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“Can you eat with us?” Parker asked, practically in tears.
Crap, this kid was killing me. “He’s working.”
Jack leaned down on his haunches in front of Parker. “Do you like pizza?”
My kid’s eyes lit up and he jumped up and down with as much excitement as he had for the zoo. “Cheese pizza!”
“How about this…I’ll order us a pizza and pick it up. But…you have to go inside and do everything your mom tells you to do.”
“I promise! I will!”
“Okay, then. I’ll be over in a little bit.”
He took off toward the house without waiting for me to follow. I felt horrible for how Parker wrangled him in, but furthermore, I was wondering how I was going to stand having this man in my house when I knew nothing about him.
“You don’t have to do that.”
“The kid looked sad.”
“Still, that’s my problem to deal with. You’ve already done enough to help me out.”
“It’s not a big deal,” he said flippantly.
“Look, Jack?—”
“Do you want something other than cheese?”
I was about to give him this big speech when I realized it really didn’t matter. This was a one-time thing, and I’d make that clear when he came over tonight.
“No, cheese is fine.”
He nodded and turned his back on me. I wasn’t sure what this meant for later, but I had to be very clear about my boundaries with this man. Not just for Parker’s sake, but for mine also.
Parker was bouncing at the door by the time I got there. I let him inside and turned on the lights. “Alright, you need to get cleaned up and put all your school stuff away.”
“I will.” He moved at a speed that I hardly ever saw when it came to cleaning up. This was such a bad idea, but I didn’t know how to keep him away from Jack without being rude.
I looked around the house and sighed. It was a mess. Well, not by other people’s standards, but by mine, it looked like a bomb went off. I quickly washed down the counters and made sure the floor was swept clean. Then I folded the blanket that I’d left on the couch last night and draped it over the back.
I ran my fingers through my hair, grimacing at how greasy I felt. I lifted my arm and sniffed, grimacing at how much I smelled. I couldn’t have Jack around me like this. I wouldn’t be comfortable. And that had nothing to do with the fact that he was extremely good-looking.
“Parker!”
“I’m cleaning, Mama!” he called from his room.
“Baby, I’m gonna take a shower. You don’t open the door for anyone.”
“I know!” he called back.
I rushed into my room, tossing my dirty scrubs into the hamper. The water was still shockingly cold when I got in, but I didn’t have time to take a nice long shower like I usually did. The problem was, as soon as I soaped up, my body tingled in ways I hadn’t felt in years. I closed my eyes, running my fingers over my nipples, testing theirsensitivity. They immediately turned hard and images of Jack’s face flitted through my head.
He was dirty and hard, but in that sexy way that made me wonder what he could do to me in bed. My fingers slid between my folds almost involuntarily, eliciting a gasp from me. My eyes flew open and I braced my hand on the shower as I circled my clit. Shocks zipped through my body and down my spine as I came just moments later.
It wasn’t surprising. I hadn’t had sex since before Parker was born. I didn’t let any man near me now that I was a parent. And it had been just as long since I was actually turned on by a man.
Oh, God…I was attracted to Jack. That should have been obvious when I got in the shower and imagined his face as I got myself off, but for some reason, that particular nugget of information eluded me. But the attraction had to be purely based on his looks. After all, he was a criminal. I had been in the ambulance when he was beaten to a pulp in prison.
Prison!
