But we can’t. Because we’re in a public place. And even when we go home, there are two girls there. Two precious, sensitive children who don’t need to wonder what “those noises from Daddy’s room” are.
Slowly and reluctantly, I pull away. It takes a few minutes for us to calm down enough to stop. It takes even longer to get our breathing under control.
Abel leans his forehead against mine, our hands clasped tightly together between us. “You’re amazing, you know that?”
“You’re not so bad yourself, Beast.”
A comical sound bursts out of him briefly before he separates us completely. “Come on. Let’s go see the penguins.” I wipe the lipstick off his mouth so it’s not obvious what we’ve been up to. “I need to cool off a bit.”
Glancing down at his crotch, I realize a little lipstick is probably the least of Abel’s worries right now.
And me? I’ve never been more disappointed in my living arrangements in my life. There won’t be any hanky-panky as long as my daughter shares a room with me. And doesn’t that thought just start the mommy guilt cycle all over again.
Chapter Nineteen
ABEL
“You know you’re not a cougar, right?”
Elliott looks at me quizzically as we walk hand in hand along the lakefront trail. It’s a cold night, of course, being that it’s only March. Still cold enough for Elliott to be bundled up in a gray scarf and matching beanie with a red-tinged nose. But a little cool air will do us some good. Well, me anyway. While the penguin habitat was chilly, it did nothing to shrink a certain part of my body that was wound up from our kiss.
And, holy shit, was that a kiss. I’ve locked lips with many women in my life, and no one has ever elicited the same kind of response Elliott did. Then again, no one has ever been like Elliott either.
I’ve never thought of myself as being shallow, but I’m starting to wonder if part of me from long ago saw my ex-wife as more of a trophy wife than a nurturing partner to build a life with. I can’t figure out any other reason why twenty-something Abel was attracted to May. She’s not a bad person, per se. Although abandoning your kid for a less than mediocre modeling career might make that debatable. It wasn’t until she was gone that I realized she was vainer and more self-centered than I’d thought. .
Granted, when we were married, I didn’t spend my days picking apart my then-wife to focus on her flaws. That’s not a good way to maintain a healthy relationship. But in hindsight, I see it clearly, and I’m no longer sure which head was making all the decisions back then.
I’m sure now, though. Elliott is everything that matters. She’s kind and generous, and the epitome of cute in a sexy way only a woman can pull off. And yet, she is practically the opposite of vain. I’ve known her long enough now and seen how her ex treats her to recognize her lack of ego can sometimes bleed into dangerous emotional territory, which is why I feel the need to reassure her now.
“Back there, when you were attacking me with your lips…” She smacks me playfully in protest. “You said you were a cougar. I want you to know, just because you’re older than I am doesn’t make you a cougar.”
It’s painfully obvious she doesn’t believe me, and this age gap causes her some stress. “I’m pretty sure that’s the exact definition of a cougar.”
I scoff. “No way. I’m almost positive a cougar isn’t just older. She’s also looking to get laid by younger men only.”
“You don’t think I’m trying to get in your pants?”
I stumble and stop walking to regain my ability not to trip on my own feet, as visual images of me taking her up against the wall in my kitchen assault me. No idea why we’re next to the fridge in this random fantasy, but it doesn’t make it any less hot. Blowing out a breath, I work hard to keep my voice from squeaking with sexual excitement. “After tonight, I’m not too sure anymore.”
“Hey! You wanted that kiss as much as I did.”
“Oh yeah, I did.” I nod exaggeratedly. “I have no complaints, nor am I trying to discourage you. I’m merely telling you there is a difference between an older woman who wants sex from a younger man, and a woman who happens to be older than the man she’s dating.”
Elliott’s nose crinkles, which makes her even more sexy/cute. “It feels weird. Me being older.”
“How come?”
“I don’t know. I guess I was raised in a generation where the norm was for a man to be older than his girlfriend. Maybe it has something to do with his ability to take care of her.”
I scoff playfully. “You don’t think I can take care of you?”
“Oh, I have no doubt you could.” She reaches over and squeezes my arm. Of course, I immediately flex. It’s practically an involuntary reflex for single me. “I’ve seen these biceps before.”
We laugh at the good-natured twist in this conversation, but I don’t let it go on for too long. I need Elliott to really understand where I’m coming from. I’m not risking this great roommate situation for a fling or a few dates while we both keep an eye out for our one and only. I really, really like Elliott. I already love her as my friend. The rest is just a matter of time and circumstance.
“I’m serious, Elliott. I have a stable career and am a homeowner. I have a daughter in school. I’ve been married and divorced. I’m not twenty-one with Sports Illustrated posters hanging on the walls of my bachelor pad.”
“And thank goodness for that. I’m not sure how any of them could compete when you have the real deal right here.” She gestures up and down her body, and I’m assaulted with yet another visual image, only this time I’m eating breakfast. While she’s lying on the table. Because she’s breakfast.
I’m eating her for breakfast.
This cold is doing nothing to help the situation I’ve got going on down below. If only the temperature would drop about a hundred degrees…
But Elliott is shivering, so abandoning the topic and heading home might be the best option right now anyway.
“This conversation isn’t over,” I say and put my arm around her shoulder, pulling her close to me.
She snuggles in closer and clasps her hand in mine. “I’ll get used to it eventually. I’m well within the cougar guidelines anyway.”
“Cougar guidelines?”
“Half your age plus seven is how young you can date without it looking weird.” She pulls away and looks up at me while we walk. “You’ve never heard that before?”
“No. So that gives you anyone above the age of, what…twenty-eight?”
“Supposedly.”
“So, you could date Joey.”
“Guess so.”
“That is so not happening.”
She giggles while I guide us toward home.
If the look on her face is any indication, she is definitely not dating Joey now.
“What in the world happened here?” Hands on her hips, Elliott looks less than amused at the disaster we walked into. Maybe even less than less than amused. So much less. Actually, she looks downright angry.
“The girls know better than to leave dishes on the table and… Oh my god Abel, what happened to the kitchen?”
Dirty pots and pans are scattered all over the counter as if Joey cooked a seven-course meal. But judging by the splatter on the ceiling, it was only spaghetti. The handful of noodles stuck to the wall by the sink is also a good indication of what he attempted to cook. Doesn’t explain why it took more than two small pots to make noodles for two small girls, but I’ve known Joey for years. This is honestly pretty clean compared to some of the disasters I’ve walked in on before.
Grabbing the step stool, I place it near the stove and wet a dishtowel.
“What are you doing?” Elliott asks, still seemingly stunned by what we’ve come home to and not sure where to begin to get things back to normal.
“First thing to know about when Joey babysits—always be prepared for a clean-up job. Second thing to know,” pointing up, I add, “anything red gets wiped up first before
it stains.”
“Oh, for shit’s sake,” Elliott cusses—which she never does—before yelling, “Girls! We’re home!”
A squeal and an overexaggerated “Oh my god they’re home” that most likely came from Joey can be heard from down the basement stairs, right before the thunder of them all barreling our way begins.
The girls immediately throw arms around us, hugging in greeting. Fortunately, we’ve done this enough times Mabel waits until I climb down the ladder for hers instead of knocking me over. I wasn’t kidding when I said this isn’t the worst state I’ve seen my kitchen in after leaving Mabel in Joey’s semi-capable hands.
“I don’t know what happened, man,” Joey starts, and I know exactly where this is going. “I was making them some spaghetti and the sauce exploded everywhere.”
“How in the world does spaghetti sauce explode?” Elliott still looks miffed, but thankfully, she isn’t one to go apeshit. At least, I hope she doesn’t. We may need Joey for more “PTA meetings” and personally, I think deep cleaning the stove is worth it if Elliott and I get to make out like that again.
Joey rubs the back of his neck, looking completely stumped. “I don’t know. I turned the stove on and then put the sauce in. I went downstairs to check on the girls and, suddenly, there was this ‘poof’ sound, and when I came back up it was everywhere.”
Elliott shakes her head. “And the noodles over the sink?”
He shrugs. “I was making sure they were done. I don’t eat a lot of heavy carbs, so I wanted to make sure they were nice and cooked for the girls. Oh and Elliott, you’ve got a good one here. Ainsley kicked some serious ass on those big balls. Am I right, girl?”
Elliott and I look at each other and smirk like twelve-year-old boys trying not to laugh over how creepy Joey sounds, knowing full well he’s talking about the WipeOut game again. But we don’t miss that both his and Ainsley’s smiles are huge as they fist bump and bond over her win that round. And that’s when Elliott’s anger seems to fizzle out completely.
All I can do is shrug at her realization, because it’s one I came to long ago. As long as he builds up my kid when I’m gone, destroying my kitchen isn’t all that important. I’m pretty sure Elliott just came to the exact same conclusion.
“Okay, girls,” I jump in as Mabel tries to defend why she kept bouncing straight into the water. “You are up way later than normal, and you have school tomorrow. Both of you—jammies.”
“But I didn’t shower yet,” Mabel protests, while Ainsley turns to argue with Elliott, who is shaking her head at her daughter’s blatant attempts to stay up later.
“No time for showers. You’ll have to slap on some deodorant because I have to work in the morning too, and you don’t want me to be grumpy tomorrow afternoon, do you?”
Mabel rolls her eyes. “You’re never grumpy, Dad.”
“And you don’t want me to start now. Seriously. Jammies.” I smack her on the bottom as she caves and drags her feet across the floor into the living room, shoulders slumped melodramatically. Ainsley looks just as defeated.
“How did it go, really? Other than,” Elliott gestures around the room, “this.”
Joey crosses his arms and legs and leans against the counter, not even attempting to clean up. No shocker there. But he’s still smiling, which is a good sign at his evening. “It was really great. When Abel said there would be two of them, I expected double the trouble. But they keep each other entertained, don’t they?”
“Oh yeah.” I rinse out the washcloth and climb back up the step stool to reach a few spots I missed. “It’s been a huge help to me that I’m not the only one for Mabel to talk to.”
“Bet you didn’t see that one coming when you moved Elliott in, huh?”
“Nope. It’s been great. Mabel has a live-in playmate, and I feel like I’m doing only half the work around here.”
“Half?” Elliott jumps in. “I’m thinking you do forty percent.”
“Only because you have to rerun the dishwasher all the time.”
She gapes at me. “I do not. I have a handy dandy little magnet to help me out now.”
“Which cuts down half your workload,” I banter. “Hell, I think I should get extra credit for it.”
Elliott rolls her eyes then her sleeves, and gets to work on the dishes in the sink.
“Y’all are weird,” Joey says matter-of-factly. “If I didn’t know any better, I’d say you’ve turned into an old married couple already.”
Out of the corner of my eye, I see Elliott has the same reaction I’m having—frozen to the spot. Because that’s not obvious at all.
“Whaa…” she clears her throat. “What do you mean?”
“About being an old married couple?”
Elliott nods and I watch as a blush starts to creep up from her neck. If this continues, she’s going to be beet red in a matter of seconds. Another dead giveaway.
“Just that you’re so comfortable around each other, joking around. People don’t usually act like that unless they’ve been together for a while.”
I’m not sure how to respond without putting my foot in my mouth, so I say nothing. Elliott appears to be doing the same, which combined, makes us look suspicious. I know that. I’m pretty sure Elliott knows that. I just hope Joey doesn’t figure out it.
He looks back and forth at us, and I watch as his expression morphs from one of relaxation to sudden realization.
And then the jaw drops open.
Yep. He knows.
“You!” He points at me and then back at Elliott and then back at me. “You!”
“Shhh!” Elliott hisses and pushes his finger out of the air. “The girls will hear you.”
He holds his hands up in defense. “The girls that are upstairs putting their jammies on? Not likely. But you!”
“Me, nothing!” Elliott insists. “You know nothing! There is nothing to know!”
She turns away from him, which means Joey now turns to me. “Yooooooooou!”
Joey has definitely been hanging out with my kid too long if he can turn on the dramatics as much as a pre-teen girl.
I calmly step down from the stool, fold it up, and slide it next to the fridge. “Me, nothing, Joe. Quit freaking out about this.”
“Abel!” Elliott yells in reaction to my lack of denial, at the exact same time Joey yells, “So you admit it?!”
“He’s already figured it out, Elliott. Might as well quit denying it.” And I’m not actually sad about this. I would never intentionally “out” us until Elliott and I had talked about it first. Regardless of being adults and living in the same house, we’re still co-workers too. Workplace dynamics can get sticky if you don’t tread lightly. Not that Joey treads lightly on anything, which is why I didn’t tell him before.
She huffs a sigh. “I mean, yeah, okay.”
“You admitted it too!”
Elliott pushes his finger down again, since he can’t seem to control it in all his excitement.
“Keep your voice down,” she hisses in his face. “Fine. Yes. We’re dating.”
Joey gasps, but Elliott continues before he can start freaking out again.
“But the girls don’t know, and we’d prefer to keep it that way—so keep your voice down.”
“But…”
“No! Joey, listen to me.” Elliott’s tone softens as she explains our thought process. The concerns we have over the girls getting too attached if this doesn’t work out, the jealousy Mabel already has over Ainsley having two parents, the desire we have to remain friends and roommates no matter what. I’m honestly not sure if he agrees with everything we say, but at least he understands and respects it. Sort of.
Pausing to think, Joey purses his lips and looks back and forth at us before making me wonder why I keep him around. “So, you’re banging your roommate.”
“No,” Elliott immediately says.
I just laugh. Man, he’s funny sometimes. “It’s not like that, and you know it,” I admit with a smile on my
face.
He shrugs. “What I know is I am a hot-blooded American man, and I’m pretty ticked you got to this one first. She’s pretty hot.”
“That’s really nice, Joey,” Elliott says sweetly, but I know her well enough to know she’s not finished yet. “But with this kind of mess from making the easiest dish in the world, there is no way in hell you will ever get in my pants. Hot-blooded American man or not.”
Joey has the wherewithal to look sheepish. “Yeah, I’m not exactly the best cook.”
“How about next time we leave money for pizza instead?” I offer up. “And you start wiping the stove off.”
I throw the washcloth at him, and he catches it just before it smacks him in the face.
“There’s gonna be a next time, huh?” Joey waggles his eyebrows up and down. “Things are that serious?”
I’m not sure how to answer him. “Serious” is a relative term. I’m not just screwing around with Elliott. Actually, I’m not screwing around with her at all at this point. But I would hardly say our relationship is serious. Is it real? Absolutely. Is it for the long-haul? Hopefully. But we have way too much fun being together to call this serious. I know that’s not quite what Joey means, but it still seems like the wrong way to label what’s happening here.
“Yes, this is a genuine attempt to see where things go.” There. That seems like a more appropriate way to answer his question. “This is not a fling or a roommates-with-benefits situation.”
“Well, I approve. Not that my opinion matters at all,” he adds with a shrug, as he puts half-ass effort into getting the sauce off the stove. I’d worry about the cleanliness of his own place if I didn’t know for a fact that he orders pre-cooked healthy meals for this very reason. The only time he tries to cook is when he’s trying to be a good babysitter. Lord help his future wife when they have a kid. “But that cougar things makes it even more hot.”
Elliott drops something in the sink making a loud “clang.”
Cutie and the Beast: A Roommates to Lovers Single Dad Romance (Cipher Office Book 3) Page 15
