Page 42 of Tempt

“It’s because you’re carrying my kid and peanut butter rules,” Landon declared, kissing her cheek and then snatching a cookie for himself.

“I am so ready to be unpregnant,” she grumbles. “I miss tying my own shoes and painting my own toes. Landon gets more on my skin than that actual nail.”

“Hey,” He hollers back over his shoulder. “I’m good at painting shit.”

“Houses hun, maybe, but definitely not toes.”

I’ve recently learned that the two of them started out avoiding one another, for two different reasons. Landon thought Chloe was too young for him and that her cousins would kill him because he was always a bit of a bachelor sowing his wild oats so to speak. Chloe had a thing for him and misheard something he said taking it the wrong way, and embarrassment had her hiding whenever he was around. Yet, now here they are married with a baby on the way. And he looks at her like she is the only one in the room. It’s an incredible thing to witness. In fact every single couple seems so in tune with the other.

Suddenly I am wrapped in a strong set of arms and pulled back into a hard chest. “What are you daydreaming about?”

“Nothing,” no way was I going to tell him that I was jealous of what everyone else had. He’d think I wasn’t happy with what we have and that is a lie. In fact, I’m a zero to sixty kind of girl. I am ready for it all with Garrett, because he is the kind of guy that sticks. He’s strong and confident, but raised to respect women and commitment, he is surrounded by loyal people, and those values have sunk in, grabbed hold and become a huge part of who he is.

Garrett is a good man.

“Thank you for inviting me,” I turn my head just enough to kiss his jaw and when I start to shift back he cups my jaw and holds me in place.

“I waited a long time for this,” his voice is low as he holds my gaze.

“For what?” I ask, my heart racing from the intimate way Garrett holds me close.

“For you,” he replies, then brings his mouth closer and presses his lips to mine.

Like I said, a really good man.

CHAPTERTWENTY-FIVE

Garrett

“So tell me about Kyra,”Granny Ann sits down at the table across from me and slides a plate of homemade banana bread sliced into single serving toward me. I smile, sliding one off the plate and onto the napkin before me. It’s always been the same with my mother’s mom, she has this thing where she sets us down, Mike and I and feeds us while picking away at the edges and getting us to tell all. Whether it be confessing our newest sins or telling her all about our greatest obsessions, you can’t deny Granny what she asks for.

She has that sweet look about her that has you rambling on before you know it and she knows every last detail of your life, the good and the bad, within minutes.

It’s weird how it's impossible to outwit Granny.

“Your momma says she is a sweet and sassy little lady, with the prettiest eyes.”

“Kyra’s eyes are something,” somehow it felt wrong to tell my granny that Kyra’s eyes make me lose my mind and any sense of control. Those damn eyes of hers have captured me from day one. Now more than ever I could stare into her turquoise eyes and see the rest of my life.

“And the rest of her?”

I chuckle when I find my innocent little Granny waggles her brows at me as if she can hear every dirty little thought I’ve ever had about my girl.

“The rest of her is pretty damn great too,” I hurry to place a piece of bread into my mouth because I’m afraid I’ll say something I can’t take back. But instead of saying anything she silently waits while I chew.

When I glance up to find her smiling at me knowingly I feel like some type of cork is unplugged and before I know it I am telling her everything.

“I’ve sat back for years, waiting for my chance. I know I wasted too much time, and I missed years of memories with her. The waiting, the wondering it was all for nothing. All I can think about is had I said something instead of sitting on the sidelines waiting for her to make the first move, then we’d be where Mike and Maddison are by now. But the things I feel for Kyra sometimes I wonder if I’m moving too fast. I wonder if I’ll scare the hell out of her if I said them out loud. Would she think I’m crazy?”

I take another bite, allowing my thoughts to consume me.

“But when I’m with her, it’s the greatest feeling. I forget so easily that things with us are new, because I feel like she has always been mine.”

When I find Granny smiling at me like everything I told her she already knew, I chuckle.

“There has got to be some kind of magic cooked into these things,” I hold up the small piece of remaining bread. “It’s like one bite and all ability to keep a secret flies right out the window.”

“You boys have never been able to keep a secret from me.”

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