Page 8 of Shielding Soledad

Everything good between us came back to me in an instant. I ran my tongue along her lush lower lip, teasing her to open for me. Before she did, I felt her hands on my chest, stroking over my pecs. I nearly moaned with desire but instead poured my energy into the kiss when her mouth opened for me and her tongue tangled with mine.

With my hands low on her waist, bringing her closer to me, I changed the angle of our kiss, deepening it and wanting more. She gave in, meeting my tongue stroke for stroke, and I felt her soften in my arms. I was lost to the sensation until something squeezed between us. Frankie. With a gasp of surprise, Soledad pushed back, putting distance between us. Her head was tipped down, looking at the dog, so I couldn’t read her expression, but we were both panting. The desire wasn’t all on my side. The kiss had made that clear. But desire didn’t mean a damn thing if she wasn’t willing to act on it anymore.

“I…uh…need to get a shower,” she said as she sidestepped me and went into the house without a backward glance.

My heart was hammering, and my dick had gone hard. I needed a shower, too, an ice-cold one.

4

SOLEDAD

Itossed the novel aside, planning not to pick it up again. Its quality wasn’t the problem—I’d enjoyed every minute of the romance set in Ireland, with its quirky heroine whose family owned a hot-air balloon company and gave rides along the Irish coast. The hero was a wealthy American, pursuing his Irish roots as industriously as he pursued the woman he loved. She resisted his overtures until halfway through the book, and then on a rainy day in a remote cottage… That was the point where I had started wishing I’d picked a different book.

I pushed out a breath and added “sultry and hot” to the review I was writing for my blog. It had been tough getting through the passionate love scenes. More than once while I read, my mind had wandered to Alex and what it was like to share a bed with him. Fantastic, sensual, intimate. All that and more. His energy, though dark at times, had translated to some amazing sex. I missed that. And this novel hadn’t helped my state of mind.

I put the book in the nightstand drawer and slammed it shut as though containing it would contain my own desires.

“The mystery next,” I said aloud. “No more romance.”

I shivered at the thought of reading the suspense novel. It wasn’t really my thing, partly because it played to my worst fear—one I’d had multiple vivid nightmares about over the years. As much as I loved the beauty of hot-air balloons, I had never ridden in one, nor did I plan to—not when I had such a deep fear of heights. From what I’d read, at one point in the mystery the murderer tossed his victim from a balloon’s basket mid-flight. I didn’t like to see violence and tragedy associated with my favorite thing, but it was better than the desire for Alex that the romance had inspired.

Okay, so maybe it wasn’t just the romance novel. Maybe it was the scintillating kiss on the back porch. I’d spent that night and the next days replaying the memory. In the months he’d been gone, I wondered if the chemistry we shared had become exaggerated in my mind. Now I had the answer. No, it had not. He was as amazing as I remembered. His lips, his tongue, the way his hands had felt on my body. My temperature was rising by the second, so I thought of the chilly breeze blowing between us.

Since that afternoon, Alex had been aloof, coldly businesslike. We had spoken in regard to Luke’s care and nothing more. If anything, Alex had avoided being in the same room with me. It seemed as though he didn’t want to come too near me lest he make the mistake of kissing me again. My mind understood his reaction and actually saw the sense in it, even if my heart didn’t. He was trying not to complicate our arrangement any further. We had agreed to co-parent Luke and nothing more, a fact he’d made clear from the beginning.

“So why did he start that spectacular kiss?” I asked the ceiling of my room.

It didn’t matter. And I couldn’t be surprised at the situation, I acknowledged with a wince. Perhaps I was succumbing to the family curse after all, the one that doomed all the women on my mother’s side of the family to make terrible decisions about the men they became involved with—men who inevitably abandoned them. My mother’s situation was a prime example. She had fallen in love with a man from Spain while he was working for a US-based company. I suppose it was to his credit that he didn’t run as soon as he found out she was pregnant—but I can’t really give him credit for much more than that. By the time I was one, he was out of our life.

I thought of my mother’s explanation from when I was a teenager. “It’s what the women in our family do. We fall too fast and too hard in love, always with the wrong man. It’s been happening for generations, and not one of us did differently. If that isn’t some type of curse, I don’t know what is. I can only hope it doesn’t touch you, but…” My mother had trailed off with a shrug, as if suggesting it was unavoidable. It wasn’t the most optimistic thing to tell a sixteen-year-old, but the Hayes women were always forthright.

In my teenage wisdom, I had laughed at the idea, but my perspective had changed over the years. I’d learned not to expect much from men and adopted the strategy of having fun but not letting my heart be touched. I’d violated that almost immediately with Alex. He’d touched my heart much more than I’d ever admitted. With him, for the first time in my life, I let myself consider having a real commitment—maybe settling down, starting a family. It had taken every bit of courage I had to talk to him about how I felt, to tell him that I wanted a real relationship…which had only made our breakup worse. Even though I was the one who had walked out, his rejection of the idea of making our relationship more serious had felt like an abandonment. And then, when I’d realized I was pregnant with his child, I felt like I should have known it would happen. Of course I’d end up with a child to raise on my own. That was how it was always meant to go.

I fought to resist the urge to give in to negativity. My life wasn’t bad. Alex and I shared a beautiful baby boy. Our situation was just complicated. I groaned at the understatement.

Downstairs, the front door opened and closed, and I heard the jingle of Frankie’s leash. The dog and Alex were back from their daily walk. I knew I should be grateful for how easily Alex had accepted being a father and having a dog. Aside from that kiss, we’d fallen into a predictable pattern of behavior despite being a rather haphazard family of four.

I headed down the stairs to greet them both. As soon as Frankie spotted me, she dashed over, expecting attention. I willingly rubbed her ears. When Frankie sprawled on her back, silently begging me to scratch her belly, I dropped to my knees to give her what she wanted.

“You’re never that happy to see me,” Alex commented, forcing me to look up. He was grinning, teasing me. He’d avoided that since the kiss. What was up today?

“I’m just returning Frankie’s happiness at seeing me,” I said, keeping my tone light but knowing that Alex would get my implication. He’d failed to recognize me except in the most perfunctory way for days. He couldn’t expect me to ignore that.

Alex cocked his head to the side and seemed to deliberate over a response. Would he engage with me or clam up? I waited, not surprised when he chose the latter. His unwillingness to talk about or express emotions and affection had been the main source of our relationship issues. We’d had some fundamental misunderstandings. The only comfort I could find in the moment was that he didn’t stalk off as he might have a year before.

There was no point in getting upset about it, I reminded myself. I understood his character, and it was my own fault that I hadn’t worked hard enough to guard myself against my feelings for him in the past. I had to avoid making that mistake again.

“I’m glad you’ve been taking Frankie for long walks. It’s good for her,” I said. Alex’s eyes flared like blue-hot flames, and I realized my error. He thought I was keeping tabs on him, trying to control him. I wasn’t. I just noticed where he was and what he was doing, even if I didn’t want to. I was attuned to him. There, I admitted it. Damn it.

“I’ve been trying to keep fit, and Frankie enjoys the exercise,” he said, crossing his arms over his chest.

I doubted walking a small dog would help a Navy SEAL maintain his level of fitness. But Alex hadn’t lost any muscle tone, from what I’d noticed. He was outstandingly—make that deliciously—fit. Those observations I kept to myself. What Alex did to work out was his business. I didn’t expect him to open up to me, but it was difficult not to notice things when we shared a home and responsibility for a child.

So, yes, I’d noticed things. Like when he took Frankie out for nearly an hour at a time. Like the two recent late-night phone calls he’d taken, speaking in hushed tones. He could have a girlfriend for all I knew. And he’d have every right to, I told myself, despite the jealousy that sparked in me at the idea. We were broken up. Living together didn’t change that. He wasn’t mine in any way other than as the father of my child.

Which should count for something. Shouldn’t it?

But had it mattered to my father? He’d returned to Spain, and I’d never once heard from him, not a birthday card or Christmas gift. Nothing. I supposed I was lucky that Alex wanted to have a role in Luke’s life.

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