AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Oh God, it’s pretty bad.”
“It’s fine. The water helped a lot.”
Cara didn’t let go of my wrist, closely examining the burn. I got a whiff of her perfume, vanilla and lavender. I turned away, clenching my good hand into a fist, and pressing it up to my nose.
“I’m so sorry, did I hurt you?”
“Mmm. No, no. It’s okay.” I yanked my hand away from her and stepped back. “It’s fine. I’m going to be fine.”
Her brow folded with worry. “Are you sure? It looks pretty —”
“It’s already blistering. Just some aloe and I’ll be good. I’ve got a big meeting today and — shit, would you look at the time! I gotta —”
“Daddy, you said a bad word.”
I took a deep breath. This was going poorly, to say the least.
Cara had already disappeared upstairs before I had a minute to respond again. She returned in a flash with a green bottle of aloe and a bundle of gauze. “Give me your hand.”
I stared at the way her hand gripped the bottle of aloe and immediately thought about my dick. No. I could not let her touch me. “I’m running late already.” I held out my hand for the materials. “I’ll do it in the car.”
Cara’s lips cracked into a smile.Is she daring me to kiss her? Because I will if she looks at me like that one more time.“It’ll only take a second.”
“Fine.” I held out my hand doubtfully.
Cara went to work. I closed my eyes, not noticing any pain, completely fixated on keeping my erection down.
But her hands…her touch was so tender as she patched me back up. I would have fumbled with one good hand, trying to wrap gauze around the other. “Does that feel better?”
I wriggled my fingers and looked at my now gauze-wrapped hand. “Much. Thank you.”
“Maybe you should call a car. Might be hard to drive with this on.”
She was right. But I wasn’t willing to look any more vulnerable than I already was. “I’ll be fine.” I stuffed my hand in my pocket and went through my usual goodbye activities. Throw on my coat, grab my briefcase, give Lucy a hug and now…
One last longing look to Cara. I didn’t realize it was a habit until it already was. Today, she noticed. And she smiled. “Be careful with that hand.”
I smiled. “Don’t worry, I had a good doctor.”
Cara’s face turned pink, highlighting her cute freckles.
Dude. You’re totally screwed.
Chapter13
Cara
Arriving late to family dinner was the last thing I needed. Since taking the job with Wesley Taves, my parents had been on the edge, the most I’d seen since I missed curfew junior year of high school.
The day had started weird and ended weird. Walking in on Wesley trying to nurse a burn on his hand at 7 am was probably the last thing I would have expected. He always seemed to have it together in his perfectly pressed suits. Seeing him frantic and in pain caught me totally off guard.
Not to mention, he seemed like I was hurting him more than helping him. Men can be so prideful sometimes.
Although right before he left, I had sworn there was something in his hypnotic brown eyes. A look I’d never seen before. As if he was trying to see right into my soul. For a split second, I wanted to ask him to stay home the rest of the day and let me take care of that hand. Then from there it wouldn’t be so hard to ask him to stay the rest of my life.Hopeless romantic, Cara. As always.
The rest of the day was nothing out of the ordinary. I took Lucy to school, I did work on the daycare business plans back at the Taves house, took a call with Danny (ick), picked Lucy back up and spent the evening with her.
In the middle of cooking dinner, Wesley had texted me.
