Page 40

CHAPTER

EIGHTEEN

DEAN

I find a movie playing on cable that I think we’ll both like, but I mute the damn thing a moment after finding it, in favor of listening to Clara June sing Archie to sleep.

A warmth spreads through my chest as she sings lines from Johnny Cash, promising to love forever. It’s a song about a man and woman, Walk The Line , but it works just as well for a bedtime song, too. I love that she sings it so well, that it’s Archie’s favorite, too.

When she comes out again, her white sundress smeared mid-thigh with blue ice cream from Archie’s hands, she looks so goddamn gorgeous that I actually struggle to catch my breath for a moment.

And thank god I tucked myself away before I came inside, else I’d be fighting a damn steel beam for her attention right about now.

“He’s out,” she says, tucking a leg beneath her as she takes a spot next to me on the couch. “That was really sweet of you to grab that peach tree and plant it with him.” Her eyes twinkle against the reflection of the TV. “That was really very sweet, Coach Dean.”

I can’t help but smirk. I love hearing her call me Coach Dean.

I can’t help but envision coaxing orgasm after orgasm out of her, saying, “ C’mon now baby, give coach another, I know you can.

” Makes me harder than I already am just entertaining the fantasy for a split second, and because I refuse to be anything but a gentleman, I knock that out of my brain quickly.

“He had fun. And I hope it gets Mrs. Salinger off your back.” I scratch the back of my head as I glance at the movie playing on cable.

It’s black and white. Marilyn Monroe. How to Marry A Millionaire , maybe.

I don’t know. The secrets of the JFK assassination could be playing and I wouldn’t care.

Not with Clara June sitting so close to me, the lights low, my heart racing—she’s all I can focus on. All I can think about.

“It should continue to fruit but if it doesn’t, gimme a call and I’ll bring over some fertilizer,” I tell her as my hand slips from my thigh to the cushion, inching toward her knee.

When my fingertips finally graze her, she looks down, and for a moment we both watch as my palm slips comfortably over the curve of her knee.

I bring our gazes back together, and stroke my finger and thumb along my mustache. “Archie’s quite the conversationalist.”

Her eyes widen. “Oh lord. What did he say?”

My hand can’t sit still on her leg, so I start making small, gentle strokes, exploring her bare skin. Thank God for white sundresses. “He played outside today, at his auntie’s house.”

She nods, looking relieved. “Yeah,” she says, pulling at the end of her lashes as she sinks closer to me on the couch, her elbow now resting nearly on top of my shoulder. “I went to my friend Jackie’s house. She’s in IT. She lives close, off of Birch.”

“So not your actual sister or your ex-husband’s sister?” I ask, wanting to know more about her even though she and I have already swapped family trees.

Clara June shakes her head, dropping her hand to the top of my shoulder, tracing the seam of my shirt. My cock is rock hard, and I think this is the moment, right here. The moment I know that I have it bad for Clara June Colt, and that I’d likely stop at nothing to have her.

I wish it was watching her laugh because she’s got a great, sexy, soft laugh.

I wish it was watching her with one of her sons, being the amazing mother that she is.

I wish it was during Tanner's hospital stay, when she was a rock for him and her other sons.

But it’s here, on the couch, the ends of her fingers playing lightly with the seam of my old Carhartt long sleeve t-shirt, me smelling like potting soil and California sun, an old movie on, her body slowly melting against mine.

She’s so beautiful that watching her makes my chest tight, makes my mind race with all the things I now know that I absolutely cannot live without.

Her. A family. A household to look after. Love, so much love that I can’t possibly spend another day feeling lonely. Happiness, in the traditional sense, that doesn’t come from a football field or a can of beer.

“No siblings. And Troy, the boys’ father, was an only child, too.” She looks up from where she was watching her fingers play on my shoulder. “The boys call her Auntie because they’ve known her like an aunt since they were born. She’s been there for me, through it all.”

I nod. “I’d love to meet her.”

Our eyes hold. She knows what I mean. I do want to meet Jackie, but it’s not about Jackie. It’s about meeting someone so important to her, and someone important to the boys, too.

“That would be nice,” she says slowly, drawing out her response not because she isn’t sure.

I think she pulls each word apart like taffy because she’s surprised.

Surprised that I’m moving this quickly when we said slowly?

I don’t know. I want to move slowly, but when she’s next to me like this, it’s hard.

I’m wrestling my brain, and maybe a few other vital organs.

“Archie also told me that I fixed your box.” I suck in my cheeks to prevent an eruption of laughter or a smirk the size of Texas.

Her eyes widen.

I laugh just a little. “So he wasn’t referring to your washing machine?”

She hides her face in her hands and shakes her head, leaning back from me, shirking away as embarrassment eats her up.

I don’t even know the context, but it’s gotta be good if she’s this embarrassed.

“Oh Jesus Christ,” she mewls, shaking her head as I laugh, hooking my palm around her thigh to keep her from getting away.

“Don’t bring him into this,” I tease. “Unless he can shed some light onto how I fixed your broken box?”

“Oh, Dean, stop,” she begs, her face beet red, visible even in the low light.

I tug her hands away from her face, and dip my head close, pressing my lips to hers.

She isn’t expecting the kiss, but when her hands slide over my cheeks and her thumbs stroke the ends of my mustache, I know she’s glad I kissed her.

When I pull back, she’s staring down at my mouth, and I kiss her again, getting her full attention. I pull her into my lap, her knees on either side of my hips, groins fully aligned. I’m tucked, because at my size, tucking is the only way to avoid awkwardness.

Her nipples poke through the thin fabric of her dress, and with the lights flickering at her back, she looks like some sort of noir angel. I grip her hips, sinking my thumbs into her flesh beneath her dress. My cock is so painfully hard, in a way I haven’t been in years.

“Now Miss Clara June, how about you tell me just how I fixed your box.”

I’ll cry big ugly man tears if this box thing isn’t a euphemism for her cunt. I realize Archie had no clue what portion of adult conversation he’d overheard and repeated, but so help me if this is about her washing machine, I may actually start sobbing.

“I’m embarrassed,” she admits, then flattens her palms against my chest, thumbs stroking over where my nipples are.

I’m not sure if she knows it, but it feels good, and I already feel too good.

Too close to the edge, like a breathless tightrope walker making those last bold steps.

You could reach a great victory, or tumble incredible heights .

I feel like gambling.

I grip her wrists.

“Don’t be embarrassed.”

She nods, looking at where I render her motionless, my thumbs now softly tracing circles on the insides of her wrists. “For the last few years, and even the last year or so with Troy, I was… I couldn’t…” she shakes her head, and moves to cover her face, but I don’t release my hold on her wrists.

“Shh,” I soothe. “You don’t have to hide your face from me. And you don’t have any reason to feel embarrassed, either.” I lean forward off the couch and dip my face toward hers, stealing another kiss, this time letting our tongues slide together for a hot moment. “C’mon Mama, open up.”

We both know I’m asking about something specific, but the impact of my words feather between us, testing my tuck job.

She licks her lips. “I was unable to have an orgasm for the last six years.”

I haven’t touched her yet. I haven’t pressed my lips to her cunt and stroked her clit with my tongue, I have yet to slip my hand under her panties on a lazy Saturday morning to make her moan, I haven’t worked myself inside of her and left her dripping and dazed.

“I thought I was broken,” she adds, slowly allowing her eyes to find mine again. She’s nervous and embarrassed, but she doesn’t need to feel either. “I thought I was broken, and for a while I wondered if that was why Troy left. Because I couldn’t, you know, come .”

The way she purrs that sexy word.

I suppose this is what I thought we were talking about.

Her box being a metaphor. And when Archie told me that Clara June told Jackie I’d fixed her broken box, I thought that too was a metaphor.

Maybe her box was symbolic for her heart?

I don’t know. I was just so eager to banter with her about it, and watch her cheeks get red, and that adorable little smile to curve those sweet lips of hers.

I crash my mouth to hers, and I know I don’t have the full story, that she has more to say, and there’s so much more for me to hear.

But hearing Clara June say the word come has scrambled my brain a little.

It feels like I’m fourteen and a girl grazed my crotch on the bus or something.

I’m wild for her, but exercise restraint, breaking the kiss to pull back.

“You are not broken,” I assure her.

She smiles, but the shyness still lingers in her cheeks, the apples pink. “I know that now… because of you.”

My brows furrow, and my dick is painfully hard.