Page 62 of Challenged by the Single Dad

Justine shook her head and rolled her eyes. “You’re ridiculous.”

Chloe’s face was on fire.

“Your pink cheeks are telling us the truth, so you can remain as tight-lipped as you want,” Brooke teased. “But the fact of the matter is, you’ve got a crush on Dom.”

Chloe pulled in a deep breath through her nose. “Up until Halloween, he hated me. And, he’s my boss. And it would never work. We’re bothwaytoo broken. Something we realized on Halloween when we ran into each other on the beach. He was …” Did the women know what he went down to the beach to do? And was she ready to tell more people about Elliott? “Anyway, he was down there, and I was down there, and we talked. And although I don’t think he hates me anymore, neither of us are in a place in our lives to make a mistake like we did the other night.”

Oh shit.

Her hand slapped over her mouth and her eyes went wide.

“What mistake the other night? Like on the beach?” Vica probed. “Did you and Dom have sex on the beach?”

Excitement filled the women’s eyes.

Chloe emphatically shook her head, hating her blabbermouth. “No. Not on the beach.”

Crap. Crap. Crap.

Three women’s jaws nearly hit the floor.

She was never normally this bad at keeping a secret. What was wrong with her?

You finally have friends that you can trust. The dam has broken and there’s no stopping the information flood now.

Where were all the beavers when she needed them? Why couldn’t she locate any brain beavers to clog this broken dam and keep her secrets locked away once more?

Because it felt really freaking good to talk to people.

“But you did have sex,” Brooke pried. “When? Where?”

“I, uh …” Chloe glanced over her shoulder at the closed cabin door, as if Dom would suddenly materialize out of thin air and appear before them.

“The first time Clint and I had sex was on his couch. My feet and knees were all cut up and I’d just nearly drown in the ocean after someone tried to kill me. Sooo …” Brooke shrugged.

“The first time Bennett and I had sex was against a tree on the road in the middle of a run,” Justine said. “Athletic leggings are impossible to remove, by the way.”

“Middle of the night, making pasta, covered in flour on his kitchen flour.” Vica lifted one shoulder. “Wouldn’t change a thing.”

Chloe nibbled on her bottom lip. “On the bar. Like … the back counter area.”

Their eyes all went wide.

“It … it wasn’t like we planned it.”

All three of them snorted.

“It never is,” Brooke said with a chuckle.

Why wasn’t the ground opening up so Chloe could fall into the hole and be swallowed up with the mantle of her embarrassment wrapped around her, thick enough to cushion her fall?

“Let me guess, you also said you couldn’t do that again?” Vica asked.

Chloe’s mouth opened, but only a squeak came out at first. “W-we can’t. It was a huge mistake. And we both realized that. He’s myboss.”

Brooke scoffed. “I was in a rom-com movie about a billionaire boss and his assistant. Happens all the time.” She tapped her chin. “Though, in reality, I don’t think there are many billionaires out there that look like Axel Reyes. They’re all weathered, old, wrinkle farms with liver spots and gout.”

Justine and Vica both snorted.

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