. . .
Ok. Don’t think about his washboard abs,again.
“Are we friends?” Ryla asked Jace from where she was standing three inches in front of him. Personal space was not really a concept she grasped yet.
“Sure, we are.” Jace placed a knee on the ground, his focus completely centered on Ryla. “We even have a secret handshake.”
Ryla’s eyes bugged out. “We do?”
Jace put his hand over his heart. “You don’t remember our secret handshake?”
“No.” Ryla shook her head vigorously.
“Here, make a fist.” Jace demonstrated. “It starts like this.” He knocked his fist over and under hers. “Then like this.” He gave her fist a little bump. “And for the ending.” Jace flared his fingers out, brought his thumb to his nose, and blew a raspberry, making Ryla jump up and down, utterly charmed.
She wasn’t the only one.
“I want to try!” Ryla mimicked the handshake back to him, then blew her own raspberry with relish.
“Great job!” Jace popped up at the same time Ryla asked, “Do you and Mommy have a secret handshake?”
Exhaling a small tittering laugh, a sound I have never made before in my entire lifetime, I waved Ryla’s question away with a fluttering shake of my hand.
“Nah, we shake like adults do.” Jace bestowed a bemused smile to Ryla, then shifted it to me as he held out his hand.
It’s funny how you can shake someone’s hand and think nothing of it; it’s just a simple handshake and then you move on with your day. But when my hand slid into Jace’s warm, strong grasp, a buzzing awareness spread through my body. I instinctively moved a step closer to him, craving more, unable to stop myself. It was like he was the edge of a cliff, something that’s risky to be near, but you can’t stop yourself from looking over the edge.
“Why are you wearing Max’s shirt?” Ryla announced loudly, breaking me out of my trance.
I dropped Jace’s hand like a hot potato, looking down at my shirt in horror. Stretched tight across my chest were the words ‘Friday Night Funkin’, my son’s favorite computer game. Both f’s were unfortunately placed over the swell of each breast, accentuating them loud and proud. I knew this shirt was too tight! It must have gotten mixed up with my clothes somehow.
“Shoot!” I exclaimed, mortified. I quickly crossed my arms over my chest, which caused the shirt to ride up over the waistband of my capris, exposing my stomach like I was a coed pledging a sorority. I pulled the shirt down, but that accentuated the f’s even more.
Doing a weird self-hug, I laughed nervously and excused myself, running up the stairs and cursing this day to hell.
I changed into my originally intended black shirt whilst busy mentally chastising myself.
Remember what you told yourself last night? You can think he’s attractive. It’s an empiric fact. A nun would revoke her chastity vows at the sight of him! But you are a mature, thirty-eight-year-old, mother of two. You will not be felled by a man with cute dimples and slabs of abs who is fourteen years your junior. Get it together!
“Where’s Max?” Jace was asking Ryla when I returned to the foyer.
“He’s in the playroom reading,” Ryla explained, grabbing Jace’s hand. “Wanna see my room?”
“Ryla!” I admonished. “You can’t ask a strange man to see your room.”
She eyed Jace, then me. “You think he’s strange?”
Twin circles of red permanently took up residence on my cheeks. “Strangers. I meant strangers. Any stranger in general, male or female. Unless I give them permission.”
“Is Jace a stranger?” Ryla cocked her head, appearing confused. As she should be, I wasn’t making sense. I’d lost any functioning brain cells somewhere between the f’s of Max’s Friday Night Funkin’ shirt.
“No,” I said weakly.
“Then why can’t I show him my room?”
I looked down to the ground in defeat. So much for getting it together.
Jace merely looked down at Ryla. “I’d love to see your room. But I think your momma wants to give me a tour first. How about we start down here and work our way up?”
