“You’re such an arrogant asshole. Does your little nanny-dick-warmer know that you will ignore her to write your stupid ass books? Does she know that you won’t take her out anywhere because you’re consumed with characters that don’t exist? Should I tell her now before she’s smitten? Or did you already dickmatize her?”
“You done?” I yawned and stretched my hands over my head.
“Fuck you, Van.”
“No thanks. I already have someone to keep my dick warm.” I winked at her then closed the door. She yelled muffled obscenities at me that I refused to acknowledge. Instead, I went into the kitchen and watched Frankie and Xari. She wasn’t wearing my shirt anymore. Now, she had on footless one-piece pajamas with angel wings and halos all over.
Frankie was busy tasting food while Xari detailed the recipes to her. I watched Frankie record every word and take notes in her mind. My baby girl was growing fond of cooking.
“Did you have fun at your mother’s?” I asked, finally letting my presence be known.
“It was cool,” she said with a shrug.
“You didn’t call me so everything must have been okay.”
“Yeah,” she nodded, tugging on Xari’s hand. “Come on. We have an appointment in my room, remember?”
“Right. Let’s go.” My heart thumped at the sight of Xari’s dimples. She glanced at me and I tried to apologize through my stare. I didn’t know if it translated but I hoped she knew I wasn’t trying to give her the cold shoulder.
After they disappeared upstairs, I went into the den and started writing again. Page after page flew from me with ease. I should have been editing my finished book, Riley’s Song but I couldn’t stop myself from writing once I started.
“Daddy,” Frankie’s voice pulled me from the six-foot hole I’d been unearthing inside myself. Whatever was at the bottom glowed bright and hot.
“Hey, sweetheart.” I saved my document and looked at her. Her makeup was done so well she didn’t look like my little girl anymore. She looked like a young woman. “Wow,” I chuckled, standing to my feet. “Xari did a number on you.” I squeezed her shoulders.
“You hate it.”
“No, no, no…” I stammered, realizing I’d shoved my foot directly down my throat.
Xari came down the hall and stood behind Frankie. My eyes roved over her angel pajamas briefly. I almost snorted at the irony. Xari was the opposite of angel wings and halos. She was still a goddess. Albeit a goddess of sin and danger, she still had ichor running through her veins.
The thin white cotton hugged her waist, hips, and ass. The buttons, meant to be closed up to her neck, stopped being buttoned halfway up her cleavage. I refused to look below her waist. I shouldn’t have allowed myself the trip to her tits.
“I think you look beautiful, Frankie. You just…you don’t look like my baby girl anymore. You look grown.” A pang of sadness echoed in my chest.
I remembered Frankie as a tiny thing. A bundle of baby powder and soft ebony curls. A chubby-cheeked blessing that fit in my hand. Now, she was before me with makeup and mascara-coated eyelashes and it was too much.
“You think I look grown?” It was like a compliment dipped in gold to a twelve-year-old.
“Yeah, kiddo. I do.”
“Oh my god, I need to take pictures. Be right back.” She hurried out of the room and I looked at Xari, taking in her mile-long lashes and glossy lips.
“Can I talk to you?” I asked, stepping closer. Her jasmine petal skin drew me in like the tide to the shore.
“Why? So you can hide more stuff then blow me off?” She rolled her eyes and turned on her heel to follow Frankie. She wasn’t getting away that easy. I reached out and grabbed her hips, pulling her against me. I placed my forearm across her throat like a bar and leaned down to her ear.
“So I can apologize for being short with you.” I couldn’t be that close to her skin and not steal a few kisses on the spot behind her ear that made her squirm.
“Stop, Evander,” she sighed.
“Make me,” I smirked, tossing her own words at her. If Frankie was taking pictures, I knew she’d be up there for a while, so I had Xari to myself. My hands roamed over her dips and curves, settling on her tits. She didn’t have on a bra. Her nipples tightened under my touch.
“Now, tell me why you care so much about what I’m hiding.” I pushed my hand between her thighs and cupped her pussy. Heat poured from her core. I was obsessed with exploring her body and finding different ways to make her come unglued.
“I don’t know.” A brick wall shielded her true feelings. The desire to dig deeper into her roared inside of me. I wanted to understand more than just the way her pussy worked and what buttons to press to trigger an orgasm that left her screaming.
“You’re lying, Miss Lucas.” I pressed the heel of my hand against her clit. I felt her piercing shift and she arched her back letting me know she liked it. I moved in slow, short circles making sure to be gentle since I knew her clit ring would do most of the work for me, rubbing against her until she was so wet she left a river in her wake.
“Stop.” Her voice was thin and barely holding on to any resolution.
“I’ll stop if you tell me why you’re so interested in what you think I’m hiding.”
“I…” My hand moved faster against her. She worked her hips urging me to keep moving…so I did. My lips found her earlobe and I licked and sucked softly, pulling whimpers from her.
“You what?” I asked in her ear.
“I wanted to get to know you more, I guess.”
“That’s fair,” I told her before kissing her neck.
“What you’re doing right now isn’t fair, Evander. You know I’m addicted to coming.”
“You’re addicted to the way I make you come. There’s a difference. I can already tell by the way you scream when my dick is drilling into you that you’ve never fucked anyone like me before.” She trapped a moan between her lips while I worked her clit with the heel of my hand. I let her determine how much pressure I put on her pussy. I worked in circles but she was fucking my hand on her own.
She shook her head vehemently but her lips parted and her chest moved up and down faster and faster. “You’re lying again, Miss Lucas. You’re about to come all over yourself, aren’t you?” My free hand squeezed and rolled her nipples while my lips worked up and down the gentle curve of her neck.
“Yes,” she whined, finally giving in. It was such a beautiful sight. My chest tightened watching it. “Oh my god, Evander.” She was so fucking hot between her legs. I knew she was soaked. The fabric dampened against my hand as confirmation. I wanted to lay her down, open her legs, and lick away all the sticky sweetness kissing her thighs. I wanted to see that piercing gleaming at me. I wanted to have her fragrance all over my face, lingering in my nose.
“You look so beautiful when you come, Xari.” I stopped moving my hand and watched while she surrendered, rolling her full lips between her teeth to stifle the noises ready to fall from her mouth.
She rested against me while she drowned in her orgasm, and her pussy flooded her cute little pajamas. She’d have to peel them off. Good. I liked her better naked anyway.
“Come see me in the den when Frankie goes to bed, okay?” I turned her to face me. Her cheeks were pinched-pink, and her lips were swollen from tucking them between her teeth.
“Okay, I need to talk to you anyway.” I loved the way her voice still held on to wisps of her climax. It hid in her vowels and shallow breaths.
“We can talk.” I nodded my head then tipped her chin up and kissed her lips. Xari’s eyes fluttered shut and mine did too. Anything to stretch time so I could spend another second tasting her. Her hand slid down to my hard dick and she gripped it like she wanted to climb on top of it.
“I need this,” she said.
“I know you do. I need to give it to you.” She reached up and kissed me, tugging on my bottom lip with her teeth and scraping her nails along the back of my neck. Her pas
sion made me want to pin her down and fuck her. “Fuck, Xari. You’re so much trouble.” I gripped her ass in my hand and she giggled, stroking my cock through my pants.
Above our heads, I heard the shuffle of feet. I pulled away from the addictive goddess standing in front of me. Frankie seeing me grab Xari’s ass with a hard dick wasn’t an image or situation I wanted to deal with. So I sat my ass on the couch and put a pillow in my lap.
“Oh, Daddy, did Xari tell you she went viral?” Frankie bounced into the room and sat beside me on the couch because…of course that’s what she’d do when I had a raging hard-on.
“Viral?” I said lifting my brows. “How so?”
“Damon Philips shared her harp video. Damon. Philips.” She made sure to emphasize with her hands and stare directly into my cornea.
“And when were you going to tell me about this, Miss Lucas?” I quizzed, aiming a gaze at her.
“I was going to tell you. Remember I said I needed to talk to you?” She smiled and showed off those damn dimples. My heart stuttered.
“Well, we like to celebrate wins around here. Frankie why don’t you tell Xari what we do when we hit our goals or have something unexpectedly good happen?”
“We pick a movie and go see it at like midnight. Then we go to IHOP. It’s so much fun.”
“I get to pick the movie?” Xari asked, placing a hand on her chest.
“Yup,” Frankie nodded eagerly.
“Think about it and let me know, Xari. My treat.” I tried not to look at her body in those curve-hugging pajamas. It was calling me though. “Frankie, go get your things ready for school in the morning.”
“Can I stay up ‘til twelve? I’m not tired.”
“No. You need to get some rest and so do I.”
“You’re going to stay up all night writing, Dad. I have something I wanna watch on YouTube and…”
“Frankie. It’s time to wind down. You know the routine. This isn’t new. We go through it every night.”
“At Mom’s, I could stay up…” I shut my eyes against her words and blew out a slow breath to compose myself. I didn’t give a fuck what she did at Alexis’s house. She knew that. My house meant my rules. I needed to get my ex-wife on the same parenting page with me so it wouldn’t be an uphill battle dealing with Frankie.
“Hey, come on, Frank. We’ll stuff your emergency kit full of shit.”
“Language, Miss Lucas,” I snapped. I wasn’t even mad at her. I was irritated with Frankie for trying to use her mother’s rules as a reason to negotiate mine.
“Right. Sorry, Senator Freeman,” she huffed before going upstairs. When I heard Frankie’s bedroom door close, a little harder than necessary, I picked up my phone and texted Alexis.
Me: We need to talk about consistent rules between your house and my house. Are you open to having a discussion?
Alexis: No. My rules are my rules. If you wanted consistency, we should have stayed married.
Frustration rippled through my muscles. I picked up my glass and prayed the whiskey relaxed me on the way down.
Me: We have a kid. Marriage isn’t the issue. It’s parenting. I’d like for us to get on the same page with the rules.
Alexis: I said what I said, Van. Go fuck your nanny and stop bothering me.
I tossed the phone down and ran my palms over my face. Alexis had a special talent for getting under my skin. No…it was worse than that. She worked her way under my thoughts. She became my frustrations and pet peeves.
When Xari came back into the den, I had my nose in the laptop and a glass of whiskey in my hand. “Frankie is gonna come apologize so…be nice.”
“I’m always nice,” I grimaced, lowering my brows on my forehead.
“Right. Like how you snapped at me before I went upstairs with Frankie? Or how you brushed me off earlier before you got in the shower. So nice.” She rolled her eyes and I flared my nostrils.
“I apologized.”
“You did.” She bit her bottom lip and swayed back and forth a little. The fire in her dark eyes made me want to fuck her where she stood. Nobody ever looked at me with so much passion before.
Xari was bursting at the seams with it. It was her life force and I’d be lying if I said it wasn’t inspiring. She might have been spoiled and a little immature in her day-to-day life but when it came to her passion…the woman was unstoppable. She had everything planned down to the hour.
“Daddy, I’m sorry for acting like a jerk,” Frankie said with a soft sigh. I hadn’t even heard her come in the room I was so busy staring at Xari. Shit. I had to get myself together. I couldn’t let Frankie see how much I wanted her nanny. I knew my kid. She’d object and I would get the silent treatment.
“I forgive you, Frankie. I don’t like what you did though. You know the rules here. I don’t want to hear about what Alexis lets you do.” I tried not to sound annoyed because it wasn’t her fault Alexis didn’t want to get on the same co-parenting page. Frankie was just being a kid and trying to bend the rules. I expected her to act like a child. I didn’t expect Alexis to act like one too.
“I know. I’m sorry.” She shot a look at Xari then at me. “I’m ready to go to bed.” I stood and wrapped her in a hug before kissing the top of her head. With her face scrubbed clean, she was my little girl again.
She went to Xari next and hugged her then went upstairs.
“Is it bad that I want to go up and tuck her in?” I asked, shaking my head.
“It’s cute, Evander.” She walked over and rubbed my shoulders. Her hands were strong working the knots out of my muscles.
“I know something else cute.” I grabbed her hands and kissed the backs of them.
“I am cute,” she smiled. She sat on the couch and plucked my glass from the table, bringing it to her lips. She looked so damn sexy.
“Why don’t you tell me about going viral…with your cute ass.”
“Well, turns out Damon Philips’s fiancé, Nicole wants me to play at their wedding in DC. I’m gonna do it because they’re willing to pay for my flight and hotel. She wants me to email my contract to her but I don’t have one.” Her words hung in the air. I let out a small chuckle and nodded my understanding.
“You’d probably need a lawyer to draft one for you…huh?”
“That would be nice. I mean, if I knew a lawyer.” She batted her lashes at me and I pulled her close. I liked the way she felt in my arms.
“Maybe I can help you.”
“You’d do that for me?” She curled her pointer finger, hooking it under my chin so she could pull me closer. Our lips pressed together and her eyes shut immediately. I watched her for a few beats before closing my eyes too.
“Absolutely. You gotta promise to come to bed with me though.” I stole her bottom lip, trapping it between my teeth then I moved to her chin…her neck…her shoulder. She was butter beneath my lips.
“As long as I wake up in my own bed, right?” She said. Her tone danced on a line between sarcasm and something sour that I couldn’t put my finger on.
“You know we can’t have Frankie seeing you in my bed in the morning.”
“I know, Evander. I was just being extra.” She was hiding something. I didn’t dwell on it though.
“I’m proud of you for taking the Damon Philips wedding. You’re going to do great.”
“Thank you. I’m a little nervous but I mostly can’t wait to play for them. They want a mixture of classical and R&B.” She smiled when she got excited. She smiled so much that my eyes were stuck to her dimples.
That’s not all the way true. I noticed the animated motion of her hands and the way her eyebrows lifted when her excitement reached a fever pitch. I wanted to take her features and paint them on the pages of my next novel. I wanted to stitch her into my words.
“What’s that look in your eyes?” She quizzed, tipping her head to the side.
“Do I have a look?” I chuckled.
“You do. You look like you’re studying.”
“I am. I’m studying you.” Maybe my words were too honest. Xari blinked a few times and cleared her throat.
“Me?” She laughed with her hand on her chest. I knew the look women had when they were flattered though. She couldn’t hide it. “Why are you studying me? I mean besides the fact that I’m amazing.”
“You are amazing, but I’m picturing you in a story.” I wet my lips then rested my elbows on my knees. “A heroine who’s strong and takes what she wants, and an alpha with a heart. I usually write strong male leads but you…” My eyes flitted over her face, taking in the scarce dusting of copper freckles across the bridge of her nose. I’d weave those into my character too. “You make me want to deviate from my usual formula.” My fingers tingled and I longed to write. I needed to finish revisions on my finished story though.
“Am I your muse, Evander Freeman?” Her voice was husky like the thought of being my muse turned her on more than anything I’d done so far. I nodded and she climbed in my lap. “You know what that look in your eyes is?” She asked, pinning me to the couch with her hot espresso gaze.
“I told you what it is, Xari. I was studying you.”
“No.” Her fluffy curls swished back and forth when she shook her head. “It’s passion. You come to life when you talk about writing. It’s so fucking sexy.” She nipped at my lips and my hands automatically squeezed her ass. “Why are you a senator if your heart is in writing?” Her plump lips fell into a frown.
“My family has been in the senate for a long time. I can’t destroy generations of progression like that.”
“Have you at least published your books? I mean if you have to be stuck doing something you hate…you can at least do what you love on the side.”
“No. It doesn’t work like that,” I laughed.
“You mean to tell me you’ve never published your books?” Her wide brown eyes were confused.
“Nah. I can’t have my name associated with the kind of books I write. I’m working for the greater good. Being in the senate helps me help others.”
“That’s bullshit.” She paused and brought her fingers to her lips. “That’s what you’re burying. Your passion.” She climbed off my lap and I dropped my head to the back of the couch with a groan. I already knew she was about launch into a speech. I finished my whiskey in preparation for it.
Whiskey and Regret Page 19
