“I didn’t catch you complaining about my dirty mind last night.”
“I didn’t say my mind isn’t dirty, too.”
His laughter warms more than just my skin. I feel like I’m glowing inside as he wraps me in his arms. “I think a shower is called for. Would you care to join me?”
What kind of question is that?
But it doesn’t go the way I expect it to. Who could blame me for thinking the two of us being in a steamy, wet, slippery place would end up rather… well… orgasmic?
Instead, it’s sweet. Playful. Silly even. He lets me mold his hair into a mohawk. He attacks me with the handheld showerhead, spraying me until I laughingly beg him to stop.
In the end, I lean against him and allow him to wash my hair. My eyes close on their own, without my meaning them to. The feeling of his fingers on my scalp is pure magic. He’s gentle and slow, massaging me with a tenderness that still surprises me.
I would never have expected him to be so gentle if we had crossed paths on the street or some other random place. In fact, I would assume he was a meathead, a brute, even with his good looks and nice clothes. I guess that’s what I get for judging the book by its cover.
When it’s over, I’m more confused about him than ever. Wouldn’t it just be easier for me to leave and get it over with? But he doesn’t seem to want that. I know I don’t. I’ll freaking move in with him today if he wants me to, caution be damned. I could definitely live with this.
But he can’t want that. Can he? Don’t unattached men want the girl out the door as soon as possible the morning after?
I dry my hair with the same sort of thick, soft towel wrapped around my body. Even the towels are top-notch. It’s not enough that I’ve spent the past two nights in a bed that reminds me of what being cradled in angels’ wings might feel like, or that the sheets on that bed are the most sumptuous thing I’ve ever felt.
The sight of him with a towel slung around his waist is nearly enough to bring tears to my eyes. The good Lord knew what was up when it was time to create this man. Does he even know how incredible he is? If I was him, I’d never get anything done for staring at myself in the mirror all day.
“What?” he asks with a grin as he passes where I’m sitting on the edge of the bed.
“Nothing.”
He glances over his shoulder at me as he goes through his dresser. Darn it, he’s going to get dressed. Would a little more time in the towel be too much to ask for?
“You sure? Because you had a funny smile there for a second.”
“I was lusting over you, okay? Jeez. Let a girl have some private thoughts.”
“Is that all I am? Just a piece of meat?” he pouts, teasing. At least I hope he’s teasing.
“No, of course not!”
“Good.”
“You’re a pretty face, too.”
He throws his towel at me before grabbing me and throwing me on the bed. Yes, he gives me a screaming climax, before he gets off the bed and steps into a pair of shorts. He’s like a study in the human physique, every muscle perfectly defined, and that grace I noticed on the dance floor last night is evident even when he performs the most mundane actions.
“Are you hungry?”
“Starved,” I groan before sinking onto the bed, moaning like a dying woman. “You expect a girl to do all these things you like to do on an empty stomach.”
“How about some brunch? My favorite spot should still be serving, even on New Year’s Day. They bake this brioche that will curl your toes, and they offer bottomless mimosas,” he adds with a grimace, “after last night, I don’t know if champagne ought to be on the menu this morning.”
“Oof. I don’t think so, either.” But mimosas? Bottomless or otherwise? House-baked brioche? This hardly sounds like a casual place, and I can’t wear last night dress to a place that serves brunch.
“What do you say?” he asks.
“In this?” I motion to the towel. It’s either this or the dress I wore last night. I didn’t exactly think about packing for the evening. Maybe I should have.
“Hmm. Good point. We could always stop off someplace and get you something new.”
I have to raise an eyebrow at this. “Just to have an outfit to go to brunch in? Doesn’t that seem like sort of a waste?”
He shrugs it off, flopping back on the bed with both hands behind his head. “A waste of what? We’re not talking about disposable clothing. I was talking about buying something for you. A gift.”
A gift, huh? It’s a very nice gesture, but I don’t think so. “That wouldn’t feel right.”
“What do we do, then?” he asks.
The fact that he’s so dead set on spending more time together is nice enough that I wouldn’t care if we just sat around and watched TV all day—but I’m hungry, too. “Would it be crazy to say I’d rather go someplace a little more…”
“Normal?” he asks.
“I was going to say plain,” I scowl, rolling my eyes. “I wouldn’t be rude enough to use the word normal.”
“But that’s what you meant.”
“No, it isn’t. I meant someplace a little more my speed. Have you ever just, I don’t know, gone to the park and had a hot dog?”
“A hot dog in the park?” I don’t know if he sounds surprised, skeptical or disgusted.
“Yes. You know, like regular people do.”
“I’m a regular person. I wasn’t raised with wealth.” He gestures around us with his hands, sort of aimlessly. “As you can see, but my mother would’ve washed my mouth out with a bar of soap for only two reasons: if I swore, and if I ate a hot dog from a street vendor.”
I have to laugh with him. “Well, why not walk on the wild side and take a chance? I mean, if I can do all sorts of brave things with the new year, why can’t you?”
He smirks. “I would tell you it’s ridiculous to consider eating a hot dog from a vendor an act of bravery, but you never met my mother. The queen of hand sanitizer.” He stands, pulling me up with him when I offer him my hands. “Yes. Let’s go.”
When my feet hit the floor, something else hits me. “On one condition.”
“What?”
“That we at least stop at the closest shoe store so I don’t have to wear last night’s heels.”
Chapter 21
Dawn
Even in jeans and sneakers, he looks like a million bucks and attracts the eye of just about every woman we pass. Is it wrong that I want to skip around and wave my arms and declare that yes, he’s walking through the park with me?
Me. Me. Me.
Would that make me petty? That would probably make me petty, but what the hell. I can gloat for once in my life,
I can’t stop looking at him, either, but not quite for the same reasons they are. “What do you think?” I ask, biting my lip to keep from smiling. He looked more than a little nervous while ordering, poor guy. He could probably hold his own in a room full of successful people, no problem, but ask the man to order a hot dog? Nope. Like the cliché of the rocket scientist who can’t tie his own shoes or hold a conversation with others.
He chews slowly, thoughtfully, as I watch. “I think I don’t understand what the big deal was all this time.”
“So you like it?”
“I guess. It’s a hot dog. I mean, we’re not exactly talking about haute cuisine here.”
I elbow him. “Snob.”
“If anything, it’s anti-climactic,” he muses before polishing the thing off. I want to lick the bit of spicy mustard away from the corner of his mouth, but he takes care of it himself, which is only like the sexiest little gesture ever. It’s okay. My hormones aren’t screaming or anything.
“I didn’t build it up too much, did I?”
“Oh, no. My mom did, always warning me against eating food from carts. You just never know who’s been touching it or what might have flown into it,” he mimics.
Wow, Mom sounds like a helluva lot of fun. “I guess that’s true no matter wh
ere you eat. Even if it’s haute cuisine.” I make sure to roll my eyes pretty heavily after that, which he elbows me for.
“True.” He nods. “I was sort of expecting to drop dead after all that build-up.”
“Good thing you didn’t.”
Suddenly, he stops, his eyes wide. He crosses his hands over his throat and makes a strange, strangled sound before coughing. His face goes red.
“Very funny,” I mutter, turning my back before I can smile and give myself away. I make it roughly a dozen strides before he runs up beside me.
“What? I wasn’t convincing? Or did you just not care whether or not I dropped dead?”
“Figure it out for yourself,” I mutter, laughing as he wraps his arms around my waist and picks me up. “Careful! I just ate a tube-shaped pork product!”
When he puts me down, he’s not laughing. He looks very serious as he brushes stray strands of hair out of my eyes. Hair he washed, I remind myself with a little thrill. “Thank you for this,” he murmurs.
“What did I do?”
“You gave me the nicest New Years Day so far. And, I know this is going to sound snobby, so forgive me in advance you remind me of the things that really matter.” He kisses the tip of my nose before moving to my lips, pressing his firmly against mine.
This might just be the most perfect moment of my life. Right here, in the middle of everything and everybody, kissing this wonderful man who’s already given me enough good memories to last the rest of my life.
And damn, I sure do hope people notice as they walk past. I can’t help it.
Chapter 22
Dawn
The day winds on, the two of us vegging out on his leather sofa after a long walk that took us well into the afternoon. It turns out he likes old movies, the way I do, though he doesn’t have nearly the extensive knowledge I have. We decide on Gone With the Wind, a nice long one he avoided watching before even though his mother gave it to him nearly five years ago, but he insists on watching it when I tell him it’s my favorite.
“You don’t mind?” I ask, settling in with him.
“Why would I mind?”
“I don’t think I’ve ever met a man who would indulge my taste in movies.”
He grimaces. “I think we’ve already established that the men you knew up to this point didn’t have any taste, Dawn.”
“Good point.”
“Do me a favor.” He kisses the tip of my nose like he did out in the park. It’s a cute gesture, one which I think would be dangerously easy to get used to. “Stop comparing me to any of them. You’re making me hate them all and remember what we agreed: new year, new you. All right?”
“Right.” I want to kick myself. I can’t let all that past bullshit leak into what’s so nice right now. I have no idea how I’ll be able to gracefully extricate myself from the situation and I hope he’s not waiting for me to decide it’s time to leave. I don’t want to overstay my welcome.
Another reason I was uncertain over whether he’d want to watch such a long movie.
I tell myself I’ll leave after the movie and, resting my head on his chest, I curl up beside him. There’s another thing he’s taught me: how I need to learn to live in the moment instead of the past or future.
It’s not long before his breathing softens, goes even. He’s sleeping. I lift my head just enough to get a look at him, and what I see is nearly enough to stop my heart. No matter how many times I see his face, it’s still enough to do that to me—especially right now, while he’s asleep and vulnerable. Trusting me. Behaving like we’re just an ordinary couple, hanging out on a day off, being lazy and enjoying each other’s company.
I want to memorize every angle of his profile. The jaw, the chin, the nose. The faint stubble on his cheeks, the dark lashes which stand out against his cheeks. His lips. “Thank you,” I mouth, just in case I don’t get the chance to thank him when this is over.
I lower my head again, going back to Scarlett and Rhett and their shenanigans. I wonder what Scarlett would do in a situation like mine.
For one thing, she probably would’ve thrown James’s things out the window, the way Gena suggested. My eyes begin to close without my even realizing I was sleepy, and they stay that way until Ace stirs beneath me.
“I think I must have been really tired,” he says, yawning and stretching after waking up about halfway through the film. Scarlett just decided she’s never going to be hungry again.
“I take it you’re not normally the napping type,” I observe, rubbing sleep from my own eyes. I didn’t mean to doze off on his chest, but he’s just got one of those chests that beg a woman to rest on it. A quick swipe of my hand over my chin confirms that I didn’t drool all over him.
“I can’t remember the last time I took one.” He flashes a sheepish grin. “Naps aren’t productive, and I’m nothing if not productive.”
This sends a pang of guilt straight to wherever guilt goes. The gut, maybe. Here I am, acting like exactly the sort of person Marissa made me sound like. Encouraging a perfect physical specimen to eat hot dogs and take naps in the middle of the afternoon. “Am I a bad influence on you? I mean, what do you normally do when you hang out with a woman? Running? Rock climbing?”
He shakes his head, ruffling my hair. “No, of course I don’t. Well… sometimes, but not all the time.”
“Because I don’t want to hold you back or make you change your routine just because I’m here.”
He sits up a little, making me sit up, too. “You sound a lot like somebody I used to know. It’s like her thoughts are coming out of your mouth. Weird.”
“You mean… her?” I don’t even want to say her name. Marissa. The bitch.
“Yes, her.” He runs a hand through his hair, then over the back of his neck. Muscles jump in his cut-glass jaw. I can barely take my eyes off him long enough to focus on what we’re discussing.
“I’m sorry. I was really only asking an innocent question. You said you don’t take naps, but you just took one.”
He looks at me like I just sprouted a second head. “Which is a good thing. My doctor’s been on my case about getting more relaxation for years now. Literally, years. I always come just inches away from telling him to shove it up his ass, too, but maybe he’s right.” He stretches, both arms over his head, a goofy grin on his face. “I feel better today than I have in ages, and it’s because of you.”
His words warm me all over, right down to the tips of my fingers. “Maybe it’s the hot dog. I mean, you never know. It could be what you were missing all along.”
He grabs me in a bear hug. “No, I found what I was missing all along, and it wasn’t a hot dog. It’s the girl who recommended the hot dog.”
Hope blooms in my chest. Does he mean what it sounds like he’s saying? Because it sounds like he’s saying that he wants to be with me. I’m what he was missing all along, and why would he want to give up what he’s been missing?
Or I could be making this up in my head. God, I hope not. I do have a pretty crappy track record when it comes to that sort of thing.
What the hell. I might as well get it over with. I can’t hang out here indefinitely—eventually, it’s going to be time to go home, so the tough questions are going to have to be asked. “What are you trying to say?” I croak out, my heart in my throat. Oh, please, don’t let me regret asking. Please, please, don’t let me mess this up.
“What does it sound like I’m trying to say?” he challenges, raising an eyebrow. “I’m trying to say that I finally found what I’ve been missing, and I don’t intend to let you go now that I’ve found you.”
Wow. Wow, wow, wow. It’s like I was in a speeding car that suddenly hit a brick wall. Or maybe the brick wall hit me. Either way, I’m all mixed up.
It takes a moment for me to realize I’m sitting here with my mouth hanging open while he’s probably waiting for me to respond. Only what is there to say? I seem to have forgotten my words. Every single word I’ve ever known, in fact. It’s jus
t… gone.
“Are you all right?” he asks, taking my hands.
I nod.
“Because you seem sort of… not here.”
“I’m here.”
“You look horrified.”
“I’m not. I’m stunned. Yes. Stunned is a good word for it. I’m stunned.”
“Why?”
It’s my turn to look at him like he’s got two heads. “Why shouldn’t I be? This is completely out of left field. Why me? Why are you saying these things to me?”
“Why do you even have to ask why? Haven’t I shown you? Haven’t I told you? I wasn’t joking when I told you I want to make you happier than you ever imagined before.”
My mind is whirling, but it still manages to go back to that particular moment because that’s not the sort of thing a girl forgets easily. Standing on the balcony, looking out over the city, with his breath on my neck and his voice in my ear. “I remember you saying that, but I also remember you saying something about not being in the position to do it.”
“I want to be in the position to do it—I just didn’t want to freak you out last night.” He strokes my knuckles with his thumbs, staring deep into my eyes. “I know I tend to come on a little strong sometimes. I see what I want and I do whatever it takes to get it. I’m not used to not getting my way.”
“Is this normally how you woo women?” I ask, still totally in shock. Unfortunately, my sarcasm finds a way through even in times such as this.
“I want to be completely honest,” he murmurs. “I want you to understand. It’s not like I’ve ever had difficulty attracting women—”
“I can’t imagine,” I whisper.
“—and that was always fine before. But not now. I never cared as much as I do now. I wanted to ease you into it, I guess. I wanted to be sure you wanted to be with me. That you weren’t just going along because of my money or because of the sex.”
The sex alone would be reason enough.
“Dawn.” He lets go of my hands and takes my face between his palms. “I wanted you the moment I saw you. I don’t ever want to be without you.”
Single Dad Page 54
