Yours To Keep

by Shannon Stacey

  Lisa was staring at her. So were Terry and Beth and Keri. All with raised-eyebrow speculation that made her want to bolt for a hiding place. So what if Sean had gone all Neanderthal on her? It didn’t mean anything. It wasn’t like he’d staked a claim. It was probably just an instinctual reaction to his older brother flirting with the woman he’d brought to the party. That had to be it.

  A few plays later, Emma ended up with the ball again. There seemed to be some kind of unspoken rule that everybody got a chance to make a play, even if they sucked. She was going to run, but then she saw Stephanie bearing down on her with that killer Kowalski spirit in her eyes and tossed the ball up in the air.

  Mitch—who hadn’t touched her since his first misguided tackle—snatched it out of the air and ran it back for a touchdown, much to the vocal dismay of her teammates.

  “You play football even worse than you drive,” Sean muttered.

  “Clearly it’s my lack of—”

  He yanked her back against his body and wrapped his arms around her so he could whisper in her ear. “Don’t you dare say it.”

  She laughed and leaned back against his chest. “Don’t say what?”

  “If you mention the magic penis in front of these guys, I’ll never hear the end of it. Never. Hell, fifty years from now when our dicks are shriveled up and useless, they’ll still be cracking magic penis jokes.”

  “What’s it worth to you?”

  He tightened his arms around her and nuzzled her hair. “What are you looking to get?”

  She turned her head so her lips were almost touching his cheek and dropped her voice down into the sexy bedroom range. “I want…to drive home.”

  He snorted. “Figures.”

  “Just imagine Mike all old and decrepit and toothless and leaning on his walker cackling and shouting, ‘Hey, Sean, how’s the magic penis hanging?’”

  “Okay, you win. You can drive.”

  “You gonna play or what?” Leo shouted at them.

  Sean let go of her and headed back toward the ball, but as Emma looked over at the sidelines and debated on making a break for it, she saw Mary watching her with what looked like a rather smug smile curving her lips.

  Emma wasn’t sure exactly what that could mean, but she wasn’t sure she wanted to know, either, so she forced herself to rejoin her team. They were in a huddle, discussing a play which thankfully didn’t seem to include her, but she listened anyway. And jumped when the huddle broke up and Sean slapped her on the ass.

  His brother flirting with her had really brought out the touchy-feely in him, she mused as Terry ran past her with the ball.

  “Emma, take her down,” Terry’s husband shouted, but it was too late. And she wasn’t stupid. Tackling Terry would hurt.

  The score was either twenty-one to forty-two or tied at thirty-five, depending on who you asked, when Mary blew the whistle. “Time to clean up and get ready for the fireworks. Kids, make sure you go to the bathroom before we leave this year.”

  Maybe it was only because Mitch was nearby and Mary had her eye on them, but Emma didn’t pull away when Sean took her hand in his for the walk into the house.

  It was almost dusk before the horde of Kowalskis got themselves settled on a patchwork island of old quilts. Cat staked her claim on one corner by setting down her bag and the straw hat she’d worn earlier to keep the sun off her face. Then she wandered away to see who she could run into.

  She stopped here and there, saying hello to a few friends, but when she saw Russell Walker sitting on one of the park benches, she was forced to admit to herself she’d been looking for him. He was alone, so she took a deep breath to steady her ridiculous school-girl nerves and walked over.

  “Is this seat taken?”

  His face brightened when he saw her and he patted the empty bench next to him. “I was sitting on a blanket with Dani and her husband, but I’m a little old for that.”

  “Emma and I are with Sean’s family, but I thought I’d go for a walk and put off sitting on the ground for as long as possible.”

  “Would they be upset at all if you stayed here with me?”

  With the amount of people on the Kowalskis’ acre of blankets, they probably wouldn’t even notice she was gone. “Probably not.”

  “Do you care if they are?”

  She smiled and shook her head. “Not really, no.”

  And speaking of Emma, there she came, obviously looking for her. She waved her hand to get her attention and didn’t miss the surprise that crossed Emma’s face.

  “Hi, Mr. Walker. We were starting to think Gram got lost.”

  “I think I’m going to watch the fireworks with Russell.”

  “Oh.” Cat watched Emma try to wrap her mind around that. “Okay.”

  “You look lovely tonight,” Russell said. “Clearly love agrees with you.”

  Because she was looking for it, Cat saw the flash of guilt in Emma’s eyes before she smiled and couldn’t resist poking at her. “Russell tells me he hasn’t met Sean yet.”

  “No. He…uh…Sean’s not much of a shopper. And he goes down to the stores in the city when he needs stuff so he can visit his aunt and uncle at the same time.”

  At least the girl was consistent. Cat wondered if she’d made up cue cards. “You’ll have to bring him over after the fireworks.”

  “Yeah. Maybe. So…have fun.”

  She walked away, but Cat caught her looking back with a frown, as if trying to puzzle out why her Gram was choosing to watch the fireworks with the guy who owned the hardware store instead of her family.

  Then they fired a test shot and Cat put Emma out of her mind as the burst lit up the darkening sky.

  They oohed and aahed along with the rest of the crowd and, as the show built toward the grand finale, Russell’s hand bumped hers. It rested there for a moment and then he threaded his fingers through hers.

  “Where’s Cat?”

  Emma sighed and looked toward where she’d found Gram and Russell Walker, even though it was too dark to see them. “She ran into a friend. She’s sitting on the bench with him, over by the trees.”

  “Him?”

  “Yeah. Russell Walker, who owns the hardware store.”

  Sean shrugged. “Probably beats sitting on the ground.”

  With her grandmother watching the fireworks with Russell, Emma was free to put a little space between her and Sean on their part of an old gaily colored quilt. Not too much space, of course, because there were a lot of Kowalskis and they had to keep the kids spread farther apart than jabbing elbows could reach.

  “Need a Valium?” Sean leaned over to ask in a low voice.

  “No. Why?”

  “You spin that engagement ring around on your finger when you’re stressed and, right now, it looks like you’re trying to generate electricity with it.”

  Emma locked her fingers together and hooked her clasped hands over her drawn-up knees. Stressed? Why would she be stressed? Her body was still humming from that caveman kiss during the football game, her grandmother had ditched her for Mr. Walker from the hardware store, and she couldn’t make sense of either event.

  It wasn’t for lack of trying. Her mind raced, trying to sort it all out, as colors burst above her in the dark sky. Maybe Sean was right and Gram had simply taken a seat on the bench next to Mr. Walker because she didn’t want to sit on the ground. And maybe Sean had only kissed her because he thought that’s what a man in love would do when his older brother was flirting with his fiancée. All very innocent.

  But she’d been watching Sean pretend to be in love with her for two weeks and, while he didn’t do too badly, she didn’t think he had the acting chops to fake the primal, possessive gleam in his eye right before he’d claimed her mouth.

  Sean scooted a little closer, probably so his mouth could be near her ear. The discretion, she appreciated. His warm breath against her skin, not so much. “You’re not even trying to enjoy this, are you?”

  “I am, too.” She enjoyed
the feel of his shoulder pressing against hers. And the way he smelled. And the way the fireworks kept lighting up his face.

  He didn’t seem inclined to say any more, but he didn’t move away either, so they watched the fireworks and laughed at the kids, who were ooh-ing and aah-ing with exaggerated exuberance. They were all decked out with glowing neon bracelets and necklaces and they were as lively and vivid as a Vegas show.

  After a while, Emma shifted her weight, trying to find a reasonably comfortable position on the hard ground. It wasn’t easy, until Sean pulled her close and she rested against his chest. It was very comfy…physically. Played hell on her senses, though, and she was surprised—and not in a good way—to find herself wishing Gram was with them on the blanket so Sean would have an excuse to wrap his arms around her and kiss the back of her neck.

  She was starting to wish Sean had excuses to do a lot of things to her. Especially things he couldn’t do in front of Gram.

  They were only halfway through the month and she’d spent so much time wondering what sex with Sean would be like, she was afraid some day soon he was going to touch her and she’d burst into spontaneous orgasm. The trip from the bathroom to the couch every night was the worst, requiring her full concentration. She didn’t trust her body not to hang a right and climb into bed with him.

  “What are you thinking about now?” Sean whispered against her ear and she cursed under her breath. She really had to stop thinking about sex near him.

  “I’m thinking about all those cakes and pies waiting at your aunt’s house,” she lied.

  He chuckled, the sound almost masked by the fireworks. “I had no idea desserts had that effect on you. I’ll have to remember that.”

  Rather than deal with the implied promise in those words and the husky, bedroom voice it was implied in, she turned her face away and ignored him. But she couldn’t ignore the aching need he’d brought back to the surface. I’ll have to remember that.

  When the last loud and colorful bursts of the grand finale lit up the sky over the lake, the Kowalski family clapped and cheered, then started gathering their things. In just the short time they’d been on the quilts, it looked like the family had taken up residence, with drink bottles and snack wrappers and toys spread all over the place. Sean pushed himself to his feet and then held out his hands to her.

  She hesitated to touch him, which was dumb. He was a gentleman, so of course he’d help her up. The fact she was still all shivery and freaked out on the inside from the kiss earlier was her problem, not his.

  Once on her feet, she withdrew her hands as quickly as she could, then looked down at her grandmother’s hat and bag. “Gram wanted me to bring you over after the fireworks. To introduce you to Mr. Walker, I guess.”

  “Does it bother you?”

  “Introducing you?”

  He shook his head and pulled her off the quilt because Terry was trying to fold them up. “That she watched the fireworks with him.”

  The mature thing to do would be to scoff at the suggestion she was bothered by her grandmother having a friend, but she couldn’t quite pull it off. Not with him watching her so intently. “I don’t know. I didn’t see it coming, that’s for sure. Where did Mitch go?”

  “Blonde. Over by the grandstand.”

  She turned to look and saw Mitch talking to a pretty blonde woman in a skimpy yellow sundress. She had the kind of primped and polished look that implied she’d shown up alone solely for the purpose of finding a man to take her home. “He doesn’t waste any time.”

  Sean snorted and she couldn’t tell if the look he gave his brother was annoyance with the ladies’ man routine or annoyance he wasn’t free to find his own sure thing in a skimpy sundress.

  Before she could figure it out, Gram showed up with Russell Walker in tow and behind him a couple who looked younger than what her parents would have been, but not by much.

  “Emma,” Gram said, “this is Russell’s daughter, Dani, and her husband Roger. This is my granddaughter, Emma, and her fiancé Sean.”

  Emma smiled and shook hands, and then kept smiling as the introductions continued around her. Inside, though, her brain was going numb. Performance exhaustion, she told herself. It was tiring, all this pretending, and she wanted to go home and make Sean crash on the couch so she could curl up in her bed and sleep. But at least this night was almost over.

  “If you’re not doing anything,” Mary said to Russell and the others, “you should come back with us and have dessert.”

  Or maybe not.

  Chapter Twelve

  Sean was going to kill his cousins. Slowly. Painfully. And he’d kick the crap out of both of them first.

  They’d all gone back to his aunt and uncle’s after the fireworks, as expected. What wasn’t expected was Cat introducing Russell and his daughter Dani and her husband Roger to the Kowalskis, who then invited them along for post-fireworks decaf and dessert.

  After the pies and cakes were demolished, Mike and Lisa had taken their boys home and the two babies, Lily and Brianna, were asleep, so the older generation decided on some card game nobody under forty knew how to play. So the under-forty crowd had retreated to the rec room in the basement, except Mitch, who’d said his goodbyes before he left the fireworks with the gorgeous blonde in the barely there sundress.

  Joe had a perfect game to pass the time, he’d said. Kevin had smirked and agreed. And there were four couples, so it was perfect. Sean should have known better.

  The reason having four couples was perfect, he found out too late, was because the game was a kind of demented adult version of The Newlywed Game. And now Joe and Kevin were laughing their asses off on the inside because Dani and Roger’s presence meant Sean and Emma had to keep up the pretense or Dani would tell her dad, who would in turn rat them out to Cat.

  “What’s the first place you had sex?” Roger read from a card.

  Dani hit the timer and six of them bent over their notepads, furiously scribbling down answers. Sean looked down at his blank page and decided to keep it simple. Hopefully Emma would do the same.

  When the timer dinged, he tossed his pencil down. Joe and Keri scored the first point by both writing in the backseat of Joe’s 1979 Ford Granada. For Kevin and Beth it was the hotel where Joe and Keri’s wedding reception was held and Dani and Roger both wrote Dani’s dorm room.

  Emma grimaced at Sean and then held up her notepad. “On a quilt, under the flowering dogwood.”

  The other women made sweet awww noises, but Joe and Kevin were already snickering. That wasn’t keeping it simple. Under a flowering dogwood?

  “We need your answer,” Roger said.

  Sean held up his paper. “In a bed.”

  His cousins’ snickers became full belly laughs, while Dani and Roger just looked a little confused.

  “Oh,” Emma said. “You meant sex with each other?”

  It was a nice save, but Sean had a gut feeling it was only going to go downhill from there. And since he and Emma would be lucky if they got out of there with their secret intact, never mind having a snowball’s chance in hell of winning, he might as well have some fun with it.

  Then came Dani’s turn to read a question. “Who’s in charge in the bedroom?”

  Much to the group’s amusement, none of them got a match and Sean didn’t think they would either as he held up his. “I am, since I carry the big stick.”

  Emma read hers with a remarkably straight face. “Sean, because he has a magic penis.”

  “Wow. Um…so Sean and Emma have a point,” Dani said as the men nearly pissed themselves laughing.

  No way in hell was he leaving that unpunished and he winked at Emma when Kevin read the next question. “Where’s the kinkiest place you’ve had sex?”

  The fact that Joe and Keri had done the dirty deed on the back of his ATV led to a few questions about the logistics of that, but then it was Emma’s turn. “In bed, because Sean has no imagination.”

  Roger threw an embarrassed wince
his way, but his cousins weren’t shy about laughing their asses off.

  Sean just shrugged and held up his notepad. “In the car in the mall parking lot. Emma’s lying because she doesn’t want anybody to know being watched turns her on.”

  Her jaw dropped, but she recovered quickly and gave him a sweet smile that didn’t jive with the you are so going to get it look in her eyes.

  Beth asked the next question. “Women, where does your man secretly dream of having sex?”

  Keri knew Joe wanted to have sex in the reportedly very haunted Stanley Hotel, from King’s The Shining. Dani claimed Roger wanted to do the deed on a Caribbean beach, but he said that was her fantasy and that his was to have sex in an igloo. No amount of heckling could get him to say why. And when it came to Kevin, even Sean knew he dreamed of getting laid on the pitcher’s mound at Fenway Park.

  Then, God help him, it was Emma’s turn to show her answer. “In a Burger King bathroom.”

  The room fell silent until Dani said, “Ew. Really?”

  “No, not really,” Sean growled.

  “Really,” Emma said over him. “He knows that’s the only way he can slip me a Whopper.”

  As the room erupted in laughter, Sean knew humor was the only way they’d get through the evening with their secret intact, but he didn’t find that one very funny, himself.

  It was the final answer that really did him in, though. The question: if your sex had a motto, what would it be?

  Joe and Keri’s was, not surprisingly, don’t wake the baby. Kevin and Beth both wrote better than chocolate cake, whatever that was supposed to mean. Dani wrote gets better with time, like fine wine and Roger wrote like cheese, the older you get, the better it is, which led to a pow-wow about whether or not to give them a point. They probably would have gotten it if they weren’t tied with Keri and Joe, who took competitive to a cutthroat level.

  When they all looked at Sean, he groaned and turned his paper around. They’d lost any chance of winning way back, but he was already dreading what the smart-ass he wasn’t really engaged to had written down. “She’s the boss.”