Chapter Three
“I take it that was your mom and grandmother?” He sat down and tried to focus on the wedge of chocolate cake in front of him rather than on sexy thoughts of Darcie Moretti.
“Yes. Rose and Edna.”
“And Johnny’s your father?”
“Smart and good-looking, too,” she quipped. “Want me to call them all back for introductions?”
“Let’s give it a few. Let me quit blushing.”
“You were thinking about watching my tongue?”
He nearly choked on a sip of milk. “You are direct.”
“Is there any other way to be?”
“Well…yes.” He felt off balance, shy, for crying out loud. His memories of Darcie were vivid and fresh in his mind. He took a bite of dessert, glad of the distraction. “Cake’s good.”
“Ma makes the best.” She sat down across from him. “What’s going through your mind?”
“Too many things to name.” He put down his fork and took another sip of milk. There was something about this homey kitchen that made him feel welcome, made him reluctant to leave. But he didn’t belong here. He needed to learn to handle his family life—his children—on his own. Enrolling in The Daddy Club was a step in the right direction, a desperate measure after being backed against the wall and not knowing where else to turn. He couldn’t allow himself to idealize the Morettis or anyone else as fairy godmothers, ready to swoop in and smooth out the wrinkles of his home life. “I appreciate you finding Heather.”
“She was at Hawkins Park.”
Flynn pushed his empty plate away and gazed up at the ceiling. “I should have known that,” he said, his voice both soft and rough. “It’s where Marsha used to take her.”
“Your wife.”
“Yeah.” Her tone surprised him, had a strained ring to it. But when he looked at her, nothing appeared amiss. Just as well. He didn’t want to talk about Marsha now. Too many whammies had blindsided him today. His nerves were raw and a breath away from splintering.
“Heather’s changed a lot in the past few months, and for the life of me, I can’t figure out how to get through to her. I had no idea she would ever think of running away.”
“You probably did, if you think back.”
“Maybe. It’s tough, though, you know? I’m dealing with a thirteen-year-old who doesn’t speak my language and a one-year-old who doesn’t speak any language!”
Darcie burst out laughing, the sound exuberant and refreshing, touching something deep in his battered soul. He didn’t realize how much he needed spontaneous laughter in his life, how much he needed a friend.
“Guess I sounded a little dramatic, huh?”
“No. Typical father of a teenager.”
“Thank God I’m typical.” Feeling lighter, he tipped back the kitchen chair, balancing on the rear legs. “I thought I was a total alien!”
“You’re a handsome alien.”
There was that directness again. Slowly he lowered the chair legs back to the linoleum floor, his gaze holding hers. He noticed beads of perspiration on her face, then glanced at her wool coat. “Aren’t you too warm in that jacket?”
She made a figure eight in a mound of spilled sugar on the maple table and didn’t look at him. “I’m fine.”
When he put his hand over hers, he felt her jolt of awareness. Darcie Moretti was attracted to him and doing her darnedest to act otherwise. He’d known it that night five months ago, and it was evident tonight. “What happened to you that night? Why did you leave?”
Because you called me Marsha. She shrugged. “I had to go. You were asleep so I left you that way.”
She wasn’t ready for this turn of conversation, didn’t have her words planned out. She liked to be in control, liked to know where every period and comma belonged, liked to fix things. All on her terms though. She didn’t care to be caught off guard like this.
He ran his thumb over the freckles on the back of her hand. “I looked for you in Philly. You led me to believe you lived there.”
This time she didn’t evade. “Maybe I did. It felt easier somehow. I don’t normally go to bed with guys I’ve just met.” Just ones I’ve been in love with all my life. “I was saving us both the embarrassment of the morning after.”
“We didn’t just meet, Darcie. I’ve known you since you were a kid.”
“Known of me, maybe, but you didn’t really know me.” The timing had always been off for them. When she was thirteen, he’d been the older boy who made her breath catch and her dreams sweet, but he hadn’t even known she was alive. He’d been wrapped up in football and cheerleaders, making her young heart weep with jealousy. Then at eighteen, she’d been the wrong social class and her fantasies had suffered a stinging death when the society page had gone gaga over his country club wedding to Marsha Levine, the district attorney’s daughter.
At thirty-one, Darcie’s fantasies had been resurrected when she’d encountered him in a hotel bar, both of them single, alone and all grown up. And she had seen her chance to put her fantasies to rest, operating on the theory that experiencing him would end her obsession.
Boy, had that been convoluted reasoning.
“I’d like the chance to get to know you now,” Flynn said, jolting her out of her musing.
His fingers stroked across hers lightly, making it hard to concentrate. And she was sure there was a reason she needed to remember all her faculties, to keep up her guard. But the firm shape of his lips was distracting, the smooth, deep tone of his voice mesmerizing.
She pulled her hand from beneath his, sat back in her chair, took a long breath.
A dimple creased his cheek. “Did that make you nervous?”
“Maybe.” She crossed her arms, then realized how that molded her coat to her body, and quickly uncrossed them.
“I’m very curious about you, Darcie Moretti, and intrigued…. I’m attracted to you and telling myself it’s not wise to pursue.”
Darcie licked her suddenly dry lips. They had a maple table between them. The smell of chocolate cake permeated the air. The heat of the furnace fogged the kitchen window that was edged with ice. All very homey and comfy and perfectly innocent, and yet she had the most overpowering urge to jump his bones. Oh, this was unacceptable.
And because it was unacceptable, she laughed. She didn’t know what else to do. She did know that she ought to head him off at the pass.
“For heaven’s sake, don’t just tell yourself not to pursue me—shout it.”
His brown-eyed gaze locked on to her, pinning her in the chair, making her heart speed up. Then his lips curved and before he even spoke, she knew she was a goner.
“So,” he began in that deep, sexy voice, “it seems you’re just as intrigued. Which means, I’m thinking…that you wouldn’t stop me if I, say…kissed you?”
The cuff of his dress shirt rode up on his wrist, revealing a silver watch. His hands were bold and strong—the kind of hands that were experienced in giving a woman pleasure. She knew that only too well.
She scooted back her chair. “We’re in my mother’s kitchen.”
“I didn’t mean right this minute.”
He was giving her a fair warning—a sensual warning. And it was thrilling.
And