“Of course. I might not have been as close with Cai as you and the others, but he was my friend, too.”
“Okay, I’d like that.”
Zara, seeming to realise that a sensitive topic was being discussed, said, “Daddy, can I have a hug?”
He glanced at her, and I saw the wave of gratitude in his gaze when he nodded profusely, “Yes, honey, come here.”
My throat thickened at the sight of our little girl with her small arms around Jace’s broad shoulders. She’d asked for a hug, but really, she knew her dad was the one who needed it.
“There. Hugs make everything better,” she announced when she finally let go, and Jace smiled at her with such love and affection it caused something in my heart to grow and expand. I adored how he looked at her, like he’d fight a thousand battles just to keep her safe.
We finished eating. Jace insisted on doing the dishes while I caught up on a few emails. I should’ve responded to them at the office, but the day had gotten away from me. My standing desk afforded me a view of Jace through the reflection in the window. He stood at the sink as he scrubbed a pan. I was oddly transfixed by the way his shoulder muscles moved under his T-shirt, the dark ink undulating on his forearms. Like always, my gaze wandered to my name inked onto the inside of his forearm. Every time I saw it, I wondered why he hadn’t had it removed or covered up, but with today’s revelation, I was beginning to understand. Jace hadn’t gotten over me yet. It should’ve made me sad or uncomfortable, but instead, it filled my belly with butterflies.
What did that say about me?
I forced myself to focus on the email I was composing and not on how sexy I found it that my ex-husband had just cooked us dinner and was currently tidying up.
“All done,” Jace announced a few minutes later after he put away the final dish. My kitchen was sparkling, and I wasn’t even surprised that a clean kitchen was an aphrodisiac for me. I’d always been a little obsessive about tidiness, though that was mainly because my mother would berate me if my room wasn’t perfect or if I had a hair out of place.
Honestly, the fact that my parents had never been able to stay put in one country had turned out to be a blessing in disguise. Even during the seven years they’d lived in Ireland, they’d travelled a lot. It was one of the reasons I’d spent so much time next door at Jace’s house, which was where I’d preferred tobe. Now having them live on another continent did wonders for my anxiety. I only had to deal with seeing them once a year.
“Thank you so much for dinner,” I said as I stood to walk him to the door.
His smile was soft. “It was my pleasure.”
As I reached forward to open the door for him, I miscalculated the space, and Jace ended up brushing past me, his chest briefly meeting mine. He shot me a small grin, and my focus went to his lip ring, wondering if it would still feel as good as it used to when he …
Okay, no more thinking about that.
“See you in the morning, Shannon,” he said, and with those parting words, he left.
That night, I slept deep and dreamed vividly. I rarely had sex dreams, but when I did, they were usually intense. And yes, they tended to feature Jace. I lay spread out naked on my bed, while Jace—also completely, distractingly naked—kissed his way down my stomach to my inner thighs. Sparks of pleasure lit me up while liquid heat encapsulated me from his hot, skilled mouth. Even in my dreams, he knew just the right places to press those lips to drive me wild.
With his head between my legs, he draped his thick, inked arm over my stomach in the most possessive fashion possible and asked, “Can I taste you?”
“Yes,” I breathed, and then his mouth was on me. The lip ring added just as much sensation as I remembered. His large hand reached up to caress my breast while his tongue licked maddeningly pleasurable circles over my clit.
“Jace,” I cried out, staring down at the illicit sight of him going down on me, and even though some distant part of my brain knew this wasn’t real, it was only a dream, itfeltreal. I felt like I was going to come so spectacularly that it was truly a pity it was all a conjuring of my horny, sex-starved imagination.
“Shannon,” I heard his deep, sexy voice utter my name, though it didn’t seem possible with his mouth on my clit.
“Shannon,” he said again, this time with more urgency. In fact, there was some kind of incessant beeping to go along with it, and I wished all the distractions would leave me alone so that I could focus on coming. His tongue increased its tempo, and I felt the impending release coil deliciously between my thighs. I was about to …
“Mam!”
Zara’s voice woke me with a start—just before what I imagined was about to be the dream orgasm of my life. I startled upright in bed, my alarm beeping loudly in my ears. When I turned it off, I saw it was almost thirty minutes past my usual wake-up time. Had my alarm been going for that long? The sex dream was so good I didn’t even hear it going off?
My bedroom door was suddenly opening, and Zara appeared. “Why are you still in bed?”
Just outside the room stood Jace, his expression darkening when he saw me sitting up in bed, the blankets tangled around me, no bra under my black, V-neck sleep shirt. I was too mortified to peer down and check if my headlights were flashing.
I mean, after that dream, they definitely were.
“I overslept. Thanks for waking me,” I said, giving her a quick kiss. “Now go wash up and brush your teeth.”
Zara skipped away to the bathroom, leaving me alone with Jace. What was he doing just standing there staring? Was my hair a crazy bird’s nest or something?
“Zara let me in. I was worried …” He paused, clearing his throat and looking away as he ran a hand over his face and swore under his breath. “She said your alarm was going off and that you weren’t answering when she called, so I came up to check you were all right.”
