“It would save us a fortune on theme nights,” Mason said. “Plus, you’d get a fancy black shirt out of the deal. Ava could make it glittery, too.”
“Very funny,” I said. “I don’t think that sounds fun at all.”
“Who said anything about being fun?” Mason said, and I laughed. After that, the night wasn’t so bad.
8
Hannah
The next day I couldn’t stop thinking about Jordan and how he’d handled the guys the night before. I tried to focus on going through the list of tasks I made for myself that morning, including washing a couple of loads of laundry and vacuuming the carpets through my house. But no matter how hard I tried not to think about him, my mind kept wandering back over.
I knew he was strong and powerful from the moment I’d met him. Jordan just carried that presence about him. That, though, was a different side of him. He was incredible as he took control and asserted himself in a completely undeniable way without making himself seem like a jerk.
It didn’t just impress me. It completely turned me on. My body had woken up and was buzzing with desire the longer I thought about him. Putting away the vacuum, I decided to take a shower, thinking it might cut through the fog.
Almost as soon as I got into the shower, I knew that wasn’t going to work out. The hot stream of water rushed down my body, and the arousal only sparked more. I filled my hand with my favorite shower gel and built it into a rich lather that I rubbed across my skin.
I rinsed it off, running my hand through the water to wash the soap away. The thoughts of Jordan took over my mind. He was so sexy, and I couldn’t resist the need for him anymore. Letting my hand trail down my belly, I dipped it between my thighs and drew my finger up through the folds of my center. The sensation sent a shiver through me, and I let out a breath.
Turning so I could lean back against the wall of the shower, I spread my feet further and focused the tips of my fingers directly on the taut, sensitive pearl at the apex. My other hand cupped my breast, kneading the flesh and twisting my fingers around my nipple to draw it up to a hard tip.
My hand heated my body up until I was shaking and wet, ready for more. I reached up and took the showerhead down from the holder. Even the sound of the massage setting turned me on more. I was enjoying the fantasies about Jordan rushing through my head and didn’t want to rush through it too much. I wanted to savor it and the intense feelings I hadn’t had in so long.
Directing the water on my shoulders, I let the rhythmic pulse of the water travel across my chest and down onto my stomach. Sweeping it back and forth across my hips made my body ache. Finally, I slid down onto the floor of the shower and propped my feet up so my thighs spread open. The water touched my clit, and I cried out with the powerful pleasure that surged through me.
Plunging two of my fingers deep inside me and envisioning Jordan filling me, I directed the water. Within seconds, it brought me to a shaking, gasping climax. It took me a few seconds to come down from the peak and let my fingers slide out of me. I sat there for a while longer, running the softer setting of the water over me as I relaxed.
When I finally peeled myself up off the floor, I finished my shower and got out. I felt a little shaky, but relaxed and relieved.
It was my day off from the bar, and I didn’t want to just spend the entire day hanging around the house. All that was left on my to-do list was going to the grocery store and doing a bit of meal prep for the rest of the week. I could have headed straight there, but instead I packed up my art supplies and went back to the beach.
I got my easel set up and looked around for what I wanted to be the focus of this new painting. I was drawn to a small boat out in the water and the way the waves moved around it. The process of capturing that image started out slow as I sketched in the spacing, but soon I lost myself in mixing the paints and filling it in.
I didn’t know how long I had been there painting when I noticed movement out of the corner of my eye. It wasn’t just the people who were also out on the beach taking in the weather. This figure was moving directly toward me. I turned toward it and was surprised to see Jordan heading right for me. He was wearing a pair of baggy athletic shorts and a tank top that highlighted the chiseled muscles of his arms and shoulders and showed off the tattoos on his skin.
Biting into my bottom lip slightly, I turned back to my painting long enough to get myself under control. He was grinning at me when I looked back.
“Hey, Hannah,” he said. “Fancy meeting you out here.”
I laughed. “Because the beach is such a strange place for people to visit?”
He let out a laugh that sounded just slightly out of breath and combed his fingers back through his damp hair. “I guess you have a point. I just haven’t seen you out here before.”
“What are you up to?” I looked him up and down like I was trying to analyze the clues.
“Just jogging. I don’t work out like I used to in the military, but I still like to keep myself in shape. Jogging out here clears my mind. I like being able to see the water,” he said.
“It is beautiful,” I agreed. “That’s why I like to come out here to paint.”
I gestured at the canvas, and Jordan leaned over to the side to get a better look at it.
“That’s really good. I didn’t realize you did all that,” he said. “I mean, I remember you mentioning you did art, but you never said you were this talented.”
The blush that came across my cheeks was unexpected, and I didn’t know if it was completely because of the compliment or because of what I had just done in my shower. It was a little awkward having Jordan standing right there so close to me while my body was still feeling warm and tingly from the intense orgasm I’d experienced fantasizing about him.
“It’s not a big deal,” I said. “Painting is just a way for me to get my thoughts out and relax.”
“I can understand that,” he said. He looked up the beach, then back at me. “Would you want to pack all this up and go for a walk with me?”
I smiled and nodded. “I would like that.”
Jordan helped me pack everything up, and we carried it to my car before heading back onto the beach. We walked along at a slow, casual pace for a few quiet seconds before I spoke again.
“Do you ever wish you were still in the service?” I asked.
Jordan shook his head, looking out over the water for a few seconds as he contemplated the question. “No. I was done. For a lot of my life, I thought the military was going to be my whole future. I figured I would go in for my initial term of service, then go career and spend the rest of my life serving. But it didn’t work out that way. Not that I regret my time. It was definitely what I was supposed to do for that part of my life. It just didn’t turn out to be what I was supposed to do for the rest of it.”
“I definitely understand that. Expectations and thinking you know what’s ahead of you, then realizing it’s something different can be a lot,” I said.
“It wasn’t just the military that changed,” he admitted. “I thought I had my whole life mapped out in front of me down to the detail. I was planning on getting married.”
“Oh, wow.”
He nodded. “Yeah. I know that’s kind of a cliché with military guys. We want to have something good at home, something to look forward to when we got back, and something to keep pushing for when times got hard. I think that was her for me. Not that I realized that at the time. I thought she was perfect. We’d been together a long time, and I was sure we were going to get married, have some kids. The whole thing. Maybe I should have caught on when she never wanted to talk about being a military wife and talked about a future that didn’t include the reality of moving around to different bases with me.”
“What happened?” I asked, tenting my hand over my eyes to block the sun so I could look at him.
“I got a short leave that let me come home for a little bit. Nobody knew I was coming. It was supposed to be a surprise. And it definitel
y was that. When I got home, I found her cheating on me with one of my friends,” Jordan said.
I cringed. “That’s terrible. I’m sorry you went through that.”
He nodded. “So am I. But at least it seems like I dodged a bullet in a way. Maybe if I hadn’t found out, she would have kept up with it all and I would have ended up marrying her, and it would have been much worse down the line.”
“That’s a good way of looking at it,” I said.
“How about you? Any skeletons in your closet?”
“You could say that. My parents decided they knew what was best for me and that they should have absolute control over my life. That included picking out who they wanted me to be with. They paired me up with this guy I’ve known basically forever. Ethan. According to them, he was an appropriate match for me and what they thought I should have in a husband. It didn’t quite matter to them that I didn’t feel the same way,” I said.
“So, an arranged marriage situation?”
I laughed. “Not quite, but something like that. I didn’t love him. Never. I’ll admit I tried. Having couples kind of put together by parents wasn’t so unusual in our circles, so I tried to see in him what they did and let the relationship develop. But it never did. Then I started to suspect he was about to propose, and I couldn’t handle that. So, I left him.”
I left out the big details about my relationship with Ethan. It felt far too soon to get into everything about the mental abuse and the controlling way he treated me. I didn’t want to pour too much of that out to Jordan and scare him away. Besides, it wasn’t something I talked about with anyone. Even Samantha only knew some of the truth. This just wasn’t the time for me to put it all out there.
Instead, I focused on how nice it was to walk down the sand with Jordan and get to know each other better. I hoped the beach would just keep stretching on and we wouldn’t have to stop.
9
Jordan
Work seemed to fly by with Hannah there to talk to. Or more appropriately, to flirt with. I found myself smiling and laughing a lot more than usual when she was nearby and not busy with customers. I also found more and more reasons to get behind the bar and go shoulder to shoulder or hip to hip with her. Occasionally, she would knock one hip into me to move me out of the way for something, and I would do it back. The banter between us was silly and funny, and the customers seemed to like it, which made me happy, but I was enjoying it all too much.
Suddenly, I realized Mason was staring at me from across the bar, a smirk on his face while I was in the middle of another mock argument with Hannah. I could feel my skin get warm as I flushed, and I looked back into her gorgeous eyes. She was making a face at me, her nose and lips all scrunched up because of something I had said that made her fake angry at me. An overwhelming urge to grab her by her face and kiss her soft, supple lips was only held back by the heat from where I could sense Mason watching me.
Instead, I turned on my heel and walked away, shaking my finger above me. She laughed, and so did a few of the patrons, and I went into the back to get some air. I needed to get control of myself before I lost it.
Grabbing an ice water, I passed Tyler in the hallway, who nodded at me.
“Taking your break?” he asked.
“Not a full one,” I said. “Just needed a drink of water and some air. It’s pretty calm in there now.”
“Warm tonight, isn’t it?” Tyler asked, pulling at the front of his shirt.
“Yeah,” I said, pretending that was the problem. “Maybe check the thermostat.”
Tyler saluted with two fingers and walked away. I turned and headed through the door to the outside, taking a deep breath when I got into the fresh air.
I took a deep sip of the cold ice water and closed my eyes as I leaned my head on the bricks behind me. I didn’t want to sit. Sitting meant complacency and rest, and I wasn’t in the mood for rest. Just a break from the noise and the heat. And Hannah. I needed a break from Hannah before I said or did something really dumb.
My mind kept wandering back to the conversation we had on the beach the day before. She blew me away with how well-rounded she was as a person. At only twenty-eight, she seemed far more my speed than some of the other almost-thirty-year-olds who came into the bar on the regular. She was smart as a whip and creative and talented. She was insanely easy to talk to.
She was also stunning to look at. I couldn’t get that part out of my head. People as gorgeous as her shouldn’t be so damn interesting and funny and talented, too. It wasn’t fair for the rest of humanity. No one should ever have to compare themselves to a knockout with a perfect figure, who was smarter than they were and more talented, too.
I took another sip of my water and sighed, staring into the middle distance. I had to get a grip on myself. She was an employee and a budding friend. Nothing more. I was nearly a decade older than she was and again, one of her bosses. It wasn’t something that was feasible. She was new, and she was fun, and she was cool. Leaving it at that was where I needed to settle. A little more time and she’d just be another person I enjoyed hanging out with, like Luke or Ava.
Who was coming through the door. With Mason.
Fuck.
“Hey, guys,” I said, “need me back in there?”
“No, no,” Mason said, putting his palm up at me. “You’re good. We thought we’d take a break for a second, too. Tyler and Hannah can handle the tiny crowd we have in there for a minute.”
“Oh, well, I probably should get in there,” I said, moving away from the wall.
“Can’t stay away from Hannah for too long, eh?” Ava asked, taking a sip from her own water and feigning innocence.
“What? No,” I said.
“Right,” Mason said, looking at Ava and making some silent married-people connection that I didn’t understand.
“What?” I asked.
“We just noticed how you really seemed to like her,” Ava said innocently.
“She’s nice to talk to,” I said, sighing a little. “I enjoy our conversations. That’s it. Besides, I know what you two are getting at, but I also know about the policy here about dating employees.”
Mason and Ava laughed and looked at each other again.
“Uhh,” Mason began.
“Hush, you know that’s different,” I said. “You two are married.”
“We weren’t always married, remember?” Mason said.
“We started dating again when I came to work here,” Ava said. “That policy doesn’t matter if you actually are planning on trying to have a relationship.”
“I barely know this girl,” I said. “I think you two are getting ahead of yourselves. We clicked as friends. I like talking to her. Let’s slow the train down.”
“You can keep telling yourself that,” Ava said, “but one day you’ll figure out the truth.”
“I just hope it’s not too late,” Mason said, putting his arm around Ava.
I rolled my eyes and went back into the bar, determined to give Hannah a little space and maybe calm things down for myself a little.
The next day, I got a text from Luke, responding to one I had sent him the night before. I wanted to meet him somewhere other than the gym or our places, so he suggested the same restaurant Matt had me meet him before. Glad I got to eat another plate of sweet potato fries, I headed that way.
“Hey, man, thanks for meeting me,” I said as I approached the table. “Before anything else, I just wanted to apologize for how I acted at the gym. I shouldn’t have gotten so upset with you, and I am sorry.” I held out my hand, and Luke shook it instantly.
“No, stop,” he said. “I am sorry for acting the way I was. I was a dick. You obviously really like this new girl, and I was being a frat boy about it. I’m sorry, dude.”
I shook my head. “No worries,” I said, sitting. “Let’s just let it go, yeah?”
“Fine by me,” Luke said, sitting down across from me. “So, tell me about this girl. I promise I won’t be crude.”
<
br /> “She’s just a friend,” I said. “But she’s really cool and easy to talk to, you know? Like, you know how you can have instant chemistry with someone? Where it’s like you’ve known each other for a long time, but you have all these things to find out about them still? That’s what it’s like. She’s comfortable to be around and to talk to, but she’s also interesting and full of stories and life experiences.”
“She sounds great,” Luke said. “But if I may say so, as your best friend, I can tell you right now that you want more than just being friends. That’s why I was making jokes. I didn’t mean any disrespect—I was just ribbing you.”
I didn’t really have a response to that, instead just shaking my head and being thankful for the break in conversation when the waiter came by. I gave my order, and Luke gave his, but before he could walk away, Matt popped his head up behind me.
“Can I join you guys?” he asked.
“Christ, can you not surprise me like that?” I asked.
“My bad.” He came around to sit beside Luke. “Hey, Luke, good to see you.”
“You too, Matt. You come here often?” Luke asked.
“Came here just a few days back with Jordan,” he said. “I had a hankering for their fries.”
“So did I,” I said. “I ordered a plate for the table.”
“Awesome,” Matt said, then made a separate sandwich order to the waiter, who was still hanging around. When he left, Matt turned to us. “So, what’s shaking, guys?”
“Nothing much,” Luke said. “Just chatting about life.”
“Women?” Matt asked.
“Not for me,” Luke said. “But I was talking with Jordan about this girl he’s so hung up on.”
“Hannah?” Matt asked.
“Ahh, so you know who it is, too,” Luke said.
“Oh, for sure,” Matt said. “Jordan’s been all googly-eyed since she came to work with us. What did you say?”
“Nothing,” I interjected. “It was a misunderstanding. Let’s leave that be.”
Boss Daddy: A Secret Baby Romance Page 5