Page 92 of Pieces of Me

“I don’t know,” I murmur, retaking his hand. “They’re just so accepting, you know?”

Holden’s silent a moment, and I wonder if he’s caught on to the fact that I’m not just talking about Benny. I’m talking about me. “Well, he kind of has to be,” Holden says. “Have you metme?”

I giggle into his arm.

“Shit, Jamie, before I met you, I was a major fuck-up.”

“What do you meanbeforeyou met me?”

He stops, dropping his gaze to mine. Eyes thinned and voice low, he says, “I should really put you over my knees and spank you.”

“You could always just…” I get up on my toes, put my mouth to his ear. “…fuck me.”

He pushes me away and brings me back just as fast. Then, arm around my shoulders, he leads us toward the Eastwood Nursery stall.

“I’m just saying… you haven’t really touched—”

“Hey, Maggie!” Holden cuts in. “How’s it going?”

I stifle my giggle because I don’t know what else to do. I’ve been here for a week now, and Holden seems to be avoiding any and all sexual contact. We sleep in the same bed every night, hethreatensme with the things hewantsto do to me, and yet… I’ve given him every opportunity, and he won’t so much as touch me inappropriately. Or, appropriately, in my case.

“…think they’re so cool with their fancy signs and their double space,” Maggie spits, glaring at nothing in particular.

“Who?” I ask.

“That bullshit franchise garden center in Justice. They stole half our business and think they can just show up here like… like…” She throws her hands in the air. “I should go kick over their plants.”

“Want me to?” I offer. It would be an excellent way to release all my pent-up sexual frustration. It’s either that or tie Holden down and sit on his face. Mmm…

“No, but thank you,” Maggie says, her shoulders deflating. “You know what we should do?” We should just set the whole place on fire.”

“I shouldnotbe hearing this,” Leo says from behind me, his arms full of snow cones in all different flavors.

“Ha ha!” Maggie exaggerates, shifting her eyes from side to side. “We’re kidding, Leo!”

“Leo’s a police officer,” Mia informs me.

“Really?”

I look up at Leo, and he nods, lifting his arms to offer me a snow cone. Mia and I help him unload the rest, and before he’s even had a taste of his, he shouts, “Ooh! Funnel cake!” And then he’s off again.

“My daddy likes food,” Benny tells me.

I look down at him. “He does, huh?”

Big, light brown eyes just like his mother’s blink, blink, blink up at me. “He says it’s because he has five brothers, and they all had to fight for food even though they always had plenty.”

“Five brothers? That sounds like a lot…”

Mia settles a hand on her son’s shoulder. “Imagine his excitement when he found out he had five other Uncle Holdens.”

We sit at a picnic table beneath some fairy lights and down snow cones and funnel cakes and whatever else Leo scored. “You know what I just realized?” Holden says around a mouthful of food. “Mia and Leo had their first date here.”

“We did?” Mia asks, her eyebrows bunched. Benny sits between his parents, living his best life with an array of sugar at his beck and call. He bounces in his seat, his head bopping to a song that’s playing only in his head.

Holden slips his hand beneath the table, settles it on my bare thigh.

Leo says, “Firstfakedate, but yeah.”

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