Maybe he feels my eyes on him the way I sometimes feel his. A prickling awareness, like the brush of a hand over heated skin, a soft caress as every nerve ending stands at attention. Speaking of heated skin, I feel the flush rapidly spreading, now, the longer he holds my stare. His jaw flexes, and even from this distance, I can see the way those pale eyes darken with want.Need. My stomach always does a little flip when he looks at me like that, and this time is no different.
Then … he winks.
The bastard winks before turning back to the boys and speaking to them in low tones. I catch the tail end of his quip about still having some jump left in him, and then he’s jogging up the deck to join me while Matt and Alex resume throwing around the ball.
“Feeling a little warm, Sunshine?” he teases, as he takes the seat beside me with a smug tilt to his lips. He runs a finger along my jaw and down the line of my neck, no doubt tracing my lingering blush.
I make a humming noise in response, keeping my gaze averted and pulling a pleased chuckle from him before he settles back in his chair. We watch the boys in comfortable silence for a while before he lets out a deep and contented sigh.
“I’m almost at sixty points now,” he murmurs as I glance over at him, a faint smile tugging at his lips.
I huff out a laugh. “Good for you.”
There’s a long pause, and then he says, “Thank you.”
His voice cracks with emotion, causing my eyes to fly to his, only to find them shimmering with vulnerability and hope.
“Thank you,” he repeats, then clears his throat. “For today. I know it wasn’t easy for you, but I want you to know how much I appreciate this chance you’re giving me. I hope I haven’t let you down.”
“You haven’t,” I reply softly.
“So you still think it’s going well?”
“I do.”
38
Riley
Ido.
Her simple words settle around me in the falling dusk like a balm to my weary soul, the reassurance that I had, in fact, been making inroads with the boys, soothing my worries and causing a certainty to take root inside me. A conviction that thisiswhere I’m meant to be.
This is my family.
Myhome.
I reach over and take Steph’s hand, pulling it into my lap and making soothing circles over the back of her palm with my thumb. She inhales deeply, dropping her head back and letting her eyes fall closed before releasing the breath. A warm breeze ruffles her short hair, and with her head still tipped to the sky, I watch as a soft smile spreads across her face.
One hundred and fifty-seven.
The chirping of crickets and the occasional brotherly taunt are the only backdrop to our happiness as we sit there, basking together in the shared emotion.
When the boys tire of football, we move inside, and I present them with the banana cream pie my mother had eagerly helped me with this morning. I tell them about Connor going toe-to-toe with a raccoon in the backyard a few nights ago, and how I nearly had a heart attack thinking he’d be killed, only to have him return to the back door victorious, having chased it up a tree while I’d been rushing inside for a broom to use to break up the fight.
“He seems cute,” Alex says, while Steph sits wide-eyed, having just heard that story for the first time. It had happened right before I’d left for work, and I’d had to close, so our nightly phone call had been brief, and I must’ve neglected to mention it to her later.
“He is,” she agrees. “But don’t mess with him.”
“Clearly,” Alex observes, and I nod, feeling oddly proud of my little terror—I meanterrier.
“He’s smallbut mighty.”
“Big dick energy for sure,” Matt says, causing Alex to dissolve into cackles while Steph shoots him a disapproving look.
“Will you bring him over next time you come?” Alex asks, and I grin at the acknowledgement from him that there will be a next time.
“Actually, I was thinking I’d come back in the morning and get to work on your yard, so I could bring him along then. He’ll happily patrol for squirrels.”
