A Father's Name(47)

“I found this at the garage.” She held the wrinkled envelope out to him. “It looked important, so I brought it over.”

Tyler turned and walked into the house and she assumed that was an invitation and followed. “Where’s Jace?”

“Sleeping. Bart and your dad had him out fishing this afternoon and he didn’t get his nap. He was so tired he fell asleep in his spaghetti. I took a picture before I cleaned him up and tucked him in. I figured you’d like it.”

“I would. I have a picture of Bart when he was about that age. He fell asleep while eating a chocolate ice cream cone.” A sense of wistfulness struck her anew. Her son was no longer a toddler who fell asleep in his food. He was an adult who was building his own life—one that didn’t revolve around her.

“I was going to ask to take Jace for a walk, but guess not.” She realized she was still holding the envelope and held it out to him again.

He didn’t take it.

“Is it important?” she asked.

“No,” was his monosyllabic response.

And his denial told her the opposite. “Do you want to talk about it?”

“No.” And as if suddenly recalling his manners, he added a very formal, “Thank you.”

She didn’t know what to do with the envelope, so she simply set it on the small table by the doorway.

“Tyler, what’s with you? One minute we’re buddy-buddy, then we’re kissing on the bluff, and then you’re treating me like…” She shrugged, not sure how to define the wall he’d put between them. “Did I do something?”

“Your father made it clear he doesn’t want us dating.”

“Here’s a news flash—my father doesn’t make my decisions.”

“Maybe he should, because you should want more than I’d be able to give you. You deserve the whole nine yards. Hell, you deserve…”

Tyler let the sentence fade as he stared at Tucker as she closed the distance between them.

So close. She was so close to him, but she still felt the distance he’d worked so hard to maintain the last two weeks. She wasn’t sure why it bothered her so much, but it did. She was tired of being held at arm’s length when all she wanted to do was get closer.

She was tired of her father and Tyler telling her what she should want. What was best for her.

Tucker wasn’t accustomed to taking orders from anyone. She’d forgotten that for a moment, but she remembered now. She reached up, locked her fingers behind Tyler’s neck and gently pulled him down so that his lips were an inch away from hers. She heard him sigh and sensed whatever war he’d been fighting with himself was over. He met her lips with his own.

The other kisses they’d shared, even the hot one on the Fourth, suddenly seemed chaste when compared with this one. This kiss was something so much more and it went on and on, which was fine with Tucker.

She could have stood forever, locked in this embrace. But obviously Tyler couldn’t. He pulled back and then took a couple steps to separate them. “Walk away, Angel. This is all I can offer you.”

“What? A kiss that about blew my mind. I don’t think something like that is settling.”

“It is, because for you it should be more than sex. And I can’t give you more than that. Friendship, yes. That’s already yours. But nothing more. I’m an ex-con with a kid. You’ve been a single mother your entire adult life and when Bart leaves for school in a few weeks, you’re finally going to have a chance to be on your own. To explore what you want out of life. To do what you want when you want. You deserve that.”

“Do you really want to give me what I deserve?” she asked. When he nodded, she said, “Then let’s take this into your bedroom, please.”

“Angel, I…”

At first, she thought he was going to say no, but then he took her hand and led her up the stairs.



AN HOUR AND A HALF LATER, Tyler wondered about the woman sleeping on the other side of the bed.

What the hell had he done?

Angelina deserved so much more than he could give her—he’d said as much repeatedly to himself, and to her—and yet, here they were. He watched her and wished more than anything that things were different. That he wasn’t turning into everything he hated about his father.

An ex-con, for all intents and purposes, a single parent, a mechanic and a man who saw nothing wrong with using women.