“The universe really is fucking with us now,” I chuckle grimly. “Angela’s heading to New York for a couple of days to shoot those TV commercials.”
“Whoah.” Tessa’s face lights up, her smile stretching from ear to ear. “That’s crazy. Oh my God, do you think this could be her big break? This is so amazing. She’s worked so hard.”
My chest tightens at her emotion, flooding with her contagious happiness.
Despite all the messiness, I’m so damn relieved that my daughter has such a supportive friend.
“I need to charge my phone so I can call her,” she says. “I bet she’s been calling me like crazy.”
Her happy expression falters, a frown touching her lips.
“But this means we can’t tell her about us,” she says. “Not yet, at least.”
“I thought you’d be relieved?” I ask.
“Well, I don’t want to tell her. It’s going to hurt. It’s going to be awful. But you’re right. What’s the alternative?”
“We can’t tell her over the phone,” I say. “Especially not when she needs to focus on her work.”
A bitter voice inside roars at me that I’m making excuses, that this has nothing to do with my daughter and everything to do with my selfish need to be with my woman.
“Maybe the best thing would be for us to cool things off until she’s back,” Tessa murmurs, as though she’s reading my thoughts.
“Maybe.” I nod. “But I don’t know if I can.”
She makes an intoxicating whimpering noise, the sound driving deep inside of me, causing my stomach to twist and roar out in carnal need. I almost reach out and touch her, the same way I’ve been almost reaching out and touching her ever since we pulled up outside her house.
“No,” she says softly. “Neither do I. God, this is so messy.”
“On the upside,” I say, with a smirk to try and lighten the mood, “it looks like you’re free for dinner. Let me take you somewhere.”
She laughs, her eyes glistening with the suggestion of tears. But she’s not crying. It’s more like she could cry if she let herself cross that line, but she’s bravely holding herself back.
“In Youngstone? I think Mrs. Pennyworth would have a fit if she saw us on a date.”
“Who said it was a date?” I tease, chuckling.
She giggles and rolls her eyes playfully, the most captivating sight in the goddamn world. “I guess I just did.”
She stares at me with her just-Tessa mix of sassiness and shyness, a combination that will never stop driving me crazy.
“If it’s a date, you should be a good girl and wear what I tell you to,” I smirk.
“I’d love to,” she says, her voice twitching with seriousness now. “But how can we, Trent? Even if we go to the next town over, people might recognize us. There’s nowhere we can go in the whole of Maine where we can know, for sure, that we won’t be caught.”
The word caught hangs in the air like a bad odor.
“We’re not doing anything wrong,” I growl.
She stares hard at me, her lips trembling as if she can’t decide if I’m lying to her or lying to myself.
Rage spirals through me, but not rage aimed at my woman. I don’t think I could ever be angry at the future mother of my children.
The rage is aimed at the goddamn situation, the twisted combination of circumstances and emotion that led us here.
But even if there are uncertain things about what’s happening here, one thing I’m dead certain about is how I feel about my woman.
“I’ll take you someplace where it’ll just be the two of us,” I say firmly. “I don’t want any other man seeing how captivating you are in the dress I pick out for you, anyway.”
“Are you really going to choose my clothes?” she whimpers, and my little horny virgin can’t mask the lust shimmering beneath the words.
“Don’t act like you don’t want me to,” I smirk.
A flush spreads across her cheeks, betraying her desire.
“I do,” she admits. “But I don’t want you to be disappointed if I can’t… you know.”
I chuckle. “What a shy, little virgin you are. You don’t want me to be disappointed if you’re not ready to open those thick gorgeous thighs and take my throbbing hot dick. Is that what you’re trying to say, Tessa?”
She bites her lip, letting out a moaning noise that almost turns me feral.
“Yes,” she sighs after a long pause. “But I want it. I want it so bad. I’ve dreamt about it for so long. I’ve—”
She bites down, stilling her next words.
My smirk widens.
“You naughty girl,” I tease warmly. “You’ve touched yourself thinking about me?”
She fidgets in her seat, nodding in a way that makes me want to turn full savage, grabbing her and claiming her right here. I’d tear off her shirt with my teeth, exposing those voluptuous breasts, and then take her nipples in my mouth as I sat her in my lap and drove up inside of her.