“I hope it involves staying in this bed,” I murmured, keeping my eyes closed.
“Nope!” His voice was chipper.
I cracked an eye open. “I know we agreed not to quibble about our ages, but I have a complaint.”
Jace laughed, sliding down and off the bed, looking at the floor for what I presumed to be his clothes.
“Does it involve food?” I ventured.
Jace tilted his head back and forth as he pulled on his boxers. I whined in protest. Chuckling, Jace crawled back up the bed, kissing up my shoulder until he reached my ear.
“How do you feel about chocolate sauce?” His breath tickled my ear, and I shivered.
“I’m in.”
CHAPTERFORTY-EIGHT
JACE
A man who read actual books, and then read them again. It was almost as sexy as … well, nothing, because nothing was sexier than a man who read.Except a man who read naked. Out loud. With chocolate.
April White,Code of Honor
“So, about your books . . .” I started after swallowing a bite of my hot chicken pizza. We had about a half hour before we had to leave to get the kids. Polly and I were currently lazing about on a quilt on the living room floor.
“Any chance we can talk about this tomorrow?” Polly’s lips were curved in a small smile, eyes closed as she relaxed.
Chuckling, I put down my slice, laying on my side next to her. Today was turning out to be one of the best days of my life, after it was almost one of the worst. After some of the most amazing sex I’d ever had, followed by licking chocolate sauce off my girlfriend’s naked body, we took a lazy shower and ordered hot chicken pizza.
“Did you always read?” I asked.
“My mom and I read together.The Boxcar Children, Judy Blume,The Baby-Sitter’s Club. When she died, reading fell to the wayside, like everything else. And then my father had that portrait made. I always liked to think he put it in the libraryfor me, so that I could see her whenever I wanted. But now, I know it was for him. He didn’t know me well enough to do anything like that for me.”
My face was calm, but on the inside, that familiar desire to beat the tar out of her father churned.
“I started reading again when I was pregnant with Ryla. I couldn’t sleep and aTwilightmarathon was on TV. The movies were alright, but they had such a cult book following, I decided to download the books onto an old e-reader to see what the fuss was all about.”
“What’sTwilight?” I deadpanned. Polly’s horrified expression made me drop my head back and laugh. “I know whatTwilightis. No, I don’t care that you’ve read it. Almost every girl I know has read those books.”
Polly blew out a breath and shifted on her side. “Thank God. I thought that meant you were too young to know whatTwilightwas.”
I decided not to share that those movies were all the rage during my fifth-grade year.
“I brought it up to David once, asking if he knew anyone who read them. He scoffed, telling me they were frivolous books for tweens. I never talked to him about it again. My e-reader became a place I could curl up and imagine life in a different place. Ryla’s name actually came from this badass assassin queen from a book I read when I was nine months pregnant.” Polly looked down, tracing the pattern of the quilt. “When I saw the audiobooks on your tablet, I was scared that you’d look at the safe place I’d made for myself and judge me for it.”
I pressed a kiss on her forehead. This time, I was suppressing the familiar desire to beat the living shit out of her ex-husband.
“I’ve never judged you for it. I think I’ve established how turned-on it makes me.”
Polly rolled her eyes. “When you told me you’d been listening to my books since you met me, I felt silly. Like, here was the real reason you were interested in someone like me. A sad, middle-aged mom who would give it up to anyone.”
I opened my mouth to refute her words, but Polly shook her head, indicating she wasn’t done.
“Then I called Leah, who called a few friends, and I realized I was being unfair. Nothing you’d ever done made me think you’d do that. It was all me.”
“It wasn’t all you. What I did was an invasion of your privacy. It started as a curiosity. I’m not gonna lie, when that came out of your car stereo, I was surprised.”
She furrowed her brow. “What book was it?”
