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She didn’t nod or shake her head. She didn’t shrug. She just looked at him. “Were you thinking we’d date forever?” she asked. “Or break-up?”
“I don’t—I wasn’t thinking about it at all.”
“Mm.” Lauren pushed her ponytail over her shoulder. “I suppose women do think of these types of things sooner.”
“Are you sure you don’t want to…stay?” He looked down at the ground and then up at her through his eyelashes. “I might not be thinking about marriage, but I’m thinking about other things.”
Lauren did shake her head this time. “I don’t stay overnight unless there is a wedding first.”
Blake cocked his head at her. “Really?”
“Really,” she said. Her throat worked as she swallowed, and Blake recognized that as her tell. She had something to say to him that would be hard for her, and he waited. “I have before,” she said. “But it ruined me. I was completely broken when he left only a few weeks later, and I vowed—no sex until after marriage. I want it to be this amazing, beautiful act of love. Not just a sleep over.”
“It can be both,” he said.
She smiled and tipped up to kiss him again. He wrapped her in his arms, wanting her to stay very much. He didn’t expect her to, and when she sweetly broke the kiss and rested her forehead against his, she whispered, “I’m sure it can be both,” she said. “We won’t know until after we’re married—ifwe get married.”
He nodded, his eyes still closed. He could wait for this woman, because he was falling in love with her.
* * *
The following day,he and Tommy finally made it to the beach about noon. He’d texted Lauren long after she’d left last night, and he’d told her he’d let her know where they ended up and when.
He set up their chairs and pounded the umbrella into the sand. The wind always seemed to blow here on Hilton Head, and he’d lost many umbrellas to a big gust. Once he had that done, he sprayed Tommy with sunscreen and his son bent to pick up his boogie board.
“I’m going to text Lauren and invite her,” he said. “Is that okay?”
Tommy shrugged. “Fine by me.” He started to leave.
“Tommy.”
His son turned back to him, and Blake gestured him back into the shade. He sighed as he came, and he rolled his neck from side to side. “What?”
“What? What do you meanwhat?Can’t you feel this attitude you’re throwing at me?”
Tommy growled, his frown growing deeper. “I just—don’t care about Lauren.”
“I haven’t dated anyone in a long time,” Blake said. “I haven’t introduced you to anyone in at least three years. Your mom has a man living with her. They go on trips to the Bahamas and stuff. Why am I being villainized for having a girlfriend? I don’t get it.”
“It’s just—it was gross watching you kiss her.” He scuffed his feet in the sand.
“It was? Why? You don’t want to kiss a girl?” He’d talked to Tommy about sex. He’d taken him to his fifth-grade maturation program. He’d bought the boy his first stick of deodorant, and Tommy had always been open with him.
“It looked like you were eating her face,” Tommy muttered. “I don’t know. I’ve seen it on movies and stuff, but it was just…different, I guess. I mean, you’remy dad.”
Blake’s heart softened toward his son. “Yeah,” he said. “And I like her. She likes me. So we’ve been kissing for a few weeks. I’m sorry you walked in on us. I didn’t know she was coming over or anything.”
“Did she stay overnight?”
Blake was suddenly glad she hadn’t. He didn’t want to admit to his thirteen-year-old that he’d slept with a woman when he didn’t want his son to be doing that. “No,” he said. “She didn’t. She left right after you did.”
Tommy looked at him, and Blake smiled at him. “She wants to get to know you. We’re pretty serious, bud. If things stay serious, I might could marry her, and then she’d be living in the house with us. She’d be your step-mom.”
Tommy nodded. “Do you think Mom will ever marry Cason?”
“I don’t know.” Blake drew in a breath and blew it out. He watched the waves roll ashore. “Your mom…she’s a free spirit, buddy. She didn’t like being married, and I’m not sure she’d ever do it again.”
“Why didn’t she like it?”
