by Andi Bremner
“Don’t worry about the money. I’ll sort that out with Miranda. But I didn’t get a chance to tell you about aftercare.”
“Aftercare?”
“For the tattoo.”
I blinked at him. “Oh, right.”
Immediately, he began to explain how to care for the wound, his voice sharp and matter-of-fact, his jaw set tight. Every now and then a muscle moved in his jaw as if he it was clenched tight. As if he was very annoyed or angry.
Was it because of what happened earlier between us? Was he angry he’d done that? Was he pissed I’d behaved so wantonly? Did he regret it?
Tension radiated off him in waves and the more he talked, the worse I felt. I felt almost sick. I liked Jacob. There was no denying it. He made me feel things I hadn’t thought were possible, and he had awakened things inside me I never even knew were there. Plus, he was not only sexy, but sweet and kind and thoughtful. I saw how he interacted with his daughters and I knew about the drama with his ex-wife and mother, and it only made me think more of him. He was a good man. A solid, dependable, hardworking man who also happened to be the sexiest fucking man I’d ever laid eyes on.
And now he hated me. Or something very close to it, I surmised by his demeanour.
“Um, thank you,” I said awkwardly when he finished his spiel, “for coming over to tell me all this. You really didn’t have to.”
He looked around. “Well, I’m supposed to run through this with you before you leave, but left in a hurry.”
I flushed. “Yeah. I’m sorry about that. He caught me by surprise.”
He looked around again. “I hope I didn’t interrupt anything.”
I stared at him and suddenly realized why there was so much tension radiating off him.
“Oh,” I said quickly. “Declan. He’s not … we’re not … he came because he thought he was … but he’s gone.”
He stared at me. “Lia. You’re not making any sense.”
I flushed. “Sorry. But Declan. He’s not my fiancé. I mean he was, but we broke up and I moved here and well…”
“Where is he now?”
“He left. He’s gone home. He gets it now. Finally.”
He sighed, and the tension in him visibly relaxed. “Right.”
“I would never … I would never cheat on anyone. I know how much that hurts. I would never have slept with you”—I flushed, just saying the words aloud felt risqué—“if I was with someone.”
He nodded. “I’m glad. I thought…”
“Of course”—I waved him away—“but I wouldn’t do that. I was, and am, single.”
An awkward silence settled around us and I almost expected Jacob to go. But he didn’t. He lingered in the doorway for the longest moment. My mind took me back to that afternoon, to what transpired between us and despite myself, my body began to awaken again.
But it shouldn’t have happened. I was his daughter’s teacher. I was new in town. He had too many issues of his own. I had just come out of a long-term relationship. All these thoughts were crowding my head. All these rational thoughts that made perfect sense. But I wanted to be with him and blurted without really thinking, “Stay tonight. With me.”
Chapter Ten
Jacob
I lay on my back, staring at the ceiling. Beside me, Lia slumbered peacefully, snoring a little, which I found fucking adorable. But then I found everything about Lia adorable. The way she worried her bottom lip between her teeth, the way her breath caught when I did something to her body she liked, the way she squirmed beneath me, the way she did exactly what I told her to do in bed.
Bend over.
Spread your legs.
Touch your clit.
Don’t touch your clit.
Come.
Don’t come.
Take me in your mouth.
Suck hard.
She did everything I told her, and she liked it. Which of course I found fucking adorable.
It was adorable how she begged me to stop, that she couldn’t handle another orgasm. It was adorable how she muttered a little in her sleep.
She turned on her side now and tucked herself into me, burying her face in my chest.
It’d been two sweet weeks of adorable and I still couldn’t get enough. I thought by now my infatuation with her would’ve run its course. I’d never dated a woman for more than a week, never spent the night in a woman’s bed, and never been so consumed in thinking about a woman. Not even Tara had had me feeling and acting like that, and I’d married her and had two kids with her. No. Lia was something else. Something else entirely and I wasn’t sure where this going.
She was Ava’s teacher, for fuck’s sake. I knew it wasn’t technically unethical or anything for her to be sleeping with a student’s father, but if word of this got out, in this small town, then things would be difficult for her.
People wouldn’t agree with someone like Lia dating someone like me. They wouldn’t want their grade school teacher dating a tattoo artist, they didn’t want their princess dating the toad. She was meant for greater things.
The worse thing about it all was that I knew it was true.
This thing with Lia wouldn’t last. It couldn’t.
But I wasn’t ready to let it finish just yet. Pulling her to me, I buried my nose in her hair and inhaled deeply, as if drawing her in and imprinting her scent deep into my subconscious.
****
“Are you leaving?”
I glanced over at the bed. Lia looked up at me through heavy lids, hair all mussed and lips swollen from hours and hours of passionate kissing. And fucking. Just the sight of her was enough to make me want to crawl back into bed.
“I have to, babe. I gotta get the girls ready for school.” I’d left home late last night when the girls were in bed asleep. My mom was there if the girls should happen to wake, but they rarely did. But I wanted to be back before they woke.
She nodded. “Maybe I should stay at yours.”
I swallowed, trying to imagine someone like Lia in my house with the mismatched crockery and the well-worn carpet. “I like coming to your house.”
“But at least that way you wouldn’t have to leave so early.” She glanced at the bedside clock. “It’s not even five in the morning.”
I forced a smile and came back to give her a long, drawn-out kiss. “Gotta go, babe. Sorry. I’ll see you tonight?”
She nodded and then curled herself up into a ball, moving to the side of the bed I had just occupied. I loved how she did that, as if she was chasing my scent or something. It fucking stirred something primal and caveman like inside me.
Within seconds, she was asleep.
I was home before the girls woke up.
To find fucking Tara sitting on the front step.
Chapter Eleven
Lia
My favorite parts of the day were the mornings, during school drop-off, afternoons during parent pick-up, and then late at night after children were asleep. If I had to choose, though, it would be the latter.
Then I had Jacob all to myself. Then we didn’t have to worry about anyone seeing us, noticing anything between us. Then we didn’t have to worry about watching eyes, little girls waking, or anything. The only people who knew about us were Anna and Ellis, and they wouldn’t tell a soul.
Not that I wanted to keep Jacob a secret. That was all his idea, which made me uncomfortable. I told myself he was doing it because he was a good dad, because he didn’t want to hurt his daughters, but I couldn’t help and feel as if he was ashamed of me.
Was I not pretty enough? Sexy enough? He certainly found me so when we were alone, I reasoned, so I just had to remind myself he was a dad and his girls came first. He didn’t want them to get teased in the playground or be subjected to gossip. When the time was right, he’d tell them.
He’d tell everyone.
In the meantime, I just had to treasure the moments we got alone.
It was parent pick-up time and I was busy chatting to a new student’s
mom who was worried how her boy was settling in. I was assuring her that he was okay when I heard Ava’s voice.
“Mommy!”
At first, I didn’t register her words. It was only when I looked up and saw Jacob and the woman walking down the corridor that the pieces fell into place.
Ava ran down the hall and threw herself in the woman’s arms as I tried to keep my composure, tried to keep listening to what the parent was saying.
But truthfully, I had no idea. I was too caught up in the other woman.
The woman I’d heard so much about. Tara. Jacob’s ex-wife. The woman he’d once loved so much that she wasn’t a secret. She wasn’t someone he saw only at night when they were alone. She was the woman he’d proudly walked down the aisle with and declared to the world he loved more than anyone else.
She was not me.
She was tall, very tall, and thin. She reminded me of a catwalk model, which only made me feel worse. For weeks, I’d been imagining a dirty junkie, but the woman in front of me was anything but. Her hair was long and glossy, a thick chestnut color that glowed with auburn highlights. Her skin was flawless, her eyes large and brown-fringed with long dark lashes and accentuated by high, arched cheekbones. She was dressed in denim jeans, a plain white t-shirt, and sneakers, but on her they looked effortless and chic.
This was the woman who made Jacob’s and the girls’ lives a living hell?
This was his drug-addicted, low-life ex-wife?
I somehow felt as if I’d been played.
I looked away from Tara to find Jacob watching me carefully, his expression unreadable. I wanted him to say something, I wanted to hear something reassuring. I wasn’t quite sure what, but I wanted it. In the face of this beautiful woman who was everything I wasn’t, I needed something from him. I wanted him to tell me she wasn’t Tara, that she was his sister or something. That even though this stunning, glamazon was his wife he wanted me not her. That she meant nothing to him.
Now they were headed in my direction. I stiffened, resisting the urge to turn and flee.
Up close, she was even more beautiful. I was acutely aware of how plain and ordinary I must have looked in my pants and blouse. I probably had paint in my hair as well.
“Hi.” She smiled warmly at me. “You must be Miss Henley? I’ve heard so much about you.”
I stared at Jacob, who remained mute.
“Oh?”
“Ava just adores you,” she continued. “She talked about you all morning over breakfast.”
Breakfast? I didn’t look at Jacob. Is this why he hurried out of my bed this morning? Because Tara was coming for breakfast? Sickening feelings of hurt curled in my chest.
“Ava is a lovely little girl,” I managed over the knot in my throat. “She’s delightful.”
A look flickered over Tara’s face. “You probably know about my—uh—er—problems. I was hoping we could talk some time?”
“We can. I’m afraid I can’t right now—”
“Oh no, that’s all right. Not now. We are going out with the girls now, anyhow. We said we’d take them to the park and then for pizza.” She turned her sweet smile on Jacob, “Didn’t we?”
Jacob nodded, still not saying a word. Something in me crumpled a little.
“That sounds nice.”
“But I’ll come by one day after school next week,” she said with a wave. “I have a lot I want to talk to you about.”
I nodded. Tara turned with Ava and headed off, their hands linked and swinging. I stared Jacob, who stared back at me. His eyes were full. He was sorry. I could see that. He was sorry and regretful, and I knew just looking at him that he was going to break my heart.
I’d always known it. Someone like Jacob, so sexy and dangerous and completely out of my league, was always going to break my heart.
I knew it. I’d been expecting.
I just didn’t expect it to hurt so damned much.
Chapter Twelve
Jacob
I had to talk to Lia. I sat opposite Tara in the pizza parlor and tried to listen to what she was saying, but I kept thinking about Lia.
About the hurt in her eyes.
Just thinking about that cut me, and I wished I’d said something to her then. Given her some indication that it wasn’t how it looked. It wasn’t happy families just because Tara had spent six months in rehab. It wasn’t happy families at all.
Because, for one, I didn’t trust my crazy ex-wife.
And two, I suspected I was falling in love with Lia.
“Daddy, you aren’t eating your pizza.”
I glanced down at the untouched pizza on my plate. I was too busy thinking about Lia. I had no appetite. “Not hungry, chicken.”
“Can I have it?” Montana asked.
I pushed the plate over to her. “Knock yourself out.”
Tara was watching me. “You are thinking about that teacher.”
My head snapped up. “What?”
She laughed. “I know you too well, Jacob. I probably know you better than you know yourself, but I saw the way you were looking at her. And I saw the way she was looking at you.”
I glanced at Ava and Montana. They didn’t appear to be listening, but I had a feeling Montana pretended not to hear these days. She was growing up too quick.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
She shook her head. “Don’t be an ass, Jacob. And don’t be an ass to her, either. You need to go over there and tell that girl how you feel. You need to tell her there is nothing between us, because she thinks there is.”
I frowned. I’d told Lia about Tara, pretty much told her everything, so she must know how I felt about her. I mean, it was great to see her sober, it was great that she’d been clean for six months, but that didn’t mean I trusted her. And it didn’t mean I was in love with her either. Too much had gone down between us, and too much had happened for us to ever rekindle anything.
Tara knew that. I knew that. But did Lia?
I’d seen the hurt in her eyes. She didn’t know.
“I can watch the girls.”
I glared at her. “No.”
Tara flinched a little but didn’t argue. “Do they know? About the tea—”
“No. No one knows.”
She cocked her head and considered me. “Why?”
“Why?”
“Yeah. Why such a big secret?”
“She’s Ava teacher,” I stated, dropping my voice to a hushed whisper so the girls wouldn’t hear. They were busy watching a YouTube video, though, to pay attention. “She has a reputation to uphold.”
Tara laughed. “This is not the nineteenth century, Jacob. Teachers are allowed to date.”
“Yeah, but not people like—” I stopped.
She stared at me. “People like you?”
I looked away. I hadn’t meant to say that. It sounded like I was down on myself, ashamed of who I was and what I did, which couldn’t be further from the truth. I was damn proud of myself, of my girls, of the father I was. I was even proud of the son I’d become, looking after my mother when that woman had never lifted a finger to look after me.
“You’re a good man, Jacob. Any woman would be proud to be your girl.”
“You don’t know—”
“That girl”—she pursed her lips—“that teacher would be proud to be your girl. I saw it. She’s in love with you.”
I snorted although a flutter of hope cut deep in my gut. “You don’t know.”
“I know love. I know how you look when you’re in love.”
“Tara…”
“You need to go to her and tell her.”
I stared at Tara. She was right.
I needed to tell Lia how I felt. And I needed to tell her right now.
****
“Jacob.”
“She’s been in rehab. She’s clean. She’s been clean for a while.”
Lia blinked at me, seeming to take a moment to process the words which tumbled from my mouth.
<
br /> Then she stepped back, opening the door wider for me to come in.
I followed her and she closed the door behind me. I could smell her. She smelled like strawberries and I wanted to lick her from head to toe she smelled so fucking delicious.
“I wanted you to know,” I said. “I should’ve explained earlier. I should have called.”
“You were busy.”
“I should have called you the minute I knew Tara was back in town,” I repeated. “I’m sorry.”
She stared at me. The hurt was still there in her eyes but it was tempered a little now.
“I didn’t realize,” I began again. “I thought we were just fooling around. I thought this was just casual sex.”
Lia looked as if I’d slapped her, flinching back, her face coloring at my words. “Oh.”
I swore under my breath. I was not doing this right. “I mean, I thought that was what you wanted. Casual sex. And at first that was what I wanted. Sex. With you.”
“Jacob,” she said patiently, “why are you here?”
“I’m here because I wanted to tell you that I’m in love with you,” I said in a rush. “That I think about you all the fucking time, that I can’t seem to get enough of you, and that I’ve never felt this way about anyone. Ever.”
She blinked. “Oh.”
“And I should’ve said it earlier, only I’ve been telling myself that this wasn’t serious. That I wasn’t serious because I knew…”
“You knew?” she prompted.
“Because I knew I wasn’t good enough for you.”
“Jacob…”
“Let me finish. This town is small, Lia. And they talk. I didn’t want them to talk about you. I didn’t want them talk about you the way they talk about Tara. I didn’t want them to even think of you like they think about Tara, but I knew they would. And you deserve better than that. You deserve better than a guy who works part-time in a tattoo studio, who lives in a shitty house on the outskirts of town, who has not only two kids but a sick mother to look after, plus a sober-for-now ex-wife. You deserve something simple and uncomplicated and … not me.”
