Hot Dad

by Whitley Cox

  “They certainly can.” I loved that she didn’t try to give me advice or paint a pretty picture over a crap day. Something my mother and sister always tried to do when I’d complain to them about my kids being the devil’s spawn. Part of their Pollyanna makeup I guess. But sometimes you just want commiseration. Sometimes you just want someone to say “that blows” rather than to tell you all the ways you could fix your situation, that it could be much worse so you should be grateful.

  “You working, too?” I asked, running my fingers along the tray of pencil crayons in an attempt to draw inspiration for Billy. The author had said she wanted him to be a blue bird, but she hadn’t said what shade of blue. I picked up a deep cobalt and started to shade him in.

  “Yeah. Doing up some newsletters. Booking a few signings and setting up some promotional campaigns.”

  “Are all your clients in Vancouver?”

  “No. In fact, I’m not sure any of them are. They’re all over the world. That’s the beauty of this technological world we live in. Everything can be done from anywhere so long as the Wi-Fi connection is mighty.”

  I chuckled. “That’s kind of cool. The author for the book I’m illustrating lives in Pennsylvania.”

  “I have a client who lives there, too, though she writes hardcore man-on-man, ménage and erotic romance, so I don’t think we’re talking about the same author.”

  “No, probably not. Harvey does things doggy style, but not in the same way.” I had to stop what I was doing for fear of coloring outside the line. She had me laughing so hard my whole body was shaking.

  “You never know, though. She could write under a different pen name. Man-on-man under one name, children’s books under another.”

  A lone tear escaped down my cheek. “You never know. I think we all have secrets and parts of our lives that we only reveal to certain people. Hidden personas of sorts.”

  “Do you?”

  Well, that sobered me up. “Do I what?”

  “Have a hidden persona?”

  Shit! I’d really gone and put my foot in it this time, hadn’t I? I’d been so caught up in her joke, laughing like I’d only laughed on Friday night when we’d last talked. Now here I’d gone and painted myself into a corner in the process.

  That’ll teach you for enjoying yourself.

  “Don’t you?”

  “No.”

  “Neither do I.”

  “Bullshit.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “I call bullshit on that, Samuel Forsyth Wright. You just said that we all have hidden personas, then when I asked you if you did, you said no. Well, I think that’s bullshit. A boldface lie. What’s your secret? You like to wear women’s underwear? You have a closet full of scary clown dolls who you’ve named after all your sex partners? Maybe you’re one of those guys who likes to go to BDSM and fetish parties, tie a woman up, pull on her nipple clamps as you flog her ass and then—” She cut herself off with what sounded like a palm to the mouth.

  “And then what?”

  “Never mind,” she gritted.

  “No, finish what you were going to say, Harper Melody Reynolds.”

  Holy shit! How on earth did we get here? And how on earth had she described my fantasy about her almost to a T?

  “It doesn’t matter,” she said almost snippily. “You’re the one who said he had a secret life. I was just coming up with examples.”

  “Very descriptive, vivid, erotic examples.”

  “It’s been a while. Let it go.”

  “Has it?”

  Was that a groan?

  “How long?” I prodded.

  Hesitation. “Long.”

  “Hmmm.”

  “You’re changing the subject, Sam.”

  “But you’re making this new subject so much more interesting.”

  “Are you a serial killer with a closet full of clowns or not?”

  “I am not.”

  She let out an exaggerated phew. “Well, that’s good.”

  “I’d like to think so. Now that we’ve sorted that out, let’s get back to these nipple clamps you were speaking of and how long it’s been since you … ”

  Another groan, this time I was sure of it. “Not going to happen, Forsyth.”

  I grinned at the sexy voice coming from my phone. “We’ll see about that.”

  Every Wednesday night I went to the local fire hall, where we did practice run-throughs and safety demonstrations. One of my parents or one of Meegan’s parents came over to stay with the kids until I got home around ten-thirty or eleven. It was nice that nobody lived more than about ten or twenty minutes from one another and that both sets of grandparents were so involved. Meegan’s parents, Neil and Vicki, who were retired, had actually moved here from Toronto to be with their daughter and grandchildren.

  It’d nearly destroyed them when Meegan left. And now they were estranged from their only child because they didn’t support her decision, and she was angry with them for siding with me. The children and I, however, were grateful to have them in our lives, even though I knew the toll it took on the both of them to have gone against their daughter.

  I’d loved my old job as a firefighter and I missed it greatly. The camaraderie I developed with the other men (and women, though we didn’t have many) meant a lot. We forged deep and meaningful friendships, almost a brotherhood of sorts. And those friendships had been a boon of comfort, especially when things with Meegan were going south. It was a place I could go without having to think or worry about what was going on back at home.

  A lot of my co-workers were also fathers, and when Gemma was born and then again when Landon was born, they’d all thrown me the man’s version of a baby shower. We played pool, drank beer, ate nachos and pizza, while those who already had kids told horror stories and gave sage advice or snippets of wisdom. It’d been one of the hardest decisions I’d ever made, leaving, but it was what was good for my kids, good for our family. Instead, I’d become an auxiliary firefighter. There was no money in it, but there was still the bond and friendships. It also gave me a chance to catch up with friends and stay in the circle.

  That’s where I’d met fellow firefighter Ben. We’d bonded almost instantly, and much like my father had, Ben had been a huge support during those first few months after Meegan left. He’d introduced me to mixed martial arts and brought me to his sparring gym. Now we kicked the shit out of each other on Saturdays, and I was zen for the rest of the week.

  “Hey, dork, what are you doing?” Ben asked, wandering up, giving me a friendly shove in the shoulder. Ben was half Samoan and built like a fucking tank. The guy could easily bench-press a Smart car, maybe even a Corolla.

  “Nothing.”

  “I’ve never seen you take a selfie a day in your life. Now here you are posing in the mirror. What the fuck?”

  I let my glare settle on his dark brown eyes. His smile just grew wider, exposing his straight white teeth.

  “Help me?” I asked.

  “Sure. But first you have to tell me why.”

  I handed him my phone before wandering over to one of the trucks. I was in full gear with a hat on and everything. I wanted to send a picture to Harper. Only every time I snapped a photo, it looked awful. I stepped up onto the back platform of the truck and held on to the handle.

  “Take the picture.”

  He shook his head, smiling even wider. “First tell me why. Is it for a girl?”

  “A woman, you mean?”

  Dark eyebrows flew up his tanned face. “Oh wow, this must be serious.”

  “Shut the fuck up. Just take the fucking picture.”

  “You sure you don’t want to take off your shirt, maybe grab one off the hoses, straddle it first? Give her a look that says, ‘I’ve got something even longer in my pants, baby.’ ”

  “Take the fucking picture,” I said with a snarl. We were attracting a bit of a crowd now. Ben had a tendency to do that. People were drawn to him like a moth to a flame. It didn’t help that h
is voice was loud and carried, or that the hall echoed like a cavern.

  “What’s Wright doing? Posing for another calendar shoot without us?” Wyatt asked, another smart-ass just like Ben. He ran over, hopped up behind me and wrapped his arms around my chest, leaning up to kiss my neck. Ben all of sudden became snap-happy.

  “I want in on this action,” Kjell chuckled, bounding his tall and thunderous Norwegian body across the hall, hopping up behind Wyatt.

  A few other guys joined in, and soon we were all hanging off the truck.

  “Seriously, guys,” I grumbled. Though had the shoe been on the other foot and I wasn’t the one trying to take a photo to impress a girl, I would have been right in with the thick of them.

  Eventually, they all bailed off and went to stand behind Ben.

  “Don’t smile,” Wyatt said. “You should be smoldering. Chicks dig the serious, introspective look.”

  I adjusted my face.

  “That’s not a smile! Now it looks like you want to kill her.”

  Laughter filled the hall and I couldn’t stop myself from joining in. These were my brothers.

  “Here,” Kjell offered, lumbering over. He stood beside me on the ground and cocked his hip, narrowed his brows and squinted slightly. “Pout your lips just a touch. Nope, that’s too much, now you have duck lips. There, that’s perfect. Open your eyes a little. Perfect. Ben quick, before it morphs, and he just looks constipated.”

  I quickly fell out of the “pose” and began laughing again. “You guys are not helping me.”

  “Of course we’re not,” Wyatt chuckled. “That would be the nice thing to do. No one has ever called me nice.” Funny thing was, Wyatt really was one of the nicest guys I’d ever met. You just had to work your way past the smart-ass shell to get there.

  I pinched my brows like Kjell had showed me, looked straight at Ben and my phone. “Quick now, before I start to laugh or leap off and kick the shit out of these dumb fucks.”

  Ben nodded and went to task. A couple of seconds later, we were done.

  “Wow, you must really like this chick,” Ben said, flipping me back my phone as I made my way over to the wall to undress and hang up my gear.

  “It’s new.”

  “Doesn’t mean it’s not something.”

  I pulled off my boots and then brought out my phone. A tiny picture of Harper next to her number smiled back at me. “You’re right. It’s definitely something.”

  Chapter 7

  Harper

  I couldn’t stop looking at the picture that Sam had sent me. It was, among other things, hilarious. Yes, it was sexy, smoldering and hot as all get out, but when it’d first popped through on my phone, I’d busted a gut, nearly waking up Carly sleeping in her room. He was posing. Much like he had in the calendar, only this time he wasn’t holding a puppy, just simply looking directly at the camera and saying, “How you doin’?” with his eyes. I’d texted him back immediately saying, “thank you,” along with something punny about heat and uniforms, but he hadn’t messaged me back anything besides a winky face. Yes, another winky face!

  Thursday, Sam called again, and we spent another evening chatting with our phones on speaker mode as we both worked. It was as if we were in a long-distance relationship and didn’t live fifteen minutes from each other. But such is the life of full-time parents who work, and who for the time being were trying to keep this … whatever it was, on the down low. We made plans for Friday. My sister was feeling better and said she would watch Carly, so Sam said he’d be over around seven.

  It felt like déjà vu when I was standing in front of my vanity putting on makeup on Friday night. Carly was playing sweetly with her dinosaurs on the floor when my phone started to ring. It was my sister.

  Fuck!

  “You can’t seriously be calling to cancel again, can you?”

  “I’m so sorry. I got called in to work. They’re super short-staffed, and you know Rick gets too overwhelmed with all three kids.”

  “Quinn,” I huffed in misery, then pouted at myself in the mirror. I couldn’t catch a break.

  “I’m really, really sorry. Next weekend for sure, I promise. I’m not on rotation next weekend, so I’ve just said I’m unavailable.” My sister was one of the senior nurses in an old folks’ home and was always getting called in at obscure hours with loads of overtime. They were constantly short-staffed and severely overworked. But she made good money and was building her seniority. She hoped that by the time Emmet was in grade two, she’d be running the place. It looked promising.

  “It’s not your fault,” I grumbled, putting my blush brush down and glancing down at Carly, my cute little cock-blocker. “I wish your husband didn’t get so easily overwhelmed.”

  “You and me both. Listen, I’ve got to run. I’m so sorry. I’ll make it up to you, I promise. Okay?”

  “Yeah, yeah, whatever.”

  I hung up and stared down at my phone. I was going to have to call to cancel on Sam again. Was this like baseball? Would I only have one more strike before he called it quits and deemed me as too much of a hassle? I dialed his number.

  “Hey!” he greeted. “Don’t tell me you’re calling to cancel again. I just shaved my legs. These puppies need to be seen on the town tonight.”

  I snorted a laugh. “Sorry, stud. Those gams are going to have to go out on the town without me tonight. My sister has to work.”

  He made a disappointed noise in his throat. “What time does Carly go to bed?”

  “Seven-thirty, why?”

  “Can I come over? I’ll bring dinner again like last time. We can watch a movie, or you can just stare at my sexy hairless legs all night. Your pick.”

  He had me laughing, and before I knew it, I was agreeing to him coming over once Carly was asleep. I wanted to see him, wanted to spend time with him, make sure we had the same kind of chemistry in person as we did over the phone. I hung up and continued to put on my makeup, smiling down once again at my adorable little cock-blocker.

  “You might not succeed tonight,” I said to her.

  Carly looked up at me, an Apatosaurus in one hand and a Pteranodon in the other. “Huh, mama?”

  Kid fed? Kid bathed? Kid bottle? Kid story time? Kiss kid goodnight and tell her not to get out of bed unless the house is on fire? Check. Check. Checkity check check. All systems go, my floors freshly swept, my counters wiped and my bed with fresh sheets, I sat on the couch with my laptop in front of me emailing one of my clients, waiting for that knock on my door. We’d agreed on seven forty-five; it was now seven forty-seven, where was he?

  Oh, for Christ’s sake, woman! Get ahold of yourself. It’s Vancouver, it’s January, ever thought he might be stuck in traffic? Or maybe dinner wasn’t ready for pickup. Chill the fuck out.

  My phone vibrated on the coffee table, and I lunged for it, bonking my knee on the edge of the table in the process. I was such a klutz.

  “Fuck!”

  I’d hit the “answer” button just as I said that.

  “Harper?”

  Bouncing around my living room on one foot like an idiot, I put the phone to my ear. “Yeah, sorry.”

  “I’m here. I just didn’t want to knock in case it woke up Carly.”

  My eyes flashed to the door, where sure enough a sexy dark shadow crowded the mottled glass paneling on the door. Another couple of bounces before I decided I needed to walk it off, and I was opening the door.

  My heart leaped up into my throat at the sight of him. Black leather jacket, dark jeans, dark loafers, a sexy smile, dinner and flowers. So this was how dating was supposed to go. He was wooing me. I was being wooed. I had to stick my hand out against the wall to keep myself from keeling over in a swoon as I continued to take him all in. Tall and muscular, broad and rugged. With piercing blue eyes and the most dashing dark red hair. It was even darker on his chin and cheeks. I suddenly ached to run my lips, my tongue, my nipples over those ruddy prickles.

  “Hi,” I finally squeaked.

&
nbsp; His smile was long and lazy. “Hi.”

  “Y-you want to come in?”

  “Yes.”

  I swallowed. Why did that one word make my whole body go up in flames?

  “These are for you.” He held the bouquet out, and I took them. They were gorgeous, a mix of roses and lilies, all various shades of reds and whites.

  “Thank you.” I moved to the side to let him in as he took a step forward. Inhaling, because I couldn’t stop myself, I breathed in his manly scent. Oh God, what aftershave was he wearing? It was spicy and sexy, with just a hint of minty freshness and the lingering scent of fresh linen. I wanted to jump up onto his waist, bury my face in the crook of his neck, and smell him all night long.

  I assumed he was going to just continue on walking into my house, but instead he stopped directly in front of me. I was now staring at his profile. And what a sexy profile it was. His nose wasn’t quite perfectly straight, but it added character, and looking closer there was a faint, white heart-shaped scar just above his left eyebrow.

  I swallowed again.

  “Thank you for having me,” he said as he angled his head down and kissed me on the cheek. “I’m really glad we get to have a date where I’m forced to wear pants. Though that means you don’t get to see my sexy hairless legs.”

  Just when I thought the moment was going to be too much to handle, he made it fun and funny until I was laughing at him, with him or both as I closed the door behind us and led him into my kitchen. I went on the hunt for a vase, then began unwrapping the flowers.

  “These are lovely, thank you.”

  “You’re welcome.”

  Not one to just sit and make the woman do all the work, he assumed the responsibility of sorting out dinner. White boxes were pulled out of the brown paper bag, then he went about opening them up and laying them out on my kitchen table.

  “So, what’s on the menu tonight?” I trimmed the stems of the flowers and then one by one arranged the bouquet how I wanted it.

  “I tried another new place. This one was recommended to me by a friend. Dirty Girl. Have you heard of it?”