I had been imagining a morning of coffee and sexy foreplay, not sudden confrontations of angry exes and surprise children.
Shit. Holly has a son. How old is he? Seven? Younger? I’ve never been very good at guessing kids’ ages. Why hadn’t she told me? She’d told me about the ex, so why not the kid? I’d much rather she’d been honest than be woken up by the boy calling for his mum first thing in the morning.
I took myself back to my flat, my emotions battling each other. That she hadn’t told me, combined with the way she’d tried to shove me into the bathroom to hide, left an uneasy feeling in my gut. Yeah, we’ve only known each other for a day, but she’s done something to me. Has affected me in a way no other woman had. I thought we’d shared a connection and I’d wanted more of that—more of her talking to me, her big blue eyes focused on my face. More of her kissing me with those perfect, full lips. More of how her tits fill my hands, spilling over my fingers, the nipples pressing into my palms. More of how her pussy feels clamped around my fingers.
Fuck, I get hard just thinking about her.
Yeah, I want more of Holly McCarty, even though every part of my head yells that it’s a bad idea. She has baggage, clearly, and she hasn’t been honest with me. Was she ashamed of her ex and son seeing her with me? Is it because of the tattoos and long hair? Her ex, Mike, looks exactly the way I pictured—well groomed and stinking of money. He also has that superior, cocky attitude that makes me want to punch men like him in the face. He acts as though he always thinks he’s better than everyone else. Someone like Holly deserves way better than a guy like that. No wonder he’s an ex.
Today is a Sunday, and I don’t have much else to do with myself. I need a shower but I don’t want to wash the scent of Holly off my skin.
I don’t know what steps to take now. Was I just a bit of fun in her eyes, someone totally inappropriate who she could mess around with for one night, and never see again?
“Soooo?” Tess’s American drawl meets me the moment I step through the doors of the shop on Monday morning. “How did it go?”
I throw my bag down behind the reception desk. “It went great—right up until the moment her ex-husband and son walked into the house and caught us in bed together.”
Tess’s mouth drops open. “You’re screwing with me?”
“Nope. That was exactly how it happened.”
Art’s big body comes barrelling out from our staff room. He slings an arm around Tess’s neck and drops a kiss on the top of her head. She smiles up at him, and something in my chest tightens.
“How what happened?” my boss asks.
Tess fills him in on my behalf. “Kane went out with a hot blonde who he worked on, and her ex-husband and son caught them in bed together.”
Art’s eyebrows lift. “Holy shit, man. That’s not good.”
“What’s not good?”
We all turn as the fourth member of staff pushes his way through the front door, the bell tinkling to signal his arrival. Rocco must have just caught the end of the conversation. With his shaved head and beard, together with the customary tattoos he’s guaranteed to have after working so long in the shop, Rocco probably looks the toughest out of all of us guys.
“Ex-husband and kid catching Kane in bed with the wife,” Tess handily fills in for me again.
Rocco’s brown eyes widen. “Fuck. That really isn’t good.”
I suck in a breath through my nose and slowly let it out again. “Nope. And I have no idea what I’m going to do now.”
“Did you know she had a family?” Tess asks.
I tug my hand through my hair and shake my head. “Not the kid, no. She said she had an ex, but I didn’t realise he was still on the scene.”
“On the scene, as in, they’re still together?”
“No, I don’t think so. But her having a kid makes things different.”
Tess shrugs. “It’s not always a bad thing. Kids aren’t just baggage, you know. They’re people in their own right. They can even be fun to hang around.”
“Yeah, but Kane isn’t after that, are you, mate?” Rocco shoves his elbow into my ribs. “He just wants a bit of fun, not some ready-made family to walk into.”
I find I can’t meet any of their eyes. Rocco and I often spend weekends on the prowl in bars and clubs, picking up beautiful women. Rocco probably doesn’t want to lose his wingman.
“Yeah, just a bit of fun,” I agree. “That’s all. Besides, it bugs me that she didn’t tell me about the boy. And then she was trying to hide me when they turned up, instead of just introducing me to them.”
Tess laughs. “Well, you can hardly blame her for that, can you? I mean, sure, she should have told you, but people with kids are different. She’d have been thinking about the boy and how it would have appeared to him, not about you or your feelings. She’s only known you for a day, and it’s not as though you have the image of someone you’d introduce to your mother.”
Tess gives me a wink to show she’s only joking. After all, Art probably looks even more intimidating than I do—he’s certainly bigger, with one of those stretcher rings through his ears and his spiky dark hair—but that hadn’t stopped Tess from hooking up with him.
