Page 24 of Playing With Fire
“I was, um,” her voice carries me back to the present, “trying to spice things up,” she explains before her brows crease and she looks like she’s confused about why she just said that. The fact that she even has totryto get her husband to notice her pisses me right the hell off becauseIcan’t get her out of my damn head.
“Your husband’s a blind fucking moron if he’s not devouring you like the last supper every goddamn night.” The anger in my voice makes me check myself. Pinching the bridge of my nose, I offer an apology. “I’m sorry. It’s not my place to comment on that.”Especially while the man’s child is asleep on my chest and his wife is sitting beside me in her bikini.
Shannon pulls her knees to her chest and wraps her arms around them.
“It may make me a terrible person, but it helps knowing you think that,” she admits. “Like maybe the problem isn’t me.” She wrinkles her nose. “That’s awful, isn’t it?”
Having ripped the Band-Aid off already, and desperate to touch her again, I place my fingers under her chin and turn her face toward me once more.
“No. What’s awful is that he’s made you so lonely you’re out here with me instead of wrapped in his arms. Not that I’m complaining,” I add hastily.
“Greg works hard to provide for us. I know that. I have a life most women would kill for.”
“But is it a lifeyouwould kill for? Is it the lifeyouwant?” I ask, no mercy in my tone.
“I love my husband. And I love my daughter,” she says, growing defensive.
“That’s not what I asked,” I reply in a whisper, my eyes not leaving hers.
I need to slow the hell down. The energy flowing between us is addicting, but just like drugs that cause you to make stupiddecisions, it’s inching us closer to making those same bad decisions as well.
I need to give this woman’s child back to her and get my ass out of this chair. I need to go home, jack off in a cold shower, and try to switch routes at work.
The thought leaves me nauseated. I can’t fathom putting someone else on her route. How will I know if she’s okay? Not to mention the bigger issue, which is that Monica just told me that because of the notoriety of the case she’s on, she can expect longer hours. So, for the foreseeable future, I’m the only person that can get Cam and Ally from daycare before they close.
Fuck, I’m in too deep and I don’t even know how I got here so fucking fast.
“It’s a life I should be grateful for,” she finally says in a small voice.
“Not if it leaves you empty and chasing desire elsewhere.”
Her lips part on a gasp at my words and she stands, like she’s starting to feel caged. I stay seated, calmly cradling her sleeping daughter. I don’t feel the need to beat around the bush.
Although we shouldn’t, it’s clear we both feel something. I haven’t been able to take my eyes off her body or the anguish in her eyes since I saw her sitting in the sand. And the way she’s looking at me now tells me if we were two strangers who just met and had no baggage, she’d agree to come back to my place before I could even ask the question.
Her eyes roam over my shoulders and pecs for the hundredth time. I can easily tell when they trail lower over my abs, and fuck if it doesn’t make me harder when her breathing hitches as they land on my lap.
It feels strange to be getting a hard-on for her with her daughter’s tiny fingernails digging into my chest, but mydick gives zero fucks about the infant clinging to me. Guess I was wrong when I thought kids were an instant boner-killer.
Based on this conversation though, Shannon’s dealing with enough. I should be the stronger one. I should walk away. I’ve said too much as it is.
I stand and begin to peel the sweet child off of me and hand her to her mother, finally finding some fucking decency and a moral or two.
“I should go.”
Serafina starts to fuss and Shannon reaches for her before looking around at all the toys spread out. The mess to clean up is daunting.
“I’ll help you pack up before I take off,” I tell her.
“You really don’t have to do that. I always do it alone.” She sounds so broken when she says it this time, like she’s disappointed that I’m leaving. I have a feeling that she’s getting just as much from our clandestine interactions as I am.
“You shouldn’t have to,” I remind her gently.
She flashes me a sad, but grateful smile as I start folding the blanket and breaking down the tent.
When it’s all packed up, I grab the handle of the wagon prepared to follow her to her car, but she moves to take it from me.
“I’ve got it. People might get the wrong idea.”
