AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Him,” she said decisively.
Maria looked over her shoulder to where the little girl indicated.
“Doug? You want Doug?” she asked, slightly bemused as she turned back.
“Uh, huh,” the little girl answered with a firm nod of her chin. “Superman.”
Well, hell. Maybe his dive over the bed had looked a little like flying.
Doug chuffed out a laugh.
This was the second time today he’d been called a hero.
CHAPTER TEN
“So, spill the rest, girl,” Julie prodded as they both took sips of their coffee and gave appreciative yummy noises.
“There’s not much more to spill,” Pixie replied. “I’ve already told you. I saw Doug sitting in his truck, I went over and invited him inside for supper.”
“Right. Because you were worried if you didn’t acknowledge him, you’d hurt his feelings, and you’re a wuss when it comes to telling someone they’ve been a dick. Basically, you didn’t want to make him feel bad for makingyoufeel bad.”
Julie didn’t state those facts with any malice, it was just her succinct way of pointing things out the way she saw them.
“Well, maybe…”No. She needed to ‘fess up. “Uh, actually? I wasn’t trying to placate him. I was hoping to see that he’d changed his mind. Like maybe he wanted to date again? I still…like him, Jules. And if he realized he’d made a mistake by cutting me out, I wanted to give him a second chance.”
“Oh, hon,” Julie commiserated, sending a hand over to give Pixie’s a squeeze. “I understand. He’s the first man since high school you’ve even considered dating, and it hurt like hell when your feelings weren’t reciprocated. But whether it comes to anything or not, don’t let this set you back. Don’t start thinkingall guys are like him. You’ve only trusted a few men since you were shot; my Ian, your father, and Fleet,” she reminded.
Julie wasn’t wrong. After her father, she’d added Julie’s husband, and recently Talia’s fiancée, Fleet, to the short list of men she let close. She’d been keeping every other male at arm’s length for so long she hadn’t even noticed. And that’s what made her attraction to Doug, epic. An anomaly. But a deviation Pixie wasn’t ready to let go.Why? She had no idea, but it had made her swallow her nerves and confront him outside Talia’s house; something that a month ago she never would have imagined.
“I still can’t believe you had the guts to face him,” Julie continued, mimicking exactly what Pixie had been thinking. “It must have blown his mind.”
“I think it did.” Pixie nodded, trying to remember details. Before she’d gone outside, she’d gotten her self-righteous scruff up with some serious inner pep-talks, and she’d been so inside her own head by the time she confronted him, she didn’t remember exactly how he’d taken it; her walking across the street, bold as brass. But she did recall their conversation after he’d rolled down his window. “He was definitely taken aback when I invited him into the house,” she revealed.
“Damn. I wish I could have seen his face,” Jules giggled.
Julie had briefly laid eyes on the stoic,professionalDoug in the aftermath of the school shooting, and they’d waved from the adjacent yards the on one additional occasion when Doug had picked Pixie up for a date. His demeanor, unfortunately, had screamed,stay away.
Still, Julie hadn’t warned Pixie off. She’d agreed Doug was handsome as sin, built like a Greek god, and deserved some consideration as boyfriend material.
“So then what happened?” Julie dug for more recent deets.
Pixie smiled, remembering. “We had a very nice meal, then played some cards.”
“Wait.” Julie’s mouth dropped open. “You don’t play cards. Because of your hand.”
And there was another thing that endeared Julie to Pixie. Her best friend didn’t beat around the bush where Pixie’s infirmity was concerned, like so many of Pixie’s school colleagues did.
Pixie chuckled. “He actually taught me to play a game where the cards don’t have to be held.”
“Huh,” Julie marveled. “It sounds like he was trying to be…sweet.”
“Yeah. He was.” Pixie agreed. Then her countenance dropped. “But the gist of the evening was,” a huge sigh escaped her, “he wants to be friends.Onlyfriends. And it’s because of some fucked-up thing that happened with his mother during his adolescent years. He didn’t share what that was, and according to him, he won’t. But it’s certainly screwed with him.” She recalled his exact words. “He says he won’t hold my hand except for comfort purposes. And he won’teverkiss or hug me.”
Julie’s eyebrows went up around her hairline. “That’s…crazy, Pix. It goes against everything that makes a guy, a guy. They’re all required, in the ‘dude-handbook’, to do that preliminary shit so they can score some hot sex down the road. Every guy knows that in order to hit their goal, they have to put in the work. Cuddling first. Penetration second.”
That was putting it bluntly, but Pixie knew Julie wasn’t wrong.
“Yeah. Well. I guess that means sex with me is the farthest thing from his mind. Because he made it damned clear that no contact, no matter how innocent, was going to happen.”
