“It’s not over yet. She left me on a terrible cliffhanger.”
“What was it?”
“Princess Minnie’s cat, Tigger, ran up a tree, and she needs to ask Rex the Ogre for help to get the cat down, but she’s scared of him.” Dex lowered his head to my chest and kissed by breast, my collarbone, my throat.
“She doesn’t know him,” I said. “I’m sure he’s not that scary once she gets past his hideous, grotesque appearance.”
He bit my shoulder for that. “I asked if the ogre was really a prince in disguise.”
“And is he?”
“Nope. He’s really an ogre.” He kissed his way across my collarbone.
“Well, you know, princes are overrated.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah. They’re handsome and rich, but they know it. They don’t even have to work to get the girl—girls are lining up at the castle door for them. But an ogre . . . an ogre has to woo his lady.”
He picked his head up. “Woo his lady? That sounds hard.”
“It is.” I wrapped my legs around him. “But you’re doing a good job so far. Don’t stop.”
I woke up with Dex’s naked body curled around mine, his arm wrapped around my waist, strong and solid. It was still dark, but I had no idea what time it was—I didn’t even want to look. Inhaling deeply, I let the scent of him swim around in my head, reluctant to move.
Again, I had second thoughts about leaving. Maybe we could have made this work. Despite the age gap, we were good together. I loved that he was gruff on the surface but had a soft side he kept hidden. I understood that—no one wants the world to see their weak spots or scars.
Although I’d shown him mine, hadn’t I?
Which was funny, really. I’d never even told Merrick about the monsters under my bed, or my mother abandoning us, or my fear of being unlovable. But something about Dex made me want to be vulnerable with him. I felt safe and—
A tiny frisson of worry snuck up my spine.
Gently disentangling myself from his embrace, I sat up and swung my legs over the side of the bed.
“You leaving?” Dex’s voice was raw with sleep.
“Yeah. I should go home. I have to be at work early. My alarm is set.” Moving tentatively across the room, I felt around on the floor for my bra, finding it over by his dresser. Once it was hooked, I turned around, surprised to see him getting out of bed. “Dex, don’t get up.”
He said nothing, just pulled open a drawer and tugged on some sweats.
“Guess I left my clothes downstairs.”
He laughed. “Wait here. I’ll get them.”
A few minutes later, he walked me across the driveway in the dark to my door. Rising on tiptoe, I gave him a hug. “Thanks for the Thai food. And the woo.”
“You’re welcome.”
“Tomorrow I’ll text you the names of a couple pet adoption places.”
“Thanks.”
I unlocked the door. “Night.”
“Night.”
It wasn’t until I was halfway up the stairs that I realized we hadn’t said our usual parting lines to each other. I stopped and waited, expecting him to knock again so he could tell me he didn’t love me.
But the house stayed silent.
Nineteen
Dex
I raised my arm to knock on the door like I had last night, ready to make the joke again—tell her I didn’t love her.
But I couldn’t do it.
After what she’d told me tonight, I couldn’t do it. Lowering my hand, I stepped off her porch.
She didn’t need to hear those words tonight, not even as a joke. She’d trusted me with something fragile, and I didn’t want to trample on it. In fact, it was the opposite. I felt even more protective of her than I had before.
Back at home, I stopped in the kitchen for a glass of water. As I drank it, I thought about Winnie being abandoned by her mom so young, about my daughters being shuttled back and forth between their parents, about my own youth spent watching my dad be a husband and father only when he felt like it.
Fuck, did anyone survive childhood without wounds?
Upstairs, I crawled back into bed and caught the scent of Winnie’s coconut shampoo. Turning onto my side, I grabbed the pillow she’d used and buried my face in it, inhaling deeply. My entire body warmed, and I wished she was still next to me.
But part of me knew it was a good thing she wasn’t.
I didn’t want to get used to her. She wasn’t mine to protect.
The following day, while I was driving home from the grocery store, I got a call from a number I didn’t recognize. I let it go to voicemail and listened to the message once I pulled into the garage.
“Hey Dex, this is Tyler Shaw. I wanted to reach out to you because Chip mentioned that you might be looking for an extra gig, and I could use another conditioning coach at Bayside Sports. It’s mostly baseball training for high school kids in the off-season, but I think a lot of these guys would think it was pretty badass to be coached by a Navy SEAL, and who knows? Maybe you’d find the Navy some new recruits. Anyway, give me a call if you’re interested. Thanks.”
I dialed him back right away. The job sounded great—I enjoyed physical training, and it would be cool to work with high school kids. The extra income would be welcome too.
And the distraction from Winnie.
“Hello?”
“Hey, Coach.”
Tyler laughed. “Matthews, I haven’t been your coach in what, sixteen years?”
I grinned. “Doesn’t matter. You’re still Coach to me.”
“You get my message?”
“I did, and I’m really interested, but I’m not certified or anything.”
“That’s okay. You’ll be covered by the facility’s insurance policy, and I’m just looking for someone that can work on endurance, strength, and mental mettle. I remember that being your superpower as a baseball player, and I figure you probably got a lot of that in your SEAL training.”
“Uh. Yeah.” I shook my head at the memories of grinder PT. “I can put them through hell if you want.”
He laughed. “Just put their attitudes in check and make them better athletes.”
“I think I can do that. My only hesitation is my availability.” I told him about my twenty-four-hours on, seventy-two-hours off schedule at the station. “I have my daughters during those seventy-two hours off every other week, so the days are always shifting around. But I wouldn’t be able to coach while I had them.”
“Understood. Why don’t you come over here on your next day off and look around, see the facility, the equipment and all that, and we can talk about getting some sessions on the books that work for you?”
I glanced at the time. “I’m off today if you’re going to be there for a bit.”
“I’m here until five o’clock. Come any time you like.”
After wolfing down a sandwich for lunch, I headed over to Bayside Sports, a huge complex just outside of town. The guy at the desk directed me to Tyler’s office, and I knocked on the open door.