by Quinn, Taryn
I liked what I liked.
I found myself curling my arms around him from the back as we waited in line at the butcher like we’d been together for a lifetime. People recognized him wherever we turned. He seemed to know everyone’s name as well.
Attractive women, harried mothers with kids in tow, and even men seemed to be drawn to him. It took us twice as long to get through the store since every aisle seemed to contain someone from one of his classes.
A few people frowned at me, but Caleb seemed oblivious.
Finally, we got back to the front of the store with our basket. He hefted it up on the conveyor belt. “Sure we got everything?”
I peered into the plastic basket. “Veggies, crusty bread, fruit and cheese, steak of glory—yep.”
He flashed a prepackaged tray of kabobs. “Highway robbery.”
“Do you really want to buy all the things to make them? Then, you know, make them?”
“Point taken. Easy for the win.” He tossed that and a pack of gum onto the checkout counter.
We haggled over who was paying, and in the end, I lost. Or won, depending on how one looked at it. He didn’t let me carry anything but the fruit and bread when we finished checking out.
“Looking hot with your rainbow bags, teach.”
He grinned over his shoulder at me. “I am secure in my manhood, thank you.”
I watched him walk ahead of me. His deliciously firm backside was definitely a plus as far as I was concerned. “You betcha.”
“Stop watching my ass.”
I pulled down my sunglasses. “Nah, I’m good.”
He walked faster. “Objectification? Really, Miss Hastings. You should be ashamed of yourself.”
“Shame, shame.” I sashayed after him, then laughed when he turned and hustled me down into the park by the gazebo so we were out of the way of foot traffic. He crowded me up against one of the trees and kissed me senseless before leading me back onto the sidewalk.
I was almost dizzy with laughter and hunger by the time we got to the wine bar. Lucky for us, everything was within a few blocks since it was hot enough to melt us and the food into a pile of goo.
We left with two bottles of summer wine and a growing awareness building between us again. He was charming and sweet, but he also knew how to make me come my brains out. It was a heady combination, and I found myself wanting to believe it could really be this easy with him.
Huffing our way across the street to our apartment building, we both fervently wished aloud that the elevator had been finally finished.
Alas, no.
We cooled down in his apartment for a few minutes as we prepared our food and broke into the wine.
I sipped from my glass, my butt back on the stool at his kitchen island as he doused the steaks with some concoction he called his secret rub.
“I have a secret rub too.”
He looked up, his fingers covered in spices. “Is that right?”
I set my glass down and came around to stand beside him. “Herbs are kinda my jam, though I use them for spellwork and medicinal purposes. Like the stuff I gave you for your sunburn.”
“And it worked better than anything I’ve gotten from a store.”
“Glad it helped.”
I knew I was testing him early with the witch stuff, but I wouldn’t hide that part of myself. Not ever again.
That pale eyebrow shot up as he gave me a bit of side-eye. “Spellwork?”
“Offerings to Brigid for my own spiritual practice, spells for clients to manifest things as simple as finding a job, or getting through periods of grief.”
He set the steaks aside and moved to the sink without saying a word. I could practically hear his brain working it all out.
I reached for my wine glass and took another healthy gulp, jolting when his arms came came around me from behind. “I’d heard from a few people that you were into tarot cards. Kinleigh is a little into that stuff.”
“Yeah, part of my business. I even do a podcast with my best friend Ryan.”
“Huh. Wow. I had no idea. So, it’s kind of a religion to you? The crystals and cards and all the plants I saw?”
After setting down my glass, I turned in his arms and laid my hands on his chest. “Very much so.” That was enough sharing for today. “Ready to go up?”
“Definitely.” He lowered his mouth to mine. “It makes you even more fascinating.”
I wanted to believe he meant that.
So very much.
Nine
No one ever said being a teacher was glamorous.
A day of getting my classroom ready for the new school year wasn’t exciting, but it needed to be done. I’d slacked a bit in June on my cleaning, knowing I’d step it up in the fall, and lo and behold, the fall was almost here.
Hadn’t it just been July a minute ago? Now it was verging on September. The time was flying by at a truly scary rate.
Soon, my lazy afternoons spent with a certain someone would come to an end. I wouldn’t be stopping by Kinleigh’s anymore under the guise of shopping for eclectic furniture pieces no one truly believed I wanted.
What I really wanted was to see Luna.
As lame as it was, I kept up the pretense anyway. We were exalting in this whole “no labels” business.
All the flirting, all the fucking, none of the drama.
And she had a hell of a way with a staple gun.
“Is this good enough?” She inched up on her toes to hang the “Welcome Back, Students” banner over the top of the whiteboard. Except Luna was a little thing, so she couldn’t reach very high.
Which meant I could crowd into her from behind to help her…stretch.
“How about this?” I asked against her ear, gripping her hips to hoist her up to hang one end of the banner. I’d already done the other side.
She laughed breathlessly as she stapled it into place. “Where are your hands, teach?” Her laughter turned husky. “Should you be touching me like this in a place of learning?”
“Absolutely. Fuck, are you wearing a string bikini under here?” Her denim mini skirt was very brief and showed a hell of a lot of curvy leg, ending in wedge heels with straps that wound up her calves.
I did not mind in the slightest.
“Maybe. I didn’t know what you had in mind for my afternoon off.”
“Oh, you can guess what I have in mind.” Nuzzling her loose, beachy hair, I let her slide slowly down my body, dragging her right over the definite stirring in my khakis. “But I figured we could work before we play.” I slipped my hand under the hem of her peach tank top on my way up to cupping her breast. “Why’d you have to wear a bra?”
“Because I don’t want to be arrested, maybe?”
I nibbled down the side of her neck to her shoulder. “I’d save you. But if you want to play cops and bad, bad girls we can do that too.”
A throat was cleared from the doorway. I knew that throat clearer. I heard that particular sound in my nightmares.
I went still. Were my lungs still functional? It felt as if I had a sudden, unexpected blockage. One that resulted from knowing I might be unemployed and unemployable once the principal of St. Agnes Academy put out the word to the administrators at nearby schools that Caleb Beck was a big ol’ perv.
Fondling a very willing woman in a parochial school classroom while readying the space for innocent seven and eight-year-olds. Why, I never.
Luna peeked up at me from underneath her wavy hair. “Oh, thank you, Caleb. If you hadn’t rescued my contact, I’d just be flailing around here like a blind person.” She pretended to smack at her eye. “There, that’s better. I can see now. I can’t thank you enough.” She turned and flung herself at me, hugging me around my arms currently glued to my sides.
Sheer panic at potential public shame did that to a man.
“Hi there,” she added brightly, moving toward Sister Tobias and extending a hand. “I’m—”
Sister Tobias did not shake. She seemed ri
veted by the sparkling daisy charm dangling from Luna’s belly button, nicely revealed due to the wandering hand that had pulled up her tank top.
Thanks, hand.
“Mr. Beck?” she asked in an exceptionally unfriendly tone rather than addressing Luna.
“Sister, you look lovely today.”
She looked down her nose at me, which was a feat considering I was about a foot taller than she was. But she won on the menacing score. “You’re one of the last ones to prepare your classroom. The ice cream social and picnic are coming up.”
“I know, Sister. Why I wanted to get this done today.”
“Done?” She glanced at my loaded desk.
“I just got started. Luna is happy to help.”
“Luna Hastings,” she tried again with a smile. “It’s a pleasure to meet you. Caleb tells me Saint Agnes has some of the best test scores in the state. And your grade-to-grade student retention level is in the high eighties. That’s wonderful.”
I looked at her out of the corner of my eye. How did she know all that stuff? I didn’t even know the retention percentages, so I definitely hadn’t informed her.
Besides, I preferred much more physical activities for our time together than nerding out about facts and figures.
Sister Tobias, however, was not impressed and grunted out something as she crossed her arms, flapping the sleeves of her habit. Not all of the nuns at St. Agnes wore them, but Sister believed in always looking the part.
That could’ve been why her gaze dropped to my neon green sandals. Hey, I’d been walking down at the lake this morning. I wasn’t wearing good shoes to clomp around in mud and dog poop.
“You did double-check with sweet Ivy about her truck stopping by for the social?”
“Yes. Three times.”
Sister Tobias had warned me that if my sister’s truck wasn’t there on time with the exact selection of ice cream treats she’d ordered, there would be hellfire to pay—and I would be the one paying it.
I was fairly certain Sister hated me, not unlike my own years in elementary school. I’d never been the teacher’s pet. More like the teacher’s worst spitball-throwing nightmare.
“Good, good. I hope she brings Rhiannon. She’s just the most adorable child.” Sister Tobias clapped her hands together.
“You’re in luck. Ivy’s bringing Rhi with her to help today.”
“She is?” Luna asked out of the side of her mouth.
I was almost sure Luna had met my sister along the way, since Kinleigh was Ivy’s best friend, but the first few times hanging out with your lover’s family were often awkward. So, I’d figured on keeping it casual. Ivy got along with everyone, and her husband was a damn rockstar. Or he worked with them, so same difference. If anyone would like and appreciate Luna being a little left of center in some ways, my sister should. She accepted everyone just as they were in any case.
“Yes, Rhi’s coming with Ivy as long as she can get coverage for the truck for a couple of hours. Oh, and assuming she can drag Rhi away from my mother. She has those two girls attached to her hips—Rhi on one side, Vivi on the other.”
“It’s nice that your mother’s other children gave her grandchildren.” Sister Tobias shot me a searing look and swished to the doorway. “Tell your sister to stop by on her way through. I have sweets for precious little Rhiannon.”
With that, she flew away. Only metaphorically speaking, but man, was it apt.
“Ouch.” Luna rubbed her chest. “Did she punch you or did it just feel that way?”
“She loves me. What are you talking about?” I looped an arm around her shoulders and kissed the top of her head. I contented myself with a quick peek down her tank top in case my jailer returned. “Where did you learn that stuff about the school? You really helped out in the clutch.”
Her cheeks went rosy. “I did some research when you said you worked here. Just so I had some idea what your school might be like.”
“Wait, you didn’t pester me with endlessly annoying questions with answers you really don’t care that much about, you just checked it out on your own? You are basically my ideal woman.” I reached down to palm her ass under her mini skirt. Just one quick touch to hold me over. “And not only because you can quote statistics like a boss.”
“No?” She slid her hand up my chest, flicking her tongue along her lower lip as she cast a glance at the door. My girl liked to take chances, just like I did. “I thought it was my flexibility.”
“That definitely plays a part. Your thighs could crack a coconut—oh, shit.”
She laughed until she heard the sound of a child crying. “Is that wailer your niece?”
“Survey says yes.” I willed my newly intrigued cock back into submission before my family made it to the classroom. “She’s a good kid, but she’s temperamental sometimes. Her dad’s Irish,” I explained. “Born in Ireland. Both he and my sister have that ginger thing going on. I’ve heard it makes people snarly. Poor Rhiannon was cursed from the beginning.”
“I heard that,” Ivy said, nudging wider the partially cracked door so my niece could toddle inside the classroom on mostly steady feet. She was too busy crying to care about the new surroundings or even about me.
“Hey, Rhi-Rhi. How’s my best girl?”
She took one look at me and howled before clinging to her mother’s leg.
Ivy rested a hand on her head and sighed. “It’s been a day. You don’t even know. The next time Rory even jokes about knocking me up again I’m going to give him a home vasectomy.” She seemed to notice Luna then, who had gone quiet and still. “Oh, hey, Luna, is it? Do you work here too?”
“Yes, it’s Luna. Hi, Ivy. No, I don’t. Actually, I think we met at Kinleigh’s once or twice.” Luna gave my sister an easy smile that didn’t change the momentary squalling child-induced terror in her eyes.
I’d been there many times, and I was a teacher. At least the ones in my chosen age group didn’t fling themselves on the ground and pound their hands and feet.
Usually.
“Oh, yes, that’s right. I remember talking to you there. You have such amazing style. That off-the-shoulder top with the moon cutout in the center was so gorgeous. I debated looking for one like that but maybe with an ice cream cone instead. You know, for my truck Rolling Cones?”
Luna nodded, her pupils growing larger as Rhiannon continued to scream. Her mother just talked over her about ice cream shirts as if it was an ordinary day.
Bellowing child, what? I don’t hear one.
Red-faced and soaking the collar of her Disney princess T-shirt with her copious tears, where? I don’t see her.
It was probably a parental self-defense mechanism. I had to deal with cranky kids all school year, but I could send them home to their parents at the end of the day. When they were yours, you were screwed. Only choice was to ignore them or perish.
Maybe even ignore them and perish. Lord help my sister.
Crouching in front of Rhiannon, I produced a surefire crying quencher from my pocket and held it out to her—a red sucker.
She didn’t even look at it. She just pressed her chubby face into my sister’s leg and cried.
In the midst of her tears, I heard something that sounded suspiciously like “Dabnit.” “What is she saying?”
Ivy sighed and stroked her little girl’s wavy blondish-red hair. The hue seemed to change every few weeks. “Daddy. It’s always worse after we leave him.”
“Her father isn’t here?” Luna asked, keeping her voice low.
“He comes back and forth. He’s a producer with a lot of clients on the west coast. I keep wondering if maybe we’d be better off traveling with him. If having my ice cream truck here is hurting my daughter.” She bent down to lift Rhiannon onto her hip. “Rhi, your Uncie Caleb has a sucker for you. Don’t you want that?”
She knuckled her eyes and kept right on sobbing.
Luna stepped forward and laid her hand on Rhiannon’s arm. Rhi turned her face into her mother
’s shoulder and peeked out from behind her hair, still crying.
“May I hold her? Just for a minute.”
“By all means. Rhi, Luna’s a new friend of Uncie Caleb.” Ivy couldn’t unload her fast enough. “If you yearn for more than a minute, that’s acceptable too.”
The odd phrasing made me blink until I remembered how Ivy had said Rhiannon was picking up more words from being around adults so she had to change things up to keep Rhiannon on her toes.
From what I could tell, Rhiannon was the one doing that to my sister.
Luna shifted Rhiannon in her arms. She was all arms and legs and usually preferred to not be lifted too much anymore, but when the waterworks started, all bets were off. “Hi, sweetie. I’m Luna. What’s your name?”
Rhiannon glanced tentatively at her mom before saying in a whisper, “Rhiannon Ferguson.”
“You know your whole name? Such a smart girl. And pretty too. Do you like Disney princesses?” Luna touched Rhi’s T-shirt. “My favorite is Ariel. Who’s yours?”
Rhiannon instantly brightened, the tears in her big blue eyes drying up. “Ariel too! I have her on my bed.”
“Oh, you do? I’m so jealous. I had a bed like a car when I was your age. It had a steering wheel and you could press a button for the horn. I loved it so much.”
Rhiannon pursed her rosebud pink lips. “Like a red one?”
“Yes. Mine was red. Kinda like your hair.” Luna tugged Rhi’s curls. “But you’re blond too, like me.”
“Daddy says straw-ber-ry.” She sounded it out carefully and then her chin started to quiver.
Ivy and I exchanged a look. Uh oh.
“I love strawberries. Do you?” Luna grinned. “I have an idea. Your uncle needs to decorate his classroom because he has new kids just a bit bigger than you starting soon. But we need more decorations. Can you draw?”
Rhiannon’s eyes grew wide. “Yes.”
“Can you draw strawberries?”