Worth the Wait (Picking up the Pieces #4)

by Jessica Prince

At her assurance, I released the breath I hadn’t realized I’d been holding.

  “He just wanted to know about you. He’s interested in you, Kenz. And I promise you, Brett’s one of the good ones.”

  “It’s not that I don’t believe you,” I explained. “I’m sure he’s great, but you know how I feel about getting involved with a guy. It’s just not something I’m capable of doing.”

  Lizzy’s eyes grew soft with understanding and—God help me—pity. I hated the pity most of all. “I understand, honey,” she said quietly. “Please, just promise me you won’t close yourself off from the idea of a relationship for the rest of your life. You deserve to have someone who’ll treat you like you’re his world.”

  I offered a smile to placate her and answered, “Maybe one day, just not today, all right?”

  She smiled reassuringly, letting me know the subject was dropped. “Okay.”

  The rest of the day went off without any problems…well, except for the fact that I couldn’t stop thinking of my earlier conversation with Lizzy. And I couldn’t seem to keep my gaze from darting over to the man in question.

  Brett Halstead, or as I’d begun to think of him since he started working on Lizzy’s expansion a week and a half ago, Mr. Hotty in a Tool Belt. HTB for short. The full nickname was too much of a mouthful.

  If I had been honest with Lizzy, I would have admitted that yes, I was, in fact, extremely attracted to Brett. But admitting that to her, let alone aloud would have led to a panic attack, and I’d blessedly been without one of those crippling attacks for months. I didn’t want that to change.

  Unfortunately, despite the fact that getting involved with another man made me want to run screaming for the hills, I couldn’t get my mind off of Mr. HTB in all his sexy, rugged glory.

  Since he started construction on Lizzy’s salon, every waking moment seemed to have been dedicated thinking about him. The previous night, he’d oh so stealthily snuck his way into my dreams where the images of what he could do with those amazingly strong hands of his woke me up in a panting, sweaty mess. The dream had been so damn vivid. His brown hair tousled from my fingers running through it, his warm brown eyes staring into mine, that delicious stubble that always graced his cheeks rubbing against my skin, that hard, tight body pressed against me…

  GAH! Get a hold of yourself, Kenz!

  A spontaneous orgasm in the work place was not ideal, especially with the star of all my fantasies only a few feet away.

  And all of this was without the two of us having spoken a word to each other! Knowing he’d been asking Lizzy about me, and that he was interested sent me into a tailspin.

  I needed to get my shit together. And fast.

  There was no place for a man in my life. I neither wanted nor needed one. I had no doubt Brett was a nice guy, but it became evident to me from a very early age that something about me brought out the worst in the men in my life. There wasn’t a doubt in my mind that if I stupidly allowed something to come of me and Brett, I’d turn him from a good, kind man into a mean, hateful bastard in no time.

  It was a gift. My very own special brand of fucked-up.

  I wouldn’t allow myself or my children to be hurt again.

  I also refused to allow a good man to be sucked down into my vortex of drama, only to come out worse for wear. It was best to just ignore our supposed mutual attraction and go about my new life as I had been.

  I was making the smart choice—the right choice—for once in my life.

  I pushed through the door of the daycare, silently counting down the seconds until I could get home, cook dinner, bathe my rugrats, put them to bed, and collapse on the couch for an hour or two of mindless TV before I finally crashed myself. Doing people’s nails for a living wasn’t the most strenuous job on the planet, but sitting hunched over for ten hours a day then having to wrangle two toddler tornados for hours on end, day after day, still left me exhausted.

  “Hey, Ms. Webster. You have a good day?”

  I looked up to see Lori, the daycare director, sitting at the front desk with a pleasant smile on her face.

  “Hey there, Lori. It was good, how was yours?”

  “Good, good. Just one more day closer to the weekend.”

  I let out a small giggle as I hit the touch screen in front of me and began checking my kids out for the day. “Preaching to the choir, girl. I’m counting down the seconds until my next day off.”

  “Any big plans?”

  “Other than sleeping later than seven a.m.? Not one.”

  We exchanged goodbyes before I headed down the hall to my kids’ classroom.

  Peeking through the tiny window in the door, I took a second to watch Cameron and Callie before pushing it open and making myself known.

  “Hi, Ms. Webster.”

  I looked to the side to see their teacher, a pretty high school senior, wringing her hands in front of her.

  “Hey, Megan, what’s up?”

  “Well…we, um, had some…issues today with Cameron and Callie.”

  Not good.

  “What happened?”

  Just as I asked the question, Callie released a war cry that would have made a Viking proud and went charging straight at her brother, plowing into him and taking them both to the ground. It all happened so fast; there was no time to react. Cameron screamed out as Callie planted herself on his stomach and shoved her foot is his face.

  “Kiss it. KISS IT!” she yelled at him as Megan and I ran into the chaotic fray.

  “Callie Anne Webster! What on earth do you think you’re doing?” I reached down and scooped her up while Megan picked up a wailing Cameron and held him to her chest.

  “Explain now, little girl,” I warned as I stared into my daughter’s face, not swayed whatsoever by the big hazel doe eyes she was giving me.

  “I wasn’t doin’ nothin’ wrong,” she pouted. “Ms. Lizzy told me boys is stupider than girls. That they’d be lucky to kiss our feet. That’s jus what I was doin’.”

  “She put her stinky toes in my mouth, Mommy!” Cameron cried, not to be one-upped by his sister when it came to dramatics.

  “Yeah, it’s kinda been like this all day,” Megan informed me with an apologetic smile.

  “I’m so sorry—”

  She raised her hands to stop me. “It’s okay, Ms. Webster, really. Some days are just more…tense than others. But we all know Cameron and Callie are good kids.”

  I looked down at Callie in my arms with the sternest expression I could muster. “Well, I appreciate that, Megan. But we’ll still be having a talk about this behavior when we get home. Won’t we, Callie?”

  At least she had the good grace to look properly chastised. “Yes, ma’am,” she answered with her little bottom lip poking out.

  After making the kids’ dinner later that evening and getting them bathed and de-stickified, I dressed them in their jammies and tucked then into their twin beds in the second room of our tiny apartment.

  “Now, you remember what I told you?” I asked Callie as I pulled the covers up to her chin and tucked them tightly around her body, making her into the little bedtime burrito that she liked so much.

  “Never listen to anything Ms. Lizzy says,” she repeated.

  “And?”

  “And no more puttin’ my toes in bubby’s mouf,” she stated matter-of-factly.

  I smiled and placed a kiss on her forehead. “That’s right, baby. Now, give Mommy night night kisses.”

  She tilted her face up to me and planted a smacking kiss on my lips before I climbed from the side of her bed and went over to Cameron.

  “Mommy, will you make me into a burrito, too?” I smiled down at him, brushing his sandy brown hair from his forehead. “You got it, bub.” I pulled his covers up and tucked them tightly around his body, just like I’d done to his sister, before giving him a kiss goodnight.

  I reached up to turn off the bedroom light when Callie asked, “Will you read Goodnight Moon? Just one more time? Pleeeeeease?”


  “I already read it three times, baby. Go to sleep now.”

  I flipped the switch and pulled the door to, leaving it open just a crack. Walking into the kitchen, I poured myself a glass of iced tea, and curled up on the couch. My DVR was calling my name. I had about a million episodes of The Mindy Project and New Girl just waiting to give me a much needed hour or so of enjoyment.

  My life was chaotic and every hour of my day seemed to be full, but I had my little ones, a job I loved, and new friends. Best of all, I was doing it all on my own, just me taking care of my kids and building a happy life for all of us.

  Shooting up a quick prayer of thanks, I sipped my tea and queued up a mindless sitcom.

  This was what life was all about.

  “Good morning, sunshine,” Lizzy called as I walked through the door of Elegant Nail. She was in a chipper mood. I wasn’t sure if it had to do with the cup of coffee in her hand—no doubt her second or third cup—or the fact that she had that sexy blond man warming her bed, but I was still planning to rip her a new one after the little scene at the daycare.

  “You have a good night?”

  “You tell me,” I told her dryly as I propped my hands on my hips and stared her down. “First, I had to deal with Callie pile driving her brother into the ground like she was Xena the friggin’ Warrior Princess. Does that sound good to you?”

  Lizzy choked on a surprised laugh.

  “Or how about when she planted her little ass on his chest and tried to shove her foot down his throat, all because you told her boys are stupider than girls and should be kissing our feet?”

  Her eyes grew wide in that oh, shit, my bad expression. I opened my mouth to lay into her when a deep, amused laugh from the front door caught my attention. I turned around to see Brett standing there, his gorgeous face alight with humor as he chuckled. That devastating smile of his momentarily short-circuited my brain.

  “Sounds like your girl’s being raised right, if you ask me,” he joked as he took a step closer to Lizzy and me.

  Giving my head a quick shake, I pulled myself from my lustful haze and narrowed my eyes at him. “I’m glad you find this funny.” It dawned on me in that second that those few words were the first we’d ever spoken to each other.

  “Oh, come on, beauty. You have to admit, there are worse things than your little girl being tough.”

  The first thought I had was how him calling me “beauty” caused a flutter deep in my belly—a flutter I hadn’t felt in more years than I cared to count. The second thought was how that flutter was not a good thing. I needed to stay away from this guy. Everything about him was just too tempting. I couldn’t risk letting myself feel any more for him than I already did.

  Turning my back on Brett, I faced Lizzy and shoved my finger in her face.

  “You,” I scolded. “No more teaching my kids bad habits or I’ll make sure to feed each of them a pound of candy before your next babysitting gig.”

  Without another word to either of them, I walked away and started preparing for my first appointment.

  Damn, that was one prickly woman. No matter how I went about it, I couldn’t get so much as a civilized conversation out of her.

  And damn it…that just pissed me off. I knew she was interested. When she thought I wouldn’t notice, I’d caught her staring at me enough times to know that much. And if that hadn’t been enough to go off, how those expressive hazel eyes of hers darkened as they scanned over my body was a pretty damn strong tell.

  She wanted me. I was convinced of it. And I wanted her like I couldn’t recall ever wanting another woman before. Female companionship was never something I lacked; I’d just never really wanted anything longer than a few nights. But I could see something more with this woman. She’d piqued my interests the moment I walked into Lizzy’s salon and caught sight of her. There was just something in those eyes, something that ran so deep in her jade pools I couldn’t decipher what it was.

  Lizzy told me she had some baggage and an asshole ex but other than that I had no real clue who the woman was. She was a complete mystery, one I was desperate to unravel. I found myself wanting something I’d never wanted with another woman before.

  I wanted to know her. Not just bang her, but actually find out what made this woman tick.

  I was tired of tiptoeing around, waiting for something to magically happen. I was a man used to going after what I wanted and that was exactly what I was going to do. But I was going to have to go about it in a different way. Something told me that waltzing up to her and flirting my ass off before asking her if she wanted to go home with me was definitely out of the question. Everything about Kenzie’s demeanor indicated she wasn’t a one-night stand sort of woman, and for once in my life, that actually worked for me, since as I was pretty sure I wanted way more than one night. Pursuing Kenzie was out of my comfort zone, but there was a pull every time I was in her presence that I couldn’t ignore. I wanted to take that darkness, that sadness I saw deep in her eyes, and make it disappear. Comfort zone or not, I was going after this woman with everything I had.

  Taking the opportunity to catch her unaware while her head was down rummaging through a drawer for whatever it was she needed, I walked over to her little table.

  “I didn’t mean to offend you a minute ago.”

  Her head shot up as a startled gasp escaped her lips. “Jesus, you scared the crap outta me. You can’t just wander up on a person like that.”

  She looked so damn cute when she was all ruffled and reprimanding me like I was one of her kids; I couldn’t help but laugh.

  Her eyes narrowed in a fierce glare causing me to hold my hands up in surrender. “Sorry, beauty. Didn’t mean to scare you. I just wanted to come over and apologize for earlier. I didn’t mean to upset you. I just meant that it’s good your little girl’s already so strong willed.”

  The anger slowly crept out of her gaze as she eyed me cautiously. “Thanks,” she said, sounding somewhat hesitant.

  “You’re very welcome, beauty.”

  “Why do you keep calling me that?”

  The corner of my mouth tipped up in a smirk that most women found irresistible as I answered her with complete honesty. “Because I think you’re beautiful. You’re one of the most stunning women I’ve ever laid eyes on. I’m just calling it like I see it.”

  Usually, a woman would have melted if I told her something like that, but Kenzie’s demeanor didn’t shift whatsoever, except to grow a tad icier.

  “Thanks.” Her tone as she spat out that one word was anything but thankful. She clipped out that one syllable so sharply, I was surprised she didn’t cut herself on it.

  I was floundering, and to make matters worse, Trevor and the rest of my crew had already come into the salon and gotten to work. And by work, I mean they were hovering around trying not to make it obvious that they were eavesdropping on every friggin’ word between Kenzie and me.

  “Look.” I took a step closer and leaned in so no one could hear. I realized my mistake instantly. The moment the smell of her perfume hit me, my mind blanked. Inhaling deeply, I sucked in as much of that clean floral scent as possible, wanting to keep it with me for as long as I could. I didn’t remember a time when just the scent of a woman turned me on so much.

  Her lips parted on a gasp at my close proximity, drawing my gaze down to her luscious pink mouth. Her bottom lip was just a hint plumper than the top and images of sucking it into my mouth as she moaned my name had my dick pressing painfully against the zipper of my jeans.

  Great, just what I needed…a fucking semi in front of my crew.

  “What?” Her soft voice pulled my gaze from her mouth to her intense eyes. Christ, everything about her did it for me. Her eyes, her mouth, that adorable little button nose. Everything about her looked sweet and wholesome, and damn, if I didn’t want to spend days dirtying her up in all the best ways possible.

  “Huh?”

  She blinked slowly as our eyes locked on one another. If I hadn’t
been so close, no doubt I would have missed the sweet way her pulse thrummed in her neck as she drew in a deep breath.

  “Uh,” she stuttered, and I couldn’t contain my grin. I knew I got to her. She acted distant and abrasive, but the attraction was definitely there. I could see it clear as day. She cleared her throat and started again, “You, um, started to say something, but then you just stopped.”

  What had I been about to say? Hell, I couldn’t even remember my last name with Kenzie’s soft skin so close that I could almost touch it. She was the best distraction I’d ever had.

  “Go out with me,” I blurted out, unable to control myself when it came to her. I just wanted her so damn badly; I couldn’t think straight. I got within inches of that lush body and all thought of going slow flew right out the goddamned window.

  Her eyes bugged out in complete shock. “What?”

  The damage was already done so I figured I might as well just roll with it. “Let me take you out.”

  “Like a date?”

  Jesus, even her cluelessness was irresistible.

  “Not like a date. I was thinking about an actual date.”

  One second she was staring at me with wide-eyed bewilderment and the next the shutters came slamming down into place, closing her face off from any emotion at all.

  “No.”

  Just like that. She answered with one simple word in a voice as flat as a soda that had been left open for a week. She didn’t even take the time to think about her response.

  “Why not?” I asked like the idiot I was beginning to turn in to when it came to this woman. “Are you seeing someone?”

  “Well,” she hesitated, “no.”

  “Are you a lesbian?”

  Two things rushed through my head as soon as that asinine question came out. One, I was a fucking idiot. Two, please dear sweet Lord in heaven, don’t let that be the case. A woman like this batting for the other team would be a straight up crime against humanity…a blast to watch…but a crime nonetheless.

  “What? No!”

  “Then why won’t you go out with me?”