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I spun around and there in my big front window, lined up in a row, were Deek, Sea Bass, Saint, and Seth. They had their hands cupped around their eyes and pressed against the glass and staring in.
At me in my boxers.
At Melly in my flannel and based on the way her nipples pebbled against the soft fabric, nothing else.
At us.
I shoved her behind me. It was time to get the woodchipper.
23
DANIEL
I pulledup to Melly’s house at eight-fifteen the next morning. The crew from Pearsons was already at work and I saw Melly’s car on the street. She was home. Maybe she was in bed sleeping, although doubtful with the noise being made. Maybe she was in the shower. I shifted in my seat because I knew exactly what she looked like there.
No, she had work, although the library didn’t open until ten. Yes, I knew that not because I checked out a lot of books, but because I looked it up. Earlier this morning. After my own shower where I rubbed one out and came all over the tile. Fuck, my dick was always going to be hard in that bathroom from this point on.
And now, too, just thinking about her.
No matter how much I wanted, I wouldn’t barge in her house and fuck her up against the wall. Not only because our sex contract was for my house, but because every single guy on the crew would know what was up. Beyond my four stupid-ass brothers.
We hadn’t kept our… fling a secret. Her friends Mallory and Bridget knew there was something up between us since they practically bolted from the bar for us to be alone together. I had no idea if Melly told her friends about what happenedafterthey left or not. The storeroom. Last night.
I was forty years old. I didn’t really care what people thought of me or what I did with Melly, who was a consenting adult. But she was a discreet woman. Respected, demure–at least in public–and pretty much a good girl. If word about me having sex with someone got out, people wouldn’t think twice. But if Melly having sex spread through Hunter Valley, tongues would wag. I’d be seen as the old lech who corrupted her.
Little did people know thatshewas the one doing the corrupting.
After my brothersreallyleft the night before–because I’d pulled the blinds on them– Melly hadn’t lingered. It was sex, inside a loosey-goosey contract of sorts. She wanted boundaries, I’d respect them.
This wasn’t a relationship.
The plane left on Saturday. I’d even started to pack.
I climbed from my truck and Earl hopped down after me. My breath came out in big white puffs because the temperature was barely above freezing. Ice crystals sparkled on the grass where it hadn’t yet melted away from the sun creeping across the lawn.
Two guys were putting in the new edging, the strip that would hold the pavers in place and define the driveway’s shape. Like Mom’s place, the house was large, on a large lot, and set back a ways from the street. I’d grown up just down the road and never paid much attention to this particular house when I was a kid, but studying it now, it was well tended. I would’ve remembered a For Sale sign out front so I guessed Mrs. Vigaro had lived in the place for decades. The driveway went alongside the house to a separate garage at the back. Hers also curved in a semicircle in front of the house. There were a lot of pavers to lay. And that didn’t even account for the walk which would be done to match. If the weather held, the crew could have it done within a week.
“What the hell are you doing here?”
Sea Bass came around one of the company pickups. In sturdy boots, worn jeans, a thick vest, and beanie, he was dressed for work.
So was I. I could’ve picked up a prescription at the pharmacy I needed for the trip, put my mail on hold, or many of the other things on my going away to-do list, but that wasn’t happening. I could’ve gone to a movie. Or played pickleball or eaten breakfast at the diner like all the retired people around here.
None of that was happening. Melly’s yard was a Pearson job site, and I would see it done right.
I tipped my chin toward the bobcat, the earth mover we used for everything from digging holes in the ground to planting a tree to hauling heavy loads–like stone pavers–around a job. It had been backed off the trailer, ready to be used. “Someone needs to drive that thing. Kevin and PeeWee over there aren’t certified.”
The guys doing the edging were in their early twenties and friends with Danny. Their strong–and young–backs did a shit ton of the heavy work. Earl had gone over to them and they were giving him pets.
“Jorge is going to run it. We got this, D. You’re retired, remember?”
“That can change,” I said. “You’re an asshole and that can’t.”
He rolled his eyes. “You’re still salty about last night?”
“You had your noses pressed up to the glass like the Seven Dwarfs looking at Snow White.”
An instant grin crossed his face. “If Snow White looked like that, I might have been–”
