Yeah, they were most likely the talk of the neighborhood now.
“You guys want to come over for dinner?” Freddie asked, eyeing the soccer ball under Lucas’s arm. “We can play soccer in my backyard while my dad makes dinner. We’re having mac and cheese.” He glanced up at his dad but then back at the other little boys. “With three cheeses.” He held his fingers up to show three. “Not just one. But three. Cheddar, havarti and … ” He scrunched up his nose in thought. “Dad, what’s the other cheese?”
“Gouda, buddy.”
Freddie nodded. “Right, gouda. It’s gourmet.”
Eva and Scott both hid their smiles by glancing away.
“Can we, Mom?” Kellen asked first. “I loooove mac and cheese. And you said that we were just going to have tuna on toast for dinner because you spent the whole day unpacking and haven’t been shopping. Mac and cheese with three cheeses sounds way better.”
“Yeah, I wasn’t looking forward to tuna on toast,” Lucas added. “I’d eat it, but I wasn’t excited about it.”
Heat blossomed in her cheeks as she lovingly gazed down at her children. “Guys, I promise to get some groceries tomorrow. Today just got away from me, what with all the unexpected guests. But we can’t invite ourselves over for dinner … ”
“You’re not,” Freddie cut in. “I invited you.” He glanced back up at Scott. “Right, Dad? They can come. You always make so much anyway.”
Well, it was no cup of sugar, but it was something. With a grin he knew would make her flush even redder, he rested his hand on his son’s shoulder and fixed Eva with a smoldering look. “We’d love to have the new neighbors over for dinner. Welcome you to the neighborhood properly.”
And oh, fuck, did he ever get what he wanted. Her complexion pinked up so nicely, and her lashes fluttered as she fought to hide her smile. Her sexy throat bobbed on a swallow before she lifted her gaze to his. “Well, thank you. We’d love to join you for dinner.”
All three little boys cheered, disengaging themselves from their parents’ grasps.
“Great!” Freddie cheered. “Come on. I’ll show you my backyard. We have a soccer net. I can be goalie first if you guys want to take shots on me.”
Kellen and Lucas nodded and took off after a running Freddie, down their driveway and around the hedge, the sound of their shoes slapping the concrete with each heavy step echoing from Scott’s yard.
Then there they stood, in Eva’s driveway, staring at each other.
“I’m, uh … I’m just going to finish putting these boxes inside, and then I’ll … ” She nibbled on her lip.
“Come over for dinner?” he said, finishing her sentence for her.
A lopsided smile curved her lips as she bent down to pick up a box that Kellen had left. “Yes. I’ll come over to your house for dinner.”
Fuck, he loved it when she got all flustered. “Great! Then I’ll head home and get going on dinner. Just let yourself in when you’ve finished over here.”
All she could do was nod, which only made him smile even wider.
He turned to go but then spun back around. “Oh, and Eva, just because it’s meat-free Monday doesn’t mean we’ve gone vegan.” Then he mooed like he had last night and continued on up her driveway, wanting desperately to turn around and see her reaction but knowing that it probably made a better statement not to.
Damn, he forgot how much he liked the chase. Liked the flirting and wooing. How much it turned him on to win a woman over with his charm and his wit. He’d been out of the game for so long, he forgot how much he enjoyed it. And the way Eva reacted to him made it all the better. So responsive, so beautiful, and he was only just getting started.
7
Eva blinked half a dozen times and shook herself both physically and mentally as she stood in Scott’s kitchen and cut up cucumbers and bell peppers on his bamboo cutting board. It was surreal. Completely and utterly surreal.
Six weeks ago, she’d been on her knees in the shower with Scott above her, his fist wrapped around her wet hair, his other hand cupping her cheek, and now, she was in his kitchen, cutting up vegetables for her sons and his son while he stood over the stove and stirred homemade three-cheese sauce into boiled penne.
It was domestic and wonderful with a man she hardly knew but found deliriously sexy, and it was throwing her for a serious loop.
She had no plans to start dating and certainly no plans to introduce any new man into the boys’ lives, and yet there she was having a date or whatever this was with a new man who had already met her kids.
Even though nothing was going according to plan, she was really, really happy. And the view of Scott’s back, his butt and his arms as he stood over the stove wasn’t too bad either.
Was it really going to be this easy with him? With their kids? The first guy she met—the first guy she slept with after her divorce from Todd—turned out to be Mr. Right. And then he wasn’t just Mr. Right, he was Mr. Right-Next-Door. And his kid got along with her kids—so far. Was it really that easy? Or was it a too good to be true kind of thing, and he had a sex-dungeon-style bunker hidden beneath the shed in his backyard. Was she dropping her guard down too much? Or just enough?
She liked Scott, and even though things were complicated and messy in her world now, she somehow got the feeling that he didn’t mind messy or complicated as long as he was considered and respected. And she felt the exact same way. Todd had never shown her the respect she deserved—not only as his wife, but as a woman, as a person. In the small amount of time she’d spent with Scott, he’d already shown her far more respect than Todd had in the ten years they were together.
Continuing to slice the cucumber, she let out a long, exhausted sigh.
Why did life have to be so damn confusing?
“Tired, Eva?” He swung her a glance over his shoulder, and the grin that accompanied the twinkle in his distractingly beauiful brown eyes made her insides liquefy and the knife on the cucumber slip and nearly take off her fingertip.
“Don’t look at me like that,” she scolded.
He managed to appear surprised. “Like what?”
“Like you’ve seen me naked. Don’t let my kids catch you looking at me like that.”
If it were possible, his smile grew even sexier beneath that irresistible beard. “But I have seen you naked. In fact, I can see you naked whenever I want.”
Like his window looked into her window?
Creepy.
He turned around from the stove to face her, still smiling. “All I have to do is close my eyes.” He shut his eyes. “I’m seeing you naked right now. In that position, you know the one, where your legs were thrown up over my shoulders and I was—”
“Hey!”
His eyes flashed open, the smile still devious, still enigmatic. Then he closed those baby browns again. “Oh, now you’re naked, on your knees in the shower, and I’m just about to—”
“Scott!” Heat flooded her cheeks, but the pain that it took her to keep her smile at bay caused an ache to pulse in her jaw. Her lips twisted at the same time her stomach did a somersault.