“Please don’t make me stop,” I muttered against her neck, unable to believe the words coming out of my mouth.
I moved my hands to the small of her back, to press her to my hips and feel the urgency of my situation. She shuddered with a desperate gasp and tipped her head further, exposing more of her neck, and I groaned against the smooth plane of her throat.
“Blake,” she whispered, repeating my name. “We have all n—”
“What are you doing?!”
I have never backed away from a woman as quickly as I did at the sound of Freddy’s horrified disgust. I turned to face the mirror, away from his view, to hide the obvious erection in my jeans as I prayed to a god I didn’t believe in.
Dear fucking god, get rid of this boner, amen.
“Hey, honey,” Audrey said breathlessly, trying desperately to compose herself as she straightened her rumpled top. “We’ll be out there in a second.”
“He was eating your neck!” he exclaimed, horrified.
Audrey shifted her gaze to glance at me sidelong as she struggled not to laugh, and from the corner of my eye, I winced apologetically as my hand covered my mouth. She was soundlessly asking for backup, but I had nothing to offer, as I struggled to think about anything other than her breasts and thighs and what they felt like straddling my hips.
“Um, no,” she admitted, shaking her head. “Blake wasn’t … eating my neck, honey. He, um—”
“Then, what were you doing?”
“W-well, actually, um …” She was struggling to come up with something, frantically flitting her eyes around the room to conjure an explanation without telling the truth, but I saw the defeat in her eyes and she succumbed with a sigh. “We were kissing, honey.”
“Why?” he demanded to know. He sounded angry and I worried this was the end of our budding friendship. After all, he had caught me making out with his mom. That’d piss any kid off, I think.
“Because, um, because,” she took a deep breath and settled into her response, “sometimes when grown-ups really like each other a lot, they kiss.”
“Oh,” he answered, and I heard the confusion in his voice. “Like Daddy and Mama.”
Audrey slowly nodded her head. “Yeah,” she drawled. “Like that.”
Finally, I turned around to watch him shrug and say, “Okay, well … Dinner’s ready.” With that, he hurried out of the bathroom and we both exhaled.
“Dodged a bullet there,” she said.
Allowing myself to grin, my held-back chuckle now rumbled through my chest. “You should’ve told him I was a zombie.”
She slapped the back of her hand against my arm. “Oh, really, Kiefer? But I thought you were a vampire,” she teased and sashayed toward the door.
***
“No headphones at my table,” Mom warned, pointing at the headphones in Jake’s hand. Her eyes flashed toward mine for a split second as he lowered them to the table with a pout. I couldn’t miss the distinctive glint of triumph in her glare before her attention was back on the plate in front of her.
Audrey smiled at my mother. “This is an amazing pot roast, Mrs. Carson.”
Mom barely curled her lips upward. “Thank you very much.”
“When my mom makes pot roast, it always comes out so dry and tough,” Audrey went on, “but this is absolutely perfect. You’ll have to give me your secret.”
Mom addressed Audrey with another small smile before diverting her attention to her son. “How do you like it, Freddy?”
“It’s good,” he answered in a small, shy voice.
“I’m glad,” she answered, smiling brighter. “I have something very special for dessert, so eat up.”
“Gotta eat it all, Freddy,” Jake told him. “You only get dessert if you eat it all.”
“That’s what my dad says,” Freddy said, “but he gives me dessert anyway.”
“Remind me to have a talk with Daddy,” Audrey laughed, reaching out to ruffle Freddy’s mop of hair.
“Are you close?” Mom asked.
I opened my mouth to tell her to mind her own business, when Audrey nodded and replied, “Freddy’s dad and I are really great friends, yeah. And his wife, Freddy’s Mama, is one of my best girl friends. We’re all family,” she wrapped an arm around Freddy’s shoulders and squeezed, “right, honey?”
Freddy nodded enthusiastically. “Yep.”
“I see,” Mom answered. “Well, that’s great for Freddy, to have you all getting along so well.”
“Oh, absolutely,” Audrey replied. “That’s always been very important to us. But honestly, it’s always come easy. Jason and I have been friends for so many years, I can’t imagine us not getting along.”
My mother smiled and dropped the subject by moving onto a discussion about Thanksgiving plans. I never liked Thanksgiving, or the thought of spending time with relatives, but I was trying hard to put myself into a different and more positive mindset. So, I responded to her plan of having our grandparents, aunts, uncles, and cousins over for dinner with a nod and a “sounds good, Mom.” She then invited Audrey and Freddy to join us, and while it was more likely out of politeness and less of a genuine want to include them, I still felt my chest fill with warmth and a simple sensation of goodness.
After dinner, as Freddy and Jake played with Mickey, and Audrey helped my father in the kitchen, I stopped Mom in the hallway to ask a question.
“Hey, so I was thinking,” I began, keeping my voice low, “if you guys didn’t mind, I’d like to keep Jake at my place all week. Mickey, too.”
She was startled, but then smiled. “I think that’s a good idea.”
“Okay, cool. I’ll pick them up tomorrow night.” I nodded, surprised the conversation had gone so well, so easily. “Anyway, I guess I’m gonna—”
“So, Audrey is still friends with her ex?”
I furrowed my brow. “What?”
A chill settled in her gaze as she shrugged. “I’m just making sure I understood correctly.”
“Yeah,” I nodded, unsure of where she was going with this and unsure of why it mattered. “Yeah, sure, they’re friends. Why?”
“Be careful with that.”
“Be careful with what?”
Mom shrugged again. “I don’t know, Blake. I’m just saying, if she felt enough for him at one point to have a child with him, then there’s always that chance she could still have feelings, right? Especially if they’re such great friends.”
I didn’t know what to say or how to react to the blatant accusation. She had just eaten dinner with this woman and her child. She had shared in conversation and friendly banter. And now, she was passing judgment, while said woman was mere feet away, helping to clean up.
My chest puffed with the urgent need to fight and defend, as I shook my head and crossed my arms. “They’re raising a kid together,” I stated in a flat, firm tone.
“Oh, sure,” she relented with a flippant wave of a hand. “I understand that. But I’m just mentioning, you might want to be on alert, you know? Don’t get so attached right away.”