“My plans were unavoidably changed earlier.” She met his eyes in the mirror, but had no way of knowing whether or not he told her the truth. He seemed content with the situation as he gave his attention to the road.
* * * *
Allen parked in the drive of a little white cottage trimmed with black shutters he’d installed himself. Mentally, he went through the house. He couldn’t recall if he picked up after Andy or not. Sometimes he just didn’t think about it until his days off. He glanced at Cheri in the mirror. “Hey, we’re here.” When she didn’t raise her head, he wondered if she’d fallen asleep. It seemed unlikely she would have, but he didn’t know her pain tolerance. Concerned, he exited the car and walked around to open the passenger door. “Cheri.”
She looked up at him and moved forward. “I’m sorry for the blood on your seat. Have it cleaned and send me the bill.”
“Don’t worry about it. Let’s get you inside and fixed up.” He lifted her into his arms and headed toward the front door.
“Would you do the honors?” he asked, when he realized he couldn’t unlock the door himself.
“Where’s the key?”
“Damn. Sorry. I stuck them in my pants pocket.” He looked at her and she cocked an eyebrow at him. “I guess we don’t know one another well enough for you to reach into my pocket.”
“No, we don’t.”
Hell, if she fished around in his pocket and discovered his semi-hard cock, he’d lose all sense of professionalism. It’d been that way since he first saw her sitting there on the rock. He set her down and retrieved the keys and unlocked the door.
Carrying her inside, he glanced around. Shit, he had picked up, but pictures of Andy and Erin sat on the entertainment center. He bypassed the room and took Cheri into his bedroom free of family photos. After he set her on the bed, he pulled up the pillows to cushion her as she lay back against the headboard. “Give me a few minutes to get what I need,” he said, while balling up a shirt he’d grabbed from the bed post. He placed it under her foot. “Can I get you a drink?”
“Thanks, but no.”
Allen left the room and headed down the hall to the bathroom. Bringing her back to his place had never been a part of his plan. Not this weekend. Hell, she was the first woman he’d brought to the house since Erin died. He had wanted to work up to it. Nothing was going as he planned, so far.
When he’d arrived at the restaurant just after the rescheduled time he’d sent her and found no one waiting, he worried she’d had cold feet, or didn’t get the email. Either way, he didn’t know how to find her and planned on heading home to email her. But then, the waitress had told him of a woman who sat waiting and knew the email had been missed.
While he had waited on traffic to let him out of the parking lot, he scanned the beach and in the distance appeared to be a woman fitting the description he’d been given. He breathed a sigh of relief.
On the short drive to where she sat, he decided to risk approaching her as a total stranger rather than her internet man. Granted, he might slip up, but hell, his gut said to go for it.
He pulled the first-aid basket from the linen closet and looked through it to remove items he didn’t need. Spiderman Band-aids and children’s Motrin weren’t things she needed to know about right now.
After tossing towels on the basket, he pulled out a wash basin and set it under the tub faucet. He rubbed the back of his neck while the water ran. She made him nervous, but it’d been nice to find out she wasn’t bad to look at. He’d wondered when she insisted on no pictures. She wanted the first look face-to-face.
“Shit!” A glance around the bathroom had him hastily throwing Spiderman pajamas in the hamper and setting bath toys under the sink. It’d be his luck she’d find out he had a son, assume he had a wife and lose his chance. As Darius, she knew he was a single father. The coincidence might be too much and she’d be furious he tried to play her.
When Allen reentered the bedroom, he stood looking at her. It was odd to see a woman in his bed. He’d wanted her there. Had dreamt she was there before he’d replied to her ad. This faceless, wild creature that had awakened him from two years of hibernation and lay injured because of him.
He didn’t like how pale she seemed despite the flush of her cheeks. He watched the rise and fall of her chest and noticed his bedspread balled in her hands. Shit! Maybe he should have taken her to the emergency room.
He put the things down beside the bed and caressed her cheek. She was warm and visibly shaking. “I’m not so sure we shouldn’t have taken you to the emergency room.” Her eyes opened and she looked at him. The pain-edged, light green crystals held pure desire. Well, this is a surprise. If I didn’t know better, the woman who claimed to have never been sexually aroused lay on my bed definitely aroused. Interesting. Just maybe my plan will be easier than I thought.
Chapter 2
“No, I’ll be all right,” she whispered.
Allen reached for the afghan draped over the rocker parked near the nightstand. “Let’s put this around you.” If she didn’t cover up her aroused breast, he wasn’t going to be able to concentrate. The visible outline of her nipples had him aching to take them in his mouth and swirl his tongue around the hard buds.
Cheri sat forward and he draped it around her shoulders. She pulled it around her and he moved her hair behind her ear. God, he wanted to get this over with and set his plan to teach her a lesson in motion. “Are you allergic to aspirin or ibuprofen?” he asked as he moved down the bed.
“No.”
He pulled gloves from a packet and slipped them on as he told her, “I’m going to wash it out and see what’s what. I wish I had some way of numbing it for you.”
“Don’t worry about it.” She licked her dry lips.
He really didn’t want to hurt her like this. “Cheri—“
“I am not going to the emergency room. Take it out or leave it in.”
He placed a folded towel under her foot and laid out his lighted magnifying glass and the tweezers he used to remove splinters. “You’re going to want to pull away from me, try not to do that.”
“I’ll do my best.”
He removed the gauze and opened the wound open to clean it out. Quickly, he grabbed the glass and looked. The pearly sheen of a shell had him frowning. It could still break off while he attempted to pull it out. He grabbed the tweezers and went after it. She jerked and pulled her leg up. Concerned, he looked up at her. Her face had gone completely white and the pain etched across her forehead made him uncomfortable. Still, it needed done. “Cheri, don’t hold your breath. It will intensify the pain.”
“Just do it.”
He brought her foot back on the towel. “Try to think of something else.” With his fingers holding the gash open, he grasped the shell and gently tugged. It didn’t budge. Digging deeper as he scraped tissue from it, he felt as if he’d gone down to the bone before it finally came out. He grabbed the peroxide and gave it a good washing, trying to ignore the painful moans she let out.
Out of the corner of his eye, he saw her hands move up and knew she wiped tears from her cheeks. He felt like he’d digressed to a time where medical procedures like this were done without anesthetics on a regular basis. After wiping his forehead with his forearm, he looked at her. “The worst is over. You had a nice chunk of a shell in there. Thankfully, it came out in one piece.”
“Otherwise, you’d be taking a meat cleaver and removing my foot.” She shuddered at the thought.
“I am sorry to hurt you like that.” She flinched when he pressed a clean towel against it.
“It was my choice.”
“So, you came here on personal business, but went for a walk alone on the beach. I take it the business wasn’t pleasant.”
“I’ll never know. What about you? You said your plans had changed.”
He removed the towel and checked the blood flow while he searched for an answer. “Almost.” Gently, he pressed the towel against it then knocked san
d from her toes. She jerked her foot. “Sorry.”
“No, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to pry.”
“Not at all. If they hadn’t changed, you might still be perched on the rock.” He glanced at her with raised brows. “Things happen for a reason and I guess I was meant to come to your aid.”
“Lucky me.” She smiled at him and he couldn’t help smiling back. Her eyes drew him in and he wanted to beg her to let him share her bed.
Two years was a long time to go without real companionship and sex, and then he’d look at Andy. He could see Erin in him and it’d cure the idea of giving him a step-mother. Still, more and more, it cropped into his mind. He wanted someone to share his life, his son’s life. His heart ached for that special quality she had brought to his life.
How many times had he turned over in bed to reach for her? Or tell her about something amazing Andy had done that day. He wasn’t worried about finding an exact replacement for her, it would be stupid to expect anyone to be like her, wouldn’t want another woman like her. He just wanted someone who made him feel that lucky again.
Even realizing he was ready for another woman, it’d taken months before he took the plunge and signed up with an online date finder. At first, he browsed and quickly became bored. Then he’d come across Cheri’s ad. He thought it odd she’d go this route to conceive a child and passed her off as some lunatic. But then a while later, he came across it again when she had reposted it. More and more he pondered the send message button. He didn’t know why, but something about the message pulled at him. How could a woman be willing to conceive and want to raise the child alone? It’s work. Finally, he hit reply and wrote an introduction then promptly deleted it. The third time she reposted well, he had to send her a message. She’d become a faceless creature who haunted him when he seemed vulnerable. He sent a message believing Erin would want him to.
No one was more surprised then him when Cheri replied to his message within minutes. It was late. She’d been cautious, timid and wanted to know why he replied. He explained how he’d come to message her. It seemed to have opened the door and gradually conversation bloomed and they talked every night for a week, but never about her purpose. She really seemed to be trying to get a feeling about him, but he found himself intrigued. He found himself eager for night when he once dreaded them and the loneliness that came with them.
* * * *
Allen’s eyes seemed to penetrate her and she wondered if he was trying to read her mind. She hoped not. Even though the pain hadn’t completely subsided, the fact he seemed to empathize with her enhanced the draw. “What do you do for a living?”
When he didn’t answer, she looked around the room. Simple, lots of blue and no sign of any feminine possessions on the dresser or nightstands. Confirmation of no serious relationship could be had with a look in the bathroom, but this was good enough for her. The room looked clean, neat—an oddity for a guy. He probably had a woman come in and clean a couple times a week.
“I work at Tampa General,” he said, interrupting her perusal.
With curiosity, she studied him. If he were a doctor, he would have told her, so maybe he’s an intern or male nurse. What she wouldn’t give to receive a sponge bath from him. But, he could skip the sponge, and the water and use his tongue. “Are you a—“
“So, why are you in Tampa?” He tilted his head and the green of his eyes, surrounded with black, long lashes, stopped her heart for a second or two.
She couldn’t believe this. Here she was, all alone, stretched out on the bed of a heart-throb and all she could do was bleed. Still, he definitely had potential to fulfill the wonders she held in high disbelief. Her body craved them. The sudden jolt in her belly nearly made her forget the pain. Damn, she needed to get those emails out of her head.
Cheri rubbed her arms and pulled the afghan tighter. Stupid woman, you know better. Experience was proof handsome men had a tendency to lose their luster when things went beyond conversation and dinner. Wham, bam, thank you, ma’am and I’ll call you. And sometimes they did—when they wanted a quick fuck. Hell, it’d be easier on her if they slipped into the bathroom for the three minutes it took, and then return to the table for dessert.
“Something wrong?”
She blinked and realized he waved a hand in front of her to regain her attention. Her eyes locked with his, but then lowered to his crotch when he shifted on the bed. “It’s a long story,” she mumbled. She noticed the tension stress of his zipper and arched an eyebrow in realization she had an affect on him. It wasn’t exactly unusual, but his demeanor gave no indication. Interesting possibilities involving sweaty bodies and hungry mouths ran through her mind.
“Talk. It might relax you.”
Sorry, talking isn’t going to take care of this tension. “It doesn’t really matter now.”
“Sure it does. Where are you from?”
“Illinois.” She sighed. “I had an appointment of sorts with a guy who didn’t show up.” She couldn’t believe she just told him she’d come this far to meet a guy. Worse that she’d been stood up. Heat flared in her cheeks.
“Not much of a friend—”
“I’ve never met him,” she admitted.
“You came all this way to see a guy you don’t know? Why?”
She studied him, not quite sure how to explain. Would he think her stupid or worse—label her as a nutcase? “We met in an online service and I thought… well, he seemed perfect. Too perfect to follow through on the terms, I guess.” The thought of another wasted ovulation period threatened to depress her. She brushed her hands over her face to help wipe away the niggling fact she might never have the child she wanted.
“Terms?” He checked the cut and moved down on the floor. With his fingers, he checked the water temperature in the basin. “I need you to sit up and put your feet over the side of the bed.”
She scooted, wincing as she moved her foot. He cupped the heel as it came over the side. Instinctively, she pulled it back. The movement pronounced the throb, but his touch intensified the ache between her thighs.
“Go on, tell me about the terms.” Allen’s hand slipped up to her calf as he wet a cloth and washed the blood from her foot.
Cheri took a deep breath and let it out with a whoosh. He tried to be gentle, but it hurt. “I want to have a baby, so I went to see a psychic friend of one of my sisters. She confirmed I’d have the child I want.” Her breasts rose and fell when he ran the cloth between her toes. She’d never had anyone wash her feet before. Somehow it seemed intimate, sexual and a need spiraled through her midsection.
“And, the problem is?” He dried her injured foot, being careful around the cut.
She jerked her foot when he again checked the depth, but he had a good hold on it. “It requires sperm to fertilize an egg.”
“Yes, it does, but that wasn’t what I meant.”
He tried to hide the smirk by keeping his head lowered, but she saw it. “Since the man I came to meet didn’t show, well, I can hardly produce it myself.” She swallowed the thickness lacing her voice.
“Isn’t that half the fun? Searching, getting to know someone, finding out if the chemistry is there, and setting up the meet to see if the online feelings flow into real time.”
“I’m not looking for a relationship. It’s a business deal. A weekend of free sex, and if conception occurs, he’ll sign a contract freeing him of all rights and obligations.”
“So, then, why not go to a sperm bank?”
“I have my reasons.”
He tilted his head, eyeing her. “So, are you doing this because of the psychic?”
“No.”
“I can’t believe you’d have trouble finding volunteers where you live.”
“It wouldn’t work for me.”
“So, you’d rather chance the history of a stranger than someone who could ease your mind about certain facts of family history?”
He touched the cut with the tip of his finger to apply the ointment. She gro
aned. “That stings.”
“Sorry. I should have warned you.” He set the tube down and picked up the butterfly bandages. “This is going to hurt, so take a deep breath and let it out.” When he pressed the open wound closed, she sucked in air and held it. “Breathe, Cheri.” She did, but gripped her thigh with tears in her eyes as she watched him put the Band-aids in place and tape a gauze pad over them. “Tomorrow, we’ll let it air, but tonight let’s keep it clean and dry.” His hand massaged her foot and up her calf. Damn, she could get used to his bedside manner. “How does that feel?”
“It’s fine. Thank you.” Allen picked up her other foot and set it in the warm water, rubbing the sand off with his fingers. She looked up at him and saw the corners of his eyes twitch. He knew what he was doing to her.
“So, what other requirements need to be met for this prospective donor to fertilize you?”
The way he said it made it sound so cold, and maybe it was. It’s the way she needed it to be. “Why? Are you offering?” She ran her tongue over her dry lips and watched him swallow.
He looked into her eyes. “Yes.”
Cheri fell back on the bed as she set her bandaged foot on the edge of the bed and draped an arm over her eyes. He was so tempting. The junction between her thighs pulsed, begging her to say yes. “Would you be willing to sign a contract giving up all parental rights if I conceived your child?”
He dried her foot and pushed the washbasin aside, out of the way. “Let’s say we can cross that bridge when it happens.” Lying beside her, he moved a strand of hair from her face. “Cheri, we’re both obviously interested enough to consider taking this beyond medical needs. I think it would make us both feel better if we dispensed with the outlying issues and let it happen.”
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