches?”
“You love them?”
It was Dallas who laughed first, one of his hands already sliding into his back pocket where he pulled out his wallet and a bill. “Lou, go buy another hot chocolate.”
Louie nodded and took the five, heading back into the line as Josh, who was at my side, said, “I’m gonna go find my friends.”
“All right,” I said. “Careful.”
Josh nodded and disappeared.
Dallas looked down at me with a serious expression on his face, and I raised my eyebrows back at him. A sense of being overwhelmed filled my chest as I snuggled in deeper into the warm jacket, the backs of my fingers brushed against the Post-it notes in the pocket.
What exactly was going on?
“You’re always going to take my side, Professor?” I pretty much whispered the question.
He took a step toward me, his gaze still centered directly on my face. And he nodded.
“What did you guys talk about?” I asked him, still so low only he could hear.
Dallas took another step forward, the tips of his tennis shoes touching the tips of my boots. His chin was down to his collar as he took me in. And in a voice that was a lot louder than mine had been, he said, “I suspended her for two weeks after what happened, you know.”
I didn’t know. I was actually pretty damn shocked no one had told me.
The surprise must have been apparent on my face—or maybe he knew me too well, because he dipped his chin down even further in a partial nod. “I did. And I apologized to her if I’d given her the wrong impression that I was interested in her, informing her that I wasn’t and we needed to keep things professional.”
“I thought she liked you.”
He shrugged, the corners of his mouth indenting just slightly. “It isn’t the first time it’s happened.”
“What? Getting hit on by moms on the team?”
“Yeah.”
I snickered. “Are you sure you weren’t imagining it?”
Dallas made a face before this giant, beaming grin took over his mouth, so potent I could have taken his jacket off and been warm the rest of the day. “I’m sure, baby.”
Baby again? All I could say was “Uh-huh,” so that I wouldn’t sound like an idiot.
“I wanna ask if you really said you’d pepper spray her, but I already know the answer.”
Pressing my lips together, I shrugged.
He reached up toward me and brushed the backs of his fingers over my cheek, still smiling wide, and pinched my chin. “You’re fucking nuts.”
All I did was shrug again. “You know that, but you’re still here, aren’t you?”
His smile melted into a smaller one, and the deep breath he let out made it seem like it had weighed a thousand pounds. Then his fingers brushed over my cheek again, and Dallas moved to tuck a strand of her behind my ear. His voice was soft. “I’m still here, Peach.”
Chapter Twenty-Two
I never thought the day would come where I would be excited to go to work, but after almost three weeks of taking time off, my body was so ready. I had tried picking up shears twice in the last week, and it was a little iffy and painful, but I couldn’t take being home any longer. My bank account couldn’t either. So, hand hurting or not, that Wednesday morning, I was pumped beyond belief.
So pumped Josh was steadily scowling at me through the reflection in the rearview mirror.
“Why are you so happy?” grumpy britches muttered his question.
“Because I’m going back to work,” I sang back to him, earning a bigger scowl. I really enjoyed my job on a normal basis, but after so long, I was ready to love it again in a way that only time and space was capable of.
“I’ll be happy next week when we get off from school for Thanksgiving,” the grump muttered.
Shit. I’d forgotten about Thanksgiving. “Did you guys decide what you want to do?” The Larsens were going to Louisiana and my family was staying in San Antonio, so I’d given the boys the option to choose whom they wanted to spend it with. Last year, we’d all stayed together at my parents, but I couldn’t be greedy and keep them if they wanted to see the other side of the family. Either way, I had to work the day before, half the day of, and the following day, too.
“No,” was the same reply they’d given me when I first brought up them going to Louisiana.
I sighed. “Well, you better decide soon or,” I sang, “you’re stuck with me.”
“Stop, please,” Josh pleaded.
“I like the way you sing,” Louie piped up, earning a dirty look from his brother. “You sound like a cute kitty.”
I didn’t think that was as much of a compliment as he meant for it to be, but I’d take it.
“If we stay, will Mr. Dallas eat turkey with us?” the five-year-old asked.
I glanced at him through the rearview mirror, letting myself think about how nice he’d been this past weekend at Josh’s game and how he’d given me a hug while he walked us to our car that night at the end of the tournament. He’d even apologized for having to skip dinner, but he’d left Miss Pearl alone at home all day and thought he should spend some time with her since she was staying with him and all.
I’d accepted it. I was madly, crazy, stupid in love with this guy.
The problem was that I didn’t know what to do with it. With him being more affectionate and saying the things that he said… but not doing much else. I mean, he could kiss me and that would make a statement. Or tell me he liked me… if he did. It seemed like he was dropping hints, or I don’t know what, but I wasn’t sure whether to interpret his messages or let them go.
So I was going to let them go for now and settle for what he’d been willingly giving me.
“I don’t know, Goo. He has family too. He might have plans to spend it with them. I haven’t asked him,” I explained.
“I’ll ask him,” he offered.
“Can I get a new game this weekend?” Josh asked out of the blue, making that the second time this week he’d tried.
I told him the same answer he’d already heard. I could applaud his effort, but that’s al
l he was getting from me. “Not anytime soon, J. Maybe for Christmas.”
“Why?”
“Why? Because I don’t have the money right now.” I’d barely been able to pay the mortgage and the water; I’d put the light bill on my credit card along with the cable bill.
“Why?”
“Why don’t I have money? Because I haven’t worked in weeks, J. I know you guys think I’m pouring money out of my ears, but I’m not. Sorry.”
He grumbled so much I shot him a dirty look through the rearview mirror that had him stopping the moment he saw it. “Okay,” he muttered.
“That’s what I thought,” I whispered to myself, trying to hold on to my optimism and excitement about getting back to work with two hands. I’d gone in to the salon the day before to try and start arranging my schedule again, and managed to get most of the day booked up.
“Tia, do you think Santa will give me a bike for Christmas?” Louie asked.
“As long as he doesn’t hear about all your criminal activity over the year, I think he might,” I told him, laughing when he let out a disgruntled noise as I pulled the car up to the school. “All right, have a good day at school, you menaces to society. I love you.”
Louie slipped out of his car seat just as Josh pecked me on the side of the forehead with a kiss that was more of a brush of lips—the end was coming one day for that, but it hadn’t yet. Lou did the same on my cheek, hollering, “Bye!” right before slamming the door shut.
For one moment, I glanced at my hand again, the skin pink and tight and a lot more tender than I wished it would be, but it was going to have to be good enough. I needed to work.
* * *
“D, we got a walk-in asking for you,” Ginny informed me with a sly smile as I closed the door to the break room.
A walk-in asking for me? I didn’t have enough time between clients to do a color job, but I could squeeze another cut in. My palm was only hurting about a five on a scale from one to ten from holding shears. I couldn’t afford to say no. The day had been busy, busy. I had to go slower than I was used to because closing the shears quickly bothered the freshly healed new flesh too much, but I’d been doing all right. The salon was only open for two more hours. I’d make it.
I walked toward the front desk and stopped when I caught sight of a familiar brown head tipped down at the floor. Sitting there with his elbows on his widespread knees, hands centered between them with a cell phone in his hand, wearing his usual outfit of vintage jeans and a T-shirt that he had worn to work based on the shade of gray it was covered with, was Dallas. I’d seen him at practices over the last week and a half, but besides that, we hadn’t seen each other around the neighborhood. I knew Miss Pearl was staying with him, and I couldn’t say I didn’t think it was sweet he wasn’t leaving her home alone… even if I did miss having him come around the house.
The sound of my wedges on the smooth concrete floor had him glancing up from whatever he’d been looking at, and he smiled, wide, so beautiful I felt like an idiot for ever thinking the most attractive part of him was his body. “Hey.”
“Hey, Professor,” I said, even though in my head I was really asking: what are you doing here?
“Busy?” he asked, smiling a little and coming to a stand.
“Not for you.” Why did I say that and why was my heart beating so fast in my chest?
“Someone told me you don’t take new clients, but I was wondering if you’d make an exception for a friend,” he said, running a hand through what had obviously grown out to be about an inch-long hair where he usually kept it at half an inch.
Cut his hair? Get close enough to cut his hair? The tiniest bit of unease settled right in my chest, but just meeting his gaze reminded me of who he was. My friend. My neighbor. The man who had been almost nothing but kind to me, time after time. There was nothing to worry about.
Well, at least not physically. My heart was a different story.
The smile that came on my face was as easy and natural as it should have been. “Of course I can. Come on.”
He smiled and I turned into a puddle of goo, but by some miracle, I managed not to get all moony-eyed over him. That was the plan at least. “How’s your day been?” he asked as I waited for him to walk up to me.
“Pretty good. I get off in two hours.” I met those murky brown-green eyes. “You?”
“I finished a big tiling job. It was a good day,” he answered, brushing the back of his hand against mine.
This couldn’t be happening to me. Not with my neighbor. Not with this man who was technically still married and was Josh’s coach. It couldn’t be. I wouldn’t let it.
“One day when I have the money, I’ll ask you to give me a quote on redoing the floors in my house, but that isn’t going to be any time soon,” I told him.
“All you have to do is ask, Diana.” He looked down at me from over his shoulder. “We can do it together when you have the time off.”
“Together?”
“Together,” he repeated.
I hummed and eyed him. “All right. For free?”
That had him smirking. “Yeah. You get a special discount.”
“What? The single parent who feeds you discount?”
Dallas shook his head and smiled, but didn’t say anything.
All right.
“We’re going for a Mohawk then or what?” I made myself ask.
The expression on his face was that playful one that squeezed the shit out of my ovaries every single time he brought it out. “Maybe next time.”
He winked.
He winked right at me.
He had never done that before.
What the fuck was going on?
“Okay,” I practically choked out, awkward and weird and instantly internally cringing at how I should have kept the joke going but didn’t. Damn it. “Let me get my clippers real quick and lower your chair. I don’t get anyone over six feet tall in front of me very often.”
“Okay,” he replied.
“Same cut as always?” Pulling the drawer open, I kept my gaze down as I took out the clippers and set of attachments I had in there.
His voice was low. “Whatever you think looks good.”
Grabbing a cape, I slipped it over his shoulders and made the Velcro parts meet together. “You sure?”
“Sure,” he answered back, all raspy and hoarse. “I trust you.”
Why did he do this to me?
I turned my body away from him to let out a deep breath. Those hazel-colored eyes were on me through the mirror. I could see them out of my peripheral vision as I moved around him to plug the clippers in to the extension cord I had hidden beneath my station. “You’re the one looking at me more than anyone, do what you want.”
I sucked in a breath. “Okay.”
Our eyes met as I stood up again and walked around to take in the cut of his hair. I could do it with my eyes closed and one hand behind my back. I reached up to touch my thumb against the hollow at the base of his head and moved the clippers around to where they needed to be. His face was peaceful as I shaved from the front to the back of his head, over that gentle curve of his skull, gentle, gentle, gentle not to cut him. I slowly moved my way around him until I stood in front. His knees hit my upper thighs as I paused where I was, and he let me move his head around without any resistance to get the spots I needed to reach.
I’d be lying if I said I didn’t let my fingers linger just a split second longer than necessary over the smooth skin of his forehead and his temple and that ultra-soft skin right behind his earlobe. I could feel his stare on me as I worked, but only let myself look him in the eye a couple of times, smiling each time like this was no big deal, when it felt like anything but. The clippers were loud between us, a distraction to the tension I felt in the pit of my stomach in reaction to how close we were.
“Sorry if I stink,” he apologized in that near-whisper voice.
“You don’t smell at all,” I said to him, forcing myself to kee
p my gaze on the very center of his newly trimmed hair. “I’m almost done. I just need to use my shears on a couple of spots.” Did my voice sound hoarse or was I just imagining it?
“I’m not rushing you. You doing this for me is a hell of a lot better than my usual barber.” God, how could a voice be so attractive? “I might have to start coming in every two weeks if you’re gonna be rubbing the back of my neck like that, Buttercup.”
I smiled, but it was off and my stomach was fluttering, and I’m sure my face was turning pink.
“Why you blushing?” he asked in that croon that sang straight to my ovaries.
“Because.” I laughed again, awkward and stupid, and why the hell was I doing this to myself? You know better, Diana. “You reminded me of something I heard. That’s all,” I said, rubbing my hand on my pants before moving around him.
He hummed. “You can tell me. I can keep a secret,” he said. “I don’t share.”
“Me neither,” I kind of mumbled before shuffling over to stand behind him, trading one tool for the other to catch a couple of super fine hairs right by his ears that I hadn’t been able to get. “It’s stupid. I’ll tell you another day.”
I spotted his Adam’s apple moving. I wouldn’t be surprised if he could hear my heart racing inside my chest. It only took a couple of minutes to finish up, to make sure the lines and edges along the nape of his neck were clean and straight. After brushing his bare skin off, I pulled the cape off him. I slowly shook it out as he got to his feet, avoiding the small pools of rich brown hair on the floor.
“How much do I owe you?” he asked.
I gestured toward the front desk area with my head, conscious that Sean and Ginny were nosey as fuck and still not done with their clients. “How about ten bucks?”
He touched the back of my hand again with his, and I knew without a single doubt, for one split second, his pinky finger hooked around mine before letting it go. “That’s how much I pay my old guy to cut me behind the ears and shove his sweaty armpit in my face. How much?”
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