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"Did you move here after Peter was born?" he asked.
"Yes, my grandfather left the place to me."
"I'm sorry for your loss."
"That's okay," she said. Her grandfather hadn't ever spoken to her when he'd been alive. The old man had disowned her mother when she'd first found out she was pregnant. "We weren't close."
"I remember your mom died when we were in college. Do you have any other family?"
"I have Peter."
"This must have been some fun place to explore as a kid."
She shrugged. She'd never visited here until the day they'd moved in. She'd sold her condo in Atlanta and moved here. Her grandfather hadn't kept any pictures of her mom or herself in the house. She'd found a drawer in the mahogany desk in the den filled with unopened letters from her mom. Only one letter had been opened—the one she'd sent to her grandfather telling him he had a great-grandson.
He'd never contacted her, but Larissa often wondered if that was why he'd left her this place. Not for her and for the sins of her mother, but for Peter. The great-grandson he'd never let himself know.
"I know you're an only child, but did you have cousins to play with?" he asked.
"Not every family is like yours, Jake. Some of us are only children of only children."
He put his hands up. "I didn't mean anything by it. This is a great place to raise a son. When you said he only watched PBS, I was scared you were turning him into a little brainiac."
"I'm trying, but he has your genes," she said, trying for a lightness that she didn't really feel.
He grabbed his chest. "Ouch."
She chuckled.
"I'll take that lunch you offered now," he said. Something had changed in his eyes that made a ray of hope blossom in her chest. She realized that there was no one else she'd rather share parenthood with than this man.
* * *
Larissa's kitchen reminded him of Tuscany. It was painted rich warm colors. He could tell she'd remodeled since she'd moved in. The houses in this neighborhood had been originally built in the fifties. But her kitchen was very modern. The large butcher-block island where she assembled lunch had a new look to it.
"Is salad okay?"
Not really. He'd still be hungry when he was done. But they'd reached a kind of truce on the deck and he didn't want to rock the boat. "Sure. What can I do to help?"
"Can you cook?"
He laughed. "No. But cutting up veggies isn't that hard."
"No, it's not. I'm making a Greek salad, so you can cut up olives and peppers for it."
She put on a Jimmy Buffett CD while they worked in the kitchen. The first time he'd noticed Larissa in college had been at a Buffett concert. She'd been the only one in their group without a grass skirt or Hawaiian shirt. And she'd turned eight shades of red when Buffett sang "Let's Get Drunk and Screw."
"I love this CD. I remember the first time you heard some of these songs."
"Me, too. I wanted to die, I was so mortified that ya'll were singing it at the top of your lungs."
"Wasn't long before we'd corrupted you and you were singing along. Remember the next concert less than a year later?"
She gave him a saucy grin, one he'd forgotten. For all her shy ways in a large group, one on one, Larissa was a sassy woman. "You always were a bad influence on me."
His track record with women wasn't the best. He'd gotten Larissa pregnant and not known it. In his defense, he'd been going through a lot then. His sister Victoria had disappeared and D&D's was starting to go big time. Jake didn't cut himself any slack for those things. Some men were inherently flawed when it came to women and he was beginning to believe he was one of them.
"Yeah, I guess I was," he said.
He felt her hand on his arm and realized he'd stopped cutting. "I was joking."
He put the knife on the counter, leaning his hip against it and staring down at her. Damn, he'd forgotten how small she was. He felt big—too big for her and for her kitchen. He also felt too hard for the woman who'd blushed at provocative song lyrics. "But there is an element of truth to your words."
She cupped his jaw. Her long fingers were cold against his skin. "Not really. You've never made me do anything I regretted."
There was something in her eyes that convinced him of her sincerity. He leaned down to kiss her. A quick embrace that held shared memories and the hope of finding some sort of peace for the future. She pulled away too soon for him.
"We better get back to work or we'll never eat," she said lightly, stepping away from him and moving around the island.
Did she really think one butcher-block countertop was going to stop him? He'd let her back away earlier when her phone rang but he knew they were going to have to come to terms with this sexual attraction between them before she moved into his place. "Maybe I'm not hungry for rabbit food."
