The Presence of Grace (Love and Loss #2)(40)

When the door finally dinged again, I heard Devon call out.

“I know you’re back here somewhere.” His voice was playful and coming from the middle of the store so I knew he’d moved away from the register. I turned in his direction. I smiled when he rounded the aisle I was in, his face splitting into that sexy grin at finding me. “Hey,” he said as he closed the distance between us. “I wasn’t expecting you.”

“It’s called a surprise,” I said, holding up the brown paper sack that held my most favorite Chinese takeout. “I brought you lunch. Well, I brought us lunch. Do you have time?”

His hands slid around my waist as he said, “Time for takeout and my son’s hot teacher? Yes. Yes, I have time.”

I laughed as he kissed me. He took the bag from me, then took my hand and led me to the office that was located behind the register. He had a chair at his computer and a big comfortable recliner in the corner that I sat in immediately, loving the way is seemed to hug me.

“What brings you by?” he asked as he unloaded the iconic white boxes from the paper sack.

“Just thought it would be nice to bring you lunch,” I said, shrugging. The truth of the matter was, my days and evenings had been filled with Devon and his family. Since the dinner at his house almost two weeks ago, we’d spent as much time together as possible. Most of that time involved Ruby and Jax, which I was thrilled about, but I knew his mother had them today while he worked, and it occurred to me we hadn’t had much alone time since we really started seeing each other.

Sure, there were some evenings where the kids would go to bed and we’d find ourselves alone on his couch, but I was always nervous one of the kids would wander out looking for a drink of water or needing an extra check under the bed for monsters. Even though Devon tried relentlessly to act like teenagers by making out while watching a movie—which I didn’t necessarily hate—I was always the one making sure we kept it family friendly.

Did I think much was going to happen in his office in the middle of the day at his hardware store? No. But it would still be nice to have a meal with him, just the two of us.

He filled my plate with my favorite foods, handed it to me, then dished up his own and took a seat behind his desk. I took a bite, sighing in delight, and my eyes rolled back in my head.

“There is nothing better than Chinese food,” I mumbled around a full mouth.

“Second only to watching a beautiful woman enjoying it,” Devon said with a wink.

“I have no shame when it comes to takeout. It’s delicious. I don’t care how bad it is for me.”

“Grace, I just watched you wrap your lips around that fork and then moan. I’ll buy you Chinese food every day for the rest of your life if that’s the show you put on.”

I blushed at his words but still couldn’t find it in myself to be ashamed. So I shrugged and took another bite, loving the way my body reacted to the notion that he was aroused by me. He let out a rough laugh and then sat in his chair and propped his feet up on his desk, taking a bite of his fried rice.

We continued to eat, making small talk about our day. He told me a funny story about Jax and how he went to great lengths to annoy his sister that morning, and I told him about seeing a student in the grocery store with his mother who looked completely wrecked. A lot of the time students behaved much better for their teachers than their parents, so I knew that moms and dads were just as eager for school to start in the fall as teachers were for it to be over in the summer.

We were both laughing when we heard the door ding, but I was caught off guard to hear Devon’s father call out from the back of the store, “I got it.”

“I had no idea your dad was here,” I whispered, mortified. “I would have brought him lunch, or at least made him a plate.”

Devon set his lunch down and smiled. “Come here.”

I looked out the window to make sure no customers nor his dad could see us, but then made my way over to him, putting my plate down on my chair. As I neared, his hands hit my hips and he positioned me against his desk, rolling his chair forward so that his knees straddled my legs. He looked up at me with lust in his eyes and his hands roamed from my hips down my legs, and up the backs of my thighs. For just a moment I regretted wearing jeans, wishing I’d put a skirt on to feel his fingers against my bare skin.

My breath picked up as his hands moved to cup my ass, pulling me away from the desk. Mine moved on their own and found purchase in his blond hair. I was practically in his lap and his face was mere inches from my sex, and even though I was fully dressed, it still felt dirty and illicit.

“Thank you for lunch,” he said, his voice just a breathy growl. He pulled me even closer, his hands spanning the entirety of my ass. “I can think of a million ways to repay you. But all of them involve you out of these jeans and out of this office.” His hands moved from my ass, forward, over my hips, his fingers spanning my body in the front, his thumbs dangerously close to the creases of my thighs. I was teetering between wanting his hands there so badly and wanting him to stop teasing me, to stop hinting at touching me in a way he couldn’t possibly deliver on as we sat there in his office with his father just outside.

“Devon,” I whispered, my fingers still threading through his hair, trying to imply with my tone that I wanted all those things done to me, but just not right that moment.