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For a moment, the stress of single parenthood, coaching, my players, the team, my family... it all just melted away. Lark laughed, a lot. She found humor and delight in almost everything. I couldn’t remember a time when I didn’t feel the pressure of my family or my team counting on me. Being a leader and the responsibility that came with it landed squarely on my shoulders, and I had been proud to bear the burden. It was only lately that it had started to feel like the weight was more and more unmanageable.
But Lark was wholly unburdened. Effervescent, if not a little bit flighty.
She talked openly and answered my questions, unfazed when I skated over thinly veiled questions about Penny and her mom. That was too close. Too personal. Besides, I liked listening to her talk and to the musical quality of her voice when she told a story she thought was funny.
She was also touchy. Sometimes, when she’d lean forward and laugh, her fingertips would graze over my knee, or she would gesture wildly with her hands, and I imagined capturing one midair and hauling her onto my lap just to hear her surprised little squeak.
Sitting this close to her was a mistake. I was a wreck. Two sides of me at war with each other—one that knew, bone deep, the only way to maintain control was to never be vulnerable. And the other... the tiny, hidden side that wanted to lean in, open up to her in a way that was completely foreign and uncomfortable for me.
Lark took a drink from her beer, and I watched, in slow motion, as the condensation from the bottle dripped down and landed on her knee. When her throat worked up and down, all I could think about was planting my mouth there, feeling her heartbeat hammer under my lips for long, delicious moments.
I wanted to feel, not just hear, the moans I could drag out of her.
Our conversation faded away, and the night sounds blanketed us as we sat. Staring.
“It’s getting late.” My voice was gravelly and hard. Under different circumstances those words might have been an invitation, but not tonight. I had responsibilities. I flexed my jaw to try to work out some of the tension.
Lark leaned back against the post, peering around it at the starry night sky again. I took the opportunity to let my gaze wander over the tops of her breasts. Lower still to her rib cage and to where her small waist nipped in before flaring out to her hips. Her leggings did nothing to hide the fact that she was all woman under there.
Jesus Christ, is she not wearing underwear?
The singular thought ran on a loop in my head as I tried to ignore the faintest outline of her pussy beneath the thin material between her toned thighs.
Her eyes move back to me, dancing with mischief, as always. She shrugged. “It’s not that late.”
My skin tingled. I recognized the sultry, low dip of a woman’s voice when she was not quite ready to call it a night. Hell, if she was offering, I’d happily toss her around and show her just how worn out we could make each other.
But I wasn’t that man anymore, was I? Life wasn’t as easy as a quick fuck to get it out of your system, and something about Lark told me that she was sticky. The kind of woman who stayed with you long after you left, like a cattle brand.
I didn’t need that kind of complication messing with my head. I had a daughter and a team to focus on. I could handle it on my own. But I also couldn’t halt dark thoughts of Lark pinned under me. I rose and peered down at her.
Fuck it.
“Inside.” I tipped my head toward the front door. An invitation that sounded much more like a demand.
She didn’t wither under my frown but rather drained the last of her beer, stood, and held the bottle out for me, just out of my reach.
The amber glass dangled at the end of her fingertips. When I reached forward to take it, I let my fingertips drag along the backs of her fingers. Long and smooth. I ached for more.
Lark sucked her full bottom lip into her mouth, her teeth pressing into that supple flesh, and her eyes raked over the door. If she stepped through it, it was game over. She wasmine.
Her tongue slicked over her bottom lip as she stood. One step forward and she was in my space, her scent of soft cinnamon and citrus moving over me and filling my lungs.
Lark rose on her tiptoes as my face tipped down to hers, ready to capture her lips in mine. My hands gripped her hips.
“Good night.” She let out a soft breath through her nose and smiled. Our breaths mingled. The smallest sliver of space separated our mouths, and if she closed that distance, I’d be all over her in a heartbeat.
Instead, Lark turned and bounced down the porch steps. When she reached the bottom, she twirled before smiling up at me.
Her arms wrapped around the flannel I’d given her as she hugged herself against the cool summer breeze.
A grin spread across her gorgeous face. “I’m keeping the shirt, Oscar.”
I watched her walk away.She turned me down.
I should have been disappointed. Instead, I let my laughter erupt from my gut and watched in fascination as my sunny, alluring neighbor disappeared into the apartment above the rickety old barn.
I rubbed the achy little spot that bloomed in the center of my chest, protesting her absence, before I scooped up the bottles and headed inside.
