Total pages in book: 68
Estimated words: 64337 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 322(@200wpm)___ 257(@250wpm)___ 214(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 64337 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 322(@200wpm)___ 257(@250wpm)___ 214(@300wpm)
My parents had three children by my age, and I’m not the least bit worried about dating a guy in his early forties or becoming a stepmom if things get serious between us. I adore Sprout, Seven’s eight-year-old daughter, and she feels the same way about me.
Hell, if it weren’t her night to hang out with her grandma, I would have invited her to the party.
Sprout knows how to have a good time, and watching her dance to music she can finally hear—instead of just feeling the beat in her body—is magical. Sometimes, I’ll look over at her, wiggling to whatever she put on the jukebox at her grandma’s bar, and get choked up watching her spin in giddy circles. She loves music so much, the same way I loved art as a kid. It speaks to her sweet, sassy soul, and I’m so thrilled to have played even a small part in making her surgery possible.
I would shave my head every month for the rest of my life to watch that kid shimmy to Me and Julio Down by the Schoolyard, no matter what my parents had to say about it.
And I would gladly skip having biological children for a chance at forever with Seven.
He’s made it clear he doesn’t want any more kids. It’s one of the ways he tries to scare me away, by sharing the news that he’s had a vasectomy with alarming frequency whenever I happen to be present.
But I’m not scared. Hearing he’s shooting blanks just makes me excited about all the fucking without condoms we could do if he’d just open his eyes and see how perfect we’d be together. We both love tattoos, hitting the gym, and riding motorcycles. We share a passion for the outdoors and spontaneous adventures, and I make him laugh more than anyone in the world, even Sprout.
Seeing Seven’s ruggedly handsome, occasionally menacing-looking face split into a big grin that I put on his lips is one of my favorite things in the world. He goes from dangerously handsome to wickedly cute in the blink of an eye, and his laugh warms me to the marrow of my bones.
It also turns me on.
Every time he laughs, my nipples get hard, which is part of the reason I ripped the padding out of this bra.
In the event that he showed up tonight, I wanted him to see what he does to me. I have reached the “shameless showcasing of nipples” stage of my crush on this man, which is probably a sign that I should step back and take a hard look at my life choices.
Do I really want to spend another year lusting after a guy who calls me “kid” and ruffles my hair like I’m his little sister? Do I want to spend another night at his place, grilling burgers and playing board games while falling even harder for Seven and Sprout, only to be tucked into the guest room alone when I’m too tired to drive home?
Do I really want to run into him in town on another one of his blind dates? Those blind dates that have gone nowhere so far, but will inevitably lead to Seven finding a girlfriend and having less time to spend with his “buddies,” of which I am considered one?
A buddy.
Blargh! I don’t want to be his buddy. I want to be his sex goddess, the object of his fascination, his heart’s desire. I want him to lie awake thinking of me the way I lie awake thinking of him, or at least be unable to resist an invitation to come party with me.
So maybe…
Maybe I should go dance with one of the few single men I’m not related to and consider expanding my horizons. Maybe I’ve finally met a human even more committed to stubbornly sticking to his guns than I am.
I’m about to tell Wendy Ann that we should both head up to the tent and have some fun—let any would-be diners crash the party if they want—when I hear it…the rumble of a motorcycle.
Heart leaping into my throat, my nervous system lights up like Times Square on New Year’s Eve. The hairs lift at the back of my neck, my lips start to buzz, and suddenly, it’s all I can do not to break into a victory dance in the middle of the drive.
Because I would know that softly-purring engine anywhere.
That’s Seven’s vintage, two-tone Chief, the one I helped him rebuild last summer, while obsessing about how sexy he looked with sweat running down into the neck of his white cotton t-shirt as we toiled in his garage.
He’s here! He came!
We’re about to spend our first Sprout-free evening together since the night we guarded her chickens from a particularly determined fox in his backyard last spring. Since the night he ran his fingers over my face, told me I was beautiful, and came so close to kissing me that I would have sworn he felt the potential simmering between us, too.