Page 65 of Home Field Advantage
CAN YOU SHOW ME?
Poppy
I’ve been braiding hair since I was little, whether it was mine or Lily’s. However, sitting next to Dallas and teachinghimhow to braid his daughter’s hair is making me forget every single step.
I want to be so pissed at Lily for pulling this stunt and not driving me home. Not too long ago, she did the same thing with Blair when she asked Griffin to drive her home since he also lived next door to her. Her mission was to successfully bring them closer.
I knew that was her motive.
And it worked.
I’m in Dallas’s house.
I read Sage a bedtime story, and now I’m sitting here braiding hair.
Disrupting my nighttime routine should stress me out at the moment, but strangely, it doesn’t. I feel calm around Dallas, despite how my body reacts around him. His touch is gentle and soft, yet it sends shivers down my spine. His voice is reassuring, yet hot. With every smile, laugh, or touch, my stomach flips,making my breath catch in my throat, leaving me unable to form sentences.
There’s so much I want to say to keep him at arm’s length.
I’ve never felt a pull to open up to a man before, but it makes me want to lay it all out there. Let him decide if getting involved with me and my overthinking brain would even be worth it to him.
I release a breath and take a seat next to him. He now sits behind Sage with her hair in his hands.
“Like I mentioned, you’re going to divide the hair into three sections. Then you cross one of the outside sections over the middle.”
“Like this?” he asks as he does it.
“Yep. Now that’s your new middle. Then you’ll cross the opposite outside section over your new middle.”
“Criss-cross-applesauce,” Sage singsongs.
He smiles at her as he tries to do it, but loses his grip on a section. I reach over his forearms to hold the piece. With my eyes fixed on the back of Sage’s head, I can sense the shift in Dallas’s gaze. He’s no longer looking down; all his attention is on my face. I don’t need to turn my head to know; my body can feel it.
“Can you show me?” Dallas says. “Like, guide my hands where they need to? Because this is where I always screw it up.”
Lifting my head to look him in the eyes, I’m stunned silent when I realize he’s mere inches from my face. I can feel his breath on my skin. His eyes dip down to my lips as my mouth parts, ready to say something,anything. His tongue swipes across his bottom lip, and that does it. A strange and new sensation floats to the sensitive spot between my legs.
What kind of power does Dallas Westbrook possess that he can make me feel this way with just one look?
“Yeah.” I swallow. “I can show you.”
He tips his head over my shoulder, grazing the shell of my ear. “Thank you,” he whispers, even though we haven’t even so much as formed a braid in Sage’s hair yet.
With his large hands under my small ones, I don’t say anything as I guide them where they need to go. One section over the other, before grabbing the other section and putting it over that one, repeating the pattern under a loose braid that forms in her hair. It’s not the best, but it’s also not the worst I’ve seen for someone’s first time doing it.
Taking my hands away, my body already misses the heat of his skin. “Then, when you reach the bottom of the braid, you take the hair tie and secure it at the bottom.”
“And that’s it?”
I nod. “Yep. You did it.”
“He did it?” Sage reaches behind her, blindly feeling the braid in the back of her head. “It’s perfection!” Dallas grins down at Sage as she stands, putting herself between his legs and wrapping her arms tightly around his neck. “I love it so, so much. And I love you, Daddy.”
I watch intently at this intimate moment between them. Dallas’s arms visibly tighten around Sage with her words as if they were words he’d wanted to hear her whole life.
“Okay. Now it’s time for bed, Sage.”
Sage holds up a pointer finger. “Wait, one more thing,” she says, before shuffling around the little drawing table on her desk.
