I put it in the freezer as he chuckled behind me.
“What’s the deal with her and her health foods?” he asked, allowing me to avoid the conversation in a way I appreciated. Brady was good at backing off when he felt me pull away. A dance to our conversations that mimicked the dance of our bodies around topics and emotions difficult for me. I couldn’t help but wonder what would happen, though, if one of us pushed past the lines I drew.
I stayed with the easier conversation: talking about Hannah.
“When Grams had her heart attack just after the new year, the doctor put her on a really strict diet. She had us meet with your sister to discuss meal plans, and I guess Hannah saw it as her way of saving my grandmother.”
Brady watched me as I flitted around the cupboards, trying to figure out what I was going to make for dinner that Hannah would actually eat.
“That must have been hard for her. For you.” His voice was deep with sympathy.
“Cassidy has been trying to teach Hannah balance and that it’s okay to have treats in moderation. But Hannah overheard Grams’ doctor explaining how the damage to her heart had been done over years of unhealthy eating…” I trailed off.
“So, Hannah thinks she has to protect you, too. After all, you’re all she has left,” he said quietly.
He was so perceptive it was almost impossible. Maybe it was the artist in him. Maybe he was attuned to watching others so he could display in rhythm and chords what they were feeling, but I was unused to the depth of it in my life.
Brady grabbed my arm as I went to go by him, stilling me. I looked up into his face and saw a mix of my own emotions reflected back at me. Trepidation. Longing. The essence of him?gritty and deep like his voice?wafted over me. I couldn’t move. I could barely think.
“Why don’t you want to tell me what William said?” he asked as his finger coasted over my skin, and my body temperature seemed to double.
“There’s no point in discussing it,” I said, unsure of why I was holding out. Maybe because I was afraid of the exact words that came out of his mouth.
“Maybe I can help,” he said.
Once upon a time, Nash had felt like I was his obligation. That he needed to look out for me because he hadn’t been able to save Darren, and Darren had made him promise to do just that: watch over me. It was like my life was on repeat. This time, it was Brady feeling like he had to look out for me because of his relationship with my grandmother.
I didn’t want to be an obligation. I most certainly didn’t want to be this man’s. What I wanted from him was what I’d felt the night before. Longing. Lust. Desire. Sex. It stunned me?the thoughts of wanting him?when I’d convinced myself I wanted nothing.
But it was the truth. I craved his hands on me. Longed to be touched. To feel alive. To feel like I was really only thirty-four and not seventy-four. I wasn’t sure I could handle much more than a casual flirtation. A few kisses. Some stolen moments. I certainly wasn’t ready to unravel the questions surrounding eternity that I’d wrestled with Stacy that morning.
I pushed up on my tiptoes and placed my lips on his. A soft question. A probe at what we’d felt the night before to see if it remained. And the simple touch crushed my senses. The taste of mulberry wine and the soft feel of morning sun rays on your skin.
He groaned, hands going to my waist, pulling me so I was pressed tight against his body leaning so casually against the counter. My hands on his muscled torso could feel his heart pounding at the same pace as mine.
He deepened the kiss, pushing against my lips with his tongue.
I let him.
I not only let him, I pushed back, exploring him and the touch that had been absent for years in my life. My hands went to the back of his neck, fingers tugging into the blond chunks that curled there. Shaggy. Long. Hair I’d never been able to twine into with Darren because he’d had a military crew cut from the moment I’d met him.
I pushed Darren aside, instead focusing on the sound of Brady’s breath. Heavy, deep. Focused on the sound of my breath, panting and shallow. Throbbing. Craving. The need twisting in with the ache of absence.
Molly’s nails sliding across the wood floor burst into my head along with the silence—Hannah’s keyboard no longer making a sound. I pulled back just as my daughter came bounding into the room.
“I’m hungry,” she announced.
Brady and I were still staring at each other. Apart and yet still joined in that moment of tangled mouths. He reached out across the space and put a finger on my lips, running along the bottom one as a smile took over his face again. Full and beautiful and so tormentingly sexy.
“Have you ever had sushi?” Brady asked with a glance toward Hannah.
She wrinkled her nose. “I’m not sure. What’s in it?”
“Fish and rice and seaweed.”
“Seaweed!” Hannah all but screamed.
Brady laughed. “You can’t even taste it, really. It’s like eating lettuce.”
