by Amber Lynn
Hope was careful not to show her surprise by the mention of marriage. She’d jokingly brought it up, so he wasn’t exactly lying, but they were far from setting a date.
“I guess it’s lucky for you two that my flight back to New York was only temporarily delayed. I leave in a few hours, so I should probably go make sure I’ve got everything packed.”
Kate traced her hand across the counter and winked at the pair before she turned her back and started strutting towards the door. There was no doubt in Hope’s mind that the sway of her hips was meant to accentuate the firm round butt her dress barely covered.
“Can’t wait for your visit to New York in three weeks. Let’s see how well your threats of restraining orders work on my home turf.”
The bells on the door jingled as she walked out and didn’t bother turning around for one last look. Hope had never hated a person before. Sure, she didn’t really like Jimmy Hunter after he stuck gum in her hair in the third grade, but the deep hatred she felt as she watched Kate walk away was a new emotion. Like the jealousy she’d recently felt, it wasn’t a good feeling.
“I guess I should ask if you’re able to clear your schedule in three weeks to make sure nothing happens in New York. I swear, I’ve been there five times for games since we split and she never once came looking for me. Being back on her radar isn’t going to change my routine of getting out of the state as soon as possible after the game, but I totally understand if you want to be there to make sure.”
“Can we talk about that later? I think the customers have had a big enough show for one day.”
The bakery was going to have a lot of publicity, whether it was good or bad was yet to be seen. Even though it was mainly what Hope considered the church crowd, no one had run for the doors when Kate had started talking about sleeping around. There were a lot of regulars who came in before heading to a ten o’clock service, some older, some younger, but all religious enough to go to church. Evidently they weren’t the easily offended parishioners.
Jason leaned down and kissed her head before lowering his voice more than he had to try to keep the conversation private. Since Kate didn’t seem to want it private, her parts had echoed through the otherwise quiet room.
“You’re right. Judging by their clothes, this isn’t a crowd that will like hearing how I plan on making this all up to you. So, I’ll let you get back to your regularly scheduled morning and ask your mom if she wants me to stick around for insurance. Dinner plans haven’t changed, right?”
The hands on her hips loosened as Jason stepped back to do as he said. It gave Hope enough room to spin around and look at her boyfriend. She could still smell their morning fun in the air around him, so it was no surprise to see he hadn’t showered.
His clothes had again been the first thing he could find, which if Hope remembered right were actually left in a pile in the living room somewhere. His hair looked like a bird had nested in it at some point after she’d left to go to her place and get dressed. It was the first time she’d seen the wild mess totally out of control.
“Why are you here, Jason? Kate was right about one thing during her whole little speech. I didn’t call in reinforcements.”
Hope wasn’t saying she wasn’t happy he’d shown up, but she was confused on how he knew it’d be helpful if he did. Jason smiled and looked over his shoulder. Hope looked around his body to see her mother standing in the doorway to the kitchen.
“You said to be ready to call the police. I figured he’d be a little more useful.”
The way her mother shrugged it off was just as bizarre as the words coming out of her mouth. Hope felt a little like she’d entered some alternate reality.
“How in the world did you get his number?”
It was another conversation that didn’t need to happen in the middle of the lobby area, but Hope couldn’t exactly leave her post. It’d been over twenty minutes since a customer had walked through the doors, so it was bound to happen any second. She was really starting to believe that customers thinking about coming in could sense when something was going down in the bakery and decided to take a lap around the block.
“You left your phone on a counter in the back and it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out your pin. I found his number and asked him to come down and clean up his mess.” Marie focused her gaze on Jason before she continued. “You are going to ensure me that the trash that was in here doesn’t come back and verbally assault my daughter again, right?”
“That’s my intention, Mrs. Nacin. I don’t know how much I can promise, but if it makes you feel better, I can hire some security to keep her from coming in.”
Marie shook her head as Hope did the same. She didn’t want to see Kate ever again, but she wasn’t willing to have some guy sit in the bakery or follow her around to make sure it happened.
“That won’t be necessary. Hope already told me today that she’s going to be cutting back her hours around here so she has more time to spend on her social life.”
Even though she didn’t come right out and say it, Hope got the sense by the way her mother emphasized the word social, she really meant sex. Hope had only said she felt like she needed a break from her overloaded work schedule and was thinking about asking to change her schedule to only three days.
“Interesting.” Jason tilted his head and raised his left eyebrow. “I know we talked about the possibility, but with how much Hope likes to work, I thought it’d take her a while to come to a decision.”
They’d discussed her not working at the bakery at all, which was something she still thought was coming down the road, but she wanted to stagger her departure from the six-day schedule. Cutting it in half was a good first step.
“Another discussion for later,” Hope said before the two of them could dive into a discussion about her like she wasn’t standing there.
The hostility between them didn’t seem as sharp, so there was a chance her mother was ready to do more than just scowl and growl at him. It made the concept of dinner that night a little less frightening, but only slightly. Her dad hadn’t peeked his head out, but he was in the bakery for once when Jason graced them with his presence. That meant any surprise introduction was going to be lost and he’d have plenty of time to come up with ammunition for dinner.
“I think that means it’s time for me to head home. As always, it was a treat seeing you again, Mrs. Nacin. I look forward to whatever delicacies are in store for dinner this evening.”
Jason turned and bowed his head a little towards Marie before giving Hope a quick kiss. It had to have been the most chaste one they’d shared, because it was over and he’d hopped over the counter all within about ten seconds. Unlike Kate, he turned and waved as he made his way out the door. Hope hadn’t noticed when she was standing next to him, but he hadn’t bothered to put shoes on for his jog over.
“He may have been handy today, but I still don’t like him.”
Marie didn’t bother sticking around to allow Hope to respond to the words. That was fine with her, because the customers who’d been doing laps around the block decided it was a good time to come in. Hope had to laugh at the very small chance her fantasy that they were actually doing that could be true.
Chapter Nineteen
The day had been a roller coaster ride. Jason had expected a little of it. Hope had spent the night for the fourth or fifth night in a row; it was hard to keep count when they slept in between her two shifts. With her in his bed when they woke up, it wasn’t surprising that one thing led to another and their appetites for carnal pleasures were soothed before she went off to get ready for work.
The morning seemed like it was going to be great, up until the point her mother called. Not knowing Hope wasn’t on the other end of the phone led to a very weird exchange, starting off with him saying he could still taste her skin on his lips. His insistence that Marie never know about their sexual activities was pretty well shattered at that point.
When she explained w
hy she was calling, the great morning turned even crappier. Thankfully, that ended up as well as could be expected and Hope’s mom didn’t curse his existence for once, though she still had a mildly icy glare in her eyes.
By midafternoon, things looked better. Jason had decided two years was enough time to go without a haircut. The missing hair literally felt like a weight lifted off his shoulders. He realized after it was all gone and his brown hair was down to about an inch and a half on top and a quarter inch in the back that he should’ve asked Hope whether she was committed to a long-haired boyfriend.
There was still enough there for her to run her fingers through, but he had to get used to taking someone else’s consideration into mind again. He’d always been good about that aspect of having another person in his life. Kate had thrown all his considerations back in his face. That didn’t mean Hope would do the same.
He was standing outside of her door, patiently waiting for her to answer his knock. Since the guy who cut his hair put some product of some sort in it, Jason hadn’t needed to do anything but throw on some clothes to get ready. Hope had said it was smart to keep things semi-formal, so he picked out a tan pair of pants and a blue sweater he had buried in the back of his closet.
Everything else in there was either jeans and t-shirts or suits. There hadn’t been a need for anything else in the year since he’d moved. He’d thought about wearing one of his usual button-downs, but there was snow in the forecast for the night, and Jason thought the sweater was more appropriate.
Hope had brought up her disbelief in the snow rumors, but Jason had looked at the radar on his computer and it looked like they were going to get nailed. There had been two snowfalls since he’d come to town, both of which were gone the next day.
Jason knocked on the door again, when Hope still didn’t show up to let him in. She’d told him dinner was supposed to be at six, but knowing her family, her siblings wouldn’t be there until six-fifteen. He wanted to get there early enough that it would hopefully make a good impression.
“I’m coming. It’s not easy trying to make it so other people don’t think you’re blind and can’t tell the difference between a five and a ten.”
The door opened and they both found themselves staring at what greeted them. Jason hadn’t seen Hope in makeup before, and he still stood by the fact she didn’t need it, but the addition of longer lashes, dark shadow on her eyes and rosy red lips instantly made his pants tighter.
She’d done her hair to make bouncy curls that had been on the move until she came to a stop and let her mouth drop open. He was too worried about messing up her lipstick to take advantage of her frozen state. Looking down her body, the black dress that molded to her left very little to the imagination.
“Shit, Jason. What am I supposed to do with this?”
Hope snapped out of it and lifted her left arm up and down to try to tell him exactly what she was talking about. There wasn’t a particular part she stopped at as her arm moved, so it was hard to figure out exactly what she found offensive.
“You’re going to have to be a little more specific. It’s the hair, isn’t it? I was just thinking I should have asked you before I did anything, but I thought it would make a better impression.”
“You don’t have to ask me to cut your hair. With it long, I figured people might think you had me around to keep the critters that called it home at bay, but now they’re just going to think you’re blind.”
“Anyone who thinks that is blind. Have you looked in the mirror tonight? Obviously you had to in order to get everything that perfect. It’s going to be hard to make it through tonight without checking to see if your old room still has a bed in it.”
The house her parents lived in was the one they’d raised their family in. Hope had told him that much, but she hadn’t mentioned whether her room had been remodeled into a game room or something.
“We are not having sex in my parents’ house. I know you have an affinity for doing it on every surface you can find, but everything is off limits in that house.”
Hope moved out of the doorway, but held her hand up to tell him to stay where he was. It was a good idea, because his desire to be there a little early was meeting his desire to see if Hope was wearing any underwear. As she walked away, Jason studied her luscious backside but couldn’t tell if there were any panty lines.
She grabbed a small black purse and turned off a light in the bathroom. On her way back to the door, her head shook from side to side and she let out a big sigh.
“I honestly didn’t think you could get hotter. You know how hard it’s going to be for me to keep women off of you? You’ve already got one legit stalker and now you’re going to have women following you around like puppies.”
Hope had pushed him away from the door and turned around to lock it. Closing the space she’d made, he put his hands on her hips and pushed his lower body into her.
“That’s my reaction to you, not anyone else.”
With the thin material of her dress, she had to feel the swelling making his pants tight. It’d been one thing when he was just thinking about her, but seeing her all dolled up in the flesh made it really uncomfortable.
“We’re still not having sex in my parents’ house.”
“That goes without saying.” Jason had been joking when he suggested otherwise. “We should work out a signal if I’m getting close to throwing you on the dinner table. Your parents don’t happen to have a car with a big backseat, do they?”
They hadn’t moved around from the door, so he felt the full force of her pump as she brought her right foot down on his. Hope couldn’t weigh more than a hundred and thirty pounds and the shoe wasn’t extremely pointy, which made it feel more like a little tap.
“You need to hurry up and go shopping for that car and find somewhere private we can use it so this little dream you have about it can be put to rest.”
Hope pushed him back as she put her keys into the purse. She usually carried everything in her pockets, but the dress didn’t have the luxury.
“I’m in no hurry to get through all my fantasies. There are so many that I’m looking forward to how many years it takes us to get through them all.”
“So you’re saying I need to buy stock in your preferred condoms now.”
They started walking down the hall to the car waiting for them in his designated garage. The Nacins lived within a mile, which was well within walking distance, but the sun was setting and it’d be long gone by the time dinner was over.
“I don’t know about all that. I’m hoping to have kids sometime soon and condoms make it kind of hard to do that.”
The goal for telling Hope that Jason saw them spending years doing anything was to reassure her after all the craziness with Kate. He’d spent part of the time in the barber’s chair thinking about what he’d do if an ex of Hope’s kept popping up trying to get back with her. There were no outcomes he’d come up with that didn’t leave the guy in a bloody mess. Hope was practically a saint for not knocking Kate out in her misguided quest.
“I know I’m not used to all this dating stuff, but is it normal to be talking about marriage and kids at this point?”
Jason opened the car door for Hope and waited for her to tuck herself in. He was trying to catch a glimpse of the underwear situation, but she moved too quickly.
“What’s the point of being normal?” Jason asked as he shut the door.
During their many hours spent in bed together, they’d done more than just explore each other’s bodies. Hope knew he’d waited years before asking Kate to marry him. After high school, he’d been busy trying to make a name for himself in the minors after being drafted in the fourth round.
They’d lived away from each other for about three years before he built up enough bulk and skill to play with the big boys. Jason had always assumed from the homecoming greetings he got that Kate was just sitting at home waiting for him, but that assumption was probably something that came back to bite him.
After a couple of years living together and making sure they wouldn’t kill each other, they finally got married.
The whole ordeal was a sad tale that would eventually make a great story if anyone ever wanted to write a biography of his ill-fated first marriage. Kate had already told her make-believe side of things to any reporter gullible enough to listen, so Jason wasn’t holding his breath for some book deal to come knocking, not that he really wanted to tell the story.
He got in the car and looked at the clock on the dash after he started it. They had about five minutes to get to where they were going, which was cutting it close, but doable.
“I’m pretty sure everyone knows that I’ve never been a follower of the normal concept, but I am a little worried about how fast things are moving.”
There was no blaming Hope for that worry. Her social and work lives had gone through some retooling in a very short amount of time. Jason hadn’t predicted the connection he’d felt when he asked her to call him. He’d thought there was something kindred about them, but he didn’t know simply talking to her and getting to know her more would open up feelings he thought were long dead.
“I don’t think it’s unreasonable to get married three or four months after you start dating someone. It’s not something that happens every day, but there are people who just know when what they have is right and go for it.”
When Jason had spoken with his lawyer about Kate showing up, he’d pushed for an update on the divorce. The update was, not surprisingly, there wasn’t one. Jason had worked closely with his lawyer to make sure over the months that Kate couldn’t find a way to proceed without Jason signing papers, but his delays wouldn’t help speed the process up.
With Kate showing up, Jason had been worried she could somehow put a hold on the divorce, but since he’d finally signed, they both had to agree to stop it from happening, and Jason had no plans of doing that. Even without the paper saying it was official, Jason felt like a free man, and with that freedom, he was making plans for his future.