Mom’s eyes light up. “Oh, that would be wonderful. We can bake some cookies. And I’ll take her to see that new kids’ movie.”
I grin.
One less thing to fret about. Now, all I have to do is get through the rest of the evening.
I pack an overnight bag for Clarissa and set it by the front door.
Mom changes clothes and putters around in the living room. “Adam’s lady friend, Jen…”
Jen?
She leaves the name hanging in the air as though it has some special significance.
Then she continues with a smile. “She’s really lovely.”
I swallow hard. “Of course, she is.”
“And her children are precious. That Maddie was so sweet with Clarissa.”
“Oh? That’s nice.” Nice that Adam’s daughter is sweet to mine. They can be BFFs, and it will just be a party at the holidays.
“And he’s so handsome.”
I plop onto the sofa. “I guess.”
“Just sayin’. That’s all.”
Just don’t want to hear it—that’s all.
I clasp my hands together. “Well, I guess you two should hit the road and beat that traffic. Eh?”
“Yes, I suppose so.” She taps her face. “Give your Momma a kiss.”
I give her a peck on her cheek. “I love you, Mom. You know that, right?”
“Yes, I know. I love you too, Baby Girl.”
* * *
At five minutes to seven, the bell rings.
I pull open the door with a big smile, one of those that hurts the face because it’s so forced.
My gut quivers, and my hands shake. I shove them into the front pockets of my Capri jeans before he notices. “Come on in.”
I nudge the door closed with my foot. “Dinner will be ready soon.”
“I could smell the steaks grilling from next door.” He looks me up and down. “Mouthwatering.”
No matter where I go or what I do, his gaze doesn’t leave me, even as I remove the baked potatoes from the oven and the steaks off the grill. By the time we sit to eat, I’m a jumble of nerve endings, a mass of sparking and jumping live wires.
Finally, everything is on the table and we settle in to eat. Trying to come up with small talk sucks, especially when there’s such a huge thing lurking in the recesses of my mind.
About halfway through the meal, Adam places his fork and knife on the edge of his plate. He leans across the table. “You’re awfully jumpy.”
Damn. He noticed.
“Not really.”
His eyebrows rise. “Aw, c’mon now, Beautiful Girl. Why don’t we talk about the elephant in the room and get it out of the way?”
I swallow hard. “Elephant?”
Oh, dear Lord. Does he know about the baby?
“You and me. This not seeing each other thing.”
I slump. “Oh. That elephant.”
At least he wasn’t referring to the mastodon in the room—I’m not sure I’m ready to talk about that.
Even still, I’m not sure I’m ready to talk about anything yet.
I jump from my seat. “Can I get you something more to drink?”
“Kelsey.” He follows me to the fridge.
I grab a pitcher of tea. But Adam takes it from me, setting it aside.
“What are you doing?”
He walks toward me.
I step back, but he keeps coming until I’m against the cabinetry. I wet my suddenly dry lips.
Hazel eyes follow the movement of my tongue, and then they return to my eyes, as though he’s searching for some sort of answer there.
I go stock still.
Adam traps me with one strong arm around my waist, pulling me tightly against his chest.
I try to say something but, like so many times before, my words play hide-and-go-seek with my tongue, and it can’t find them. So, I bite the corner of my bottom lip.
His mouth is only a breath away. “You don’t really think we’ll never end up back in bed together, do you?”
My knees weaken, so I grab the edge of the countertop behind me. I suck in a great breath, holding it as I give the slightest of nods.
Adam comes even closer to my ear, whispering, “You don’t really think we won’t ever make love again, do you? Really?”
My heart flutters in my chest, and heat flows to my pussy.
All the reasons I should stay away from him are in my mind, somewhere—lost, right along with my words.
I find three syllables wandering around. I grab them and push them out. “We shouldn’t.”
He nibbles at my neck, sending sweet shivers to my core. “Why? Give me a really good reason. Not some shit about how you need someone who wants the same things as you. That’s crap and we both know it. You’re running scared, Beautiful Girl.”
I close my eyes and dig deep for the strength I’ve been promising myself I’d have when the time came. It has to be here somewhere.
“Who’s Jen?”
He stills.
My heart shrivels.
Oh, God. I knew it!
I pull away from him. “Jen? And Maddie? Who are they to you?”
His brow wrinkles. “What do they have to do with anything?”
I throw my head back, glaring at the ceiling.
I suck in a frustrated breath. “I don’t know. That’s why I’m asking.”
He slides his hand around to the nape of my neck, gently forcing me to look at him. “Jen is—was—my best friend’s wife. He died at the same time I was injured. Maddie’s their daughter.”
I close my eyes as my taut muscles relax. The air in my lungs rushes out with my relief.
Thank God. He didn’t lie.
I nod. “Okay.”
His thumbs brush my cheeks, and his fingers thread into the hair behind my ears. “Yeah? So we’re good?”
The flecks of brown in his eyes mesmerize me.
He’s not married. He doesn’t have kids.
He’s here, holding me close, and he wants me.
And, good Lord, do I ever want him.
I nod and smile. Somewhere, in the back of my mind, something niggles at me. I’m forgetting something important. But with him so close, staring at me like he only ever wants to look at me for the rest of our lives, I can’t think of what it might be.
Oh well, it’ll come to me.
If it’s important, I’ll remember it eventually.
His lips graze mine as he pulls me even tighter against his chest. His bulging erection presses my belly. Heat permeates, filling me with want and need unlike anything I’ve felt.
Adam grabs my ass and lifts me as he turns us toward the bedroom. His mouth skims across mine, gently, then harder. His tongue slips in and out as he maneuvers us through the house.
A high-pitched ring sounds from the kitchen. Adam pauses in the hallway, stopping and setting me on my feet.
“You need to get that?” I ask.
“I’ll call them back later.”
I grab his hand, pulling him to the bedroom. As I close the door, his phone trills again.
He shakes his head. “It can wait.”
We fall to the bed together, our hands working furiously to get each other out of the confines of these clothes that are in the way of our every pleasure.
It’s been too long since Adam’s been inside me. Too long since he’s wrapped me in his loving embrace and made me feel like the only woman in the world—the only one he wants to touch. The one he can’t touch enough.
A little voice in the back of my mind pitches a fit, trying to remind me of something, but I don’t have time for that. All I have time for is Adam. His hands on my body. His mouth on mine. His tongue setting me aflame with every lick, lap, and tickle.
As his fingers find my folds, grazing them with a gentleness that brings tears, I run my hands over his chest, his pecs flexing under my touch. I tilt my hips, giving him easier access to my entrance.
He smiles against my mouth. “You like
that, do you?”
I nod, heat washing up my neck and over my face. Though he’s seen every part of me, and I him, somehow, he still makes me blush.
He sucks my pulse point, moving toward my bared breasts. He circles the tight pebble of my nipple with the tip of his tongue. Shooting sensations make a direct path to my pussy. Warmth gathers in anticipation.
Adam goes further down, laving attention on my navel, before he moves to the crest of my pubic bone. My abs tighten, waiting. Finally, his tongue flicks its way to my clit. Each little swipe across that sensitive spot clenches my core tight, wetting my entrance.
When he moves over me, he nibbles at my lips, teasing as his cock finds my slit, pushing inside as I taste my own cream on his tongue.
The unmistakable clatter of flatware pinging off the tile floor penetrates our pleasure. I pause, but Adam pulls away for only a moment. “Ignore it. We’ll fix it later.”
Then he kisses me harder. His spicy scent envelops me as he thrusts deeply, and I rise to meet him. My breaths jerk each time he rams his cock deep, grazing that part of me that tightens the coil, building the pressure within.
He whispers. “I’m here.”
As his speed increases, I brace myself with my hand on the headboard. He pounds against me, and I lift my legs, allowing him to shove even further inside. He slides his hand up the back of my thigh to my ankle, pushing it to rest on the front of his shoulder. He grinds against me. My clit, my slit—all of me—pulses with every roll of his hips.
“Stop running. I’m not going anywhere.” He kisses my neck, and I quiver with the idea that he might really stay.
Maybe he will. Maybe they don’t all leave.
Adam’s gaze captures mine, and he smiles as he drives into me. The smacking of wetness between us builds the faster he moves. He licks his bottom lip, and I rise to take it between my teeth, tugging him closer. His tongue tangles with mine as our bodies entwine.
He sinks in, promises falling from his lips straight to my heart. “Trust me.”
He empties my mind of all other experiences and fills me with only thoughts of him and me. Our time together is all that matters. It’s as if there wasn’t anyone before, just him. Just me. Just us.
Just this.
His strokes are long and hard, and each one pushes me closer to the edge of that cliff I want so badly to dive from.
“Let go, Beautiful. Come for me.” His breath is hot at my ear.
I throw my arms wide and close my eyes, allowing every brush, every thrust, every touch to soak into my being, to gather together until they push me higher and higher. Adam bangs against my pussy, the friction a sweet torture to be endured until it frees me.
Then, as my mind fractures with the pleasure of it all, the swell of pressure is too much, and the world, my world, explodes around me, in me, through me. My body convulses, and my pussy seizes around Adam’s as I cry his name.
He jams his cock deeper and arches his spine, throwing his head back.
“Fuck. Yes!” He meets my every pulse with his own orgasm. His seed jets inside me, hot and filling. And reminding me of the thing I forgot.
TWENTY
I go still, and Adam collapses atop me, holding his weight on his forearms on either side of my shoulders.
My stomach sinks.
Shit. I still have to tell him.
He rolls to his side and pulls me against him, pushing my hair aside and kissing my temple. I drag in a deep breath and give myself these precious moments to memorize the feel of his arms around me. In case he doesn’t handle the news well and really does take off.
The sound of breaking glass crashes in on our afterglow.
I sit up, swinging my legs over the side of the bed.
Adam grabs at my hand. “Leave it.”
But I can’t. “Chloe might cut herself on whatever she broke.”
He drags himself from the bed and follows me.
Chloe sits on the plate I abandoned earlier. Adam’s plate is on the floor—in pieces, the remnants of his steak and potato smeared across the tile.
“Par for the course.” I let out a sigh and shoo her off the table. “Go, you terrorist. All you do is tear shit up and make a nuisance of yourself.”
She scampers off, stopping at the entry to the kitchen to turn and give me an extra-loud meow, as though to tell me she doesn’t much care for my assessment of her character.
“Well, too bad. Don’t be a rotten mess, and I won’t call you a terrorist.”
Adam’s shoulders shake as he laughs. “You sound like me when I’m talking to Spike. What we put up with from our critters.”
He picks up the broken dish while I get the food cleared and put away.
Suddenly, Adam stops and grins at me. “You know, this should be a thing—cleaning naked. All cleaning should be done sans clothing from now on. I declare this to now be law.”
I wiggle my hips as I scrub and wipe the table. “That would make it more fun.”
Adam grabs for me, flopping into the chair, dragging me onto his lap, his cock erect and pressing hard against my ass cheek. He kisses the back of my neck, tickling me so that I wriggle around. Then he suddenly stops.
I open my eyes. His brows knit.
I ask, “What?”
He nods to Chloe, who’s strutting into the kitchen, a white stick hanging from her mouth.
My jaw drops, right along with my stomach. Adam moves me off his lap and stands.
Fuck. “Damned thief cat!”
I lunge for the little black and white, living, breathing disaster-maker.
Chloe hunkers down, eyeing me and growling as though to say, “Take my prize and I will end your ass, human.”
Adam dodges around me and grabs the stick from her mouth.
My shoulders hunch, and I bite my lip, covering my eyes.
Maybe he won’t know what it is. Maybe I can turn back the clock to earlier and tell him about the baby before he finds out like this.
Fucking cat.
Adam clears his throat, but I don’t look up. I can’t.
He tries again, louder.
Still, I just bite my lip harder.
Please, God. Let him understand. Let him not freak the fuck out. Let him—just let this go well.
“Is this what I think it is?”
Frame this in the most positive light possible. That should do it…right?
My heart thuds as I peek through my fingers.
His gaze is trained on the stick, and I can almost hear the wheels turning in his mind.
Positive test. Positive spin.
I drag in a great breath, steeling myself for whatever will happen next. “So, you know how you told me your doctors said you might be shooting blanks?”
His eyes dart to meet mine, his expression tightening. “Yes.”
“Surprise!” I smile a big, cheesy smile.
Keep it positive. Nothing negative going on here.
I pat my tummy. “Fully loaded.”
A myriad of expressions skips across his features. Uncertainty. Confusion. Disbelief.
Looks like he’s settling on shock for the moment.
I wait.
Let him take it in.
Finally, he seems to get his tongue untied. “But there was only that one time.”
“Only takes once.”
Adam’s phone vibrates on the table, beeping at the same time. He tosses it a glance but doesn’t move to get it.
He carefully lays the pregnancy test on the edge of the counter, and then props his hands at his hips.
We stand naked in my kitchen. The mastodon is now loose and tearing its way through my world. And I need a drink—but can’t have one—at least for another nine months or so.
Damn it.
“I’m going to grab a robe.” I head toward my bathroom.
In the lavatory, I wash my face and stare at my reflection.
I berate myself. “Dumbass. You should’ve told him first thing. Just spit it out. Then it would’v
e been done.”
When I step into my bedroom, Adam’s clothes are gone.
I check the rest of the house.
Adam is gone.
I tuck Maddie in, kissing her on her forehead.
She looks up at me, her little pink lip poking out. “When will Mommy come home? She’s not gone forever like Daddy, is she?”
I rub my neck to help me swallow the brick that lodges in my throat. “She’ll be home soon, Maddiekins. She had to go with Ryan. But she’s not gone forever.”
“Thank you for taking me to my dance.”
I pull at the knot on my tie, loosening it to breathe better. “You’re welcome. I hope you’ll ask me again.”
Her little lashes shadow her pale cheeks as she nods. “I will.”
Her yawn is contagious. I stretch and yawn as I flip her lamp off and pull the door closed, leaving a crack so the light can seep in, in case she wakes in the night.
I grab the strewn toys from the floor and pile them in the laundry basket I’ve commandeered for this purpose. I’ll try to figure out where they all belong tomorrow. The dishes are done, though not dried and put away. That can also happen tomorrow.
Right now, all I want is to sit.
I fall onto Jen’s couch. Something jabs me in the ribs. I pull the G.I. Joe action figure from between the cushions and toss it across the room toward the basket. It goes wide.
Oh well. Maybe I’ll hit it next time.
I adjust the pillows I’ve been sleeping on behind my head and lie back, letting the tension flow from my sore back. I swear, if I’ve picked Maddie up once in the last few days, I’ve done it a hundred times—sucker that I am.
Exhaustion doesn’t even describe the level of tiredness I feel at this moment. It’s not as bad as when Carter and I were overseas, but not far from it.
Who knew taking care of two kids could be so much work? And that doesn’t even include the house shit that has to be done every stinking day.
I was right all along. Kids are cute, but a total pain in the ass.
I was thinking that at five and eight, Maddie and Tucker would be pretty self-sufficient. Yeah, not so much.
It’s a good thing I love those two rugrats, otherwise I’d be looking for a nanny to care for them while Jen’s off with Ryan at the Children’s Hospital.
So Long: Bad Boy Next Door Page 18