Wild Man (Dream Man #2)(122)

By the way, my ban on the mall was up and I made a vow to myself that, next year, post Christmas, no matter how frenzied Christmas could get, I was lifting the ban in February because I’d gone gonzo when I hit a mall for the first time in over two months and I bought practically an entirely new vacation wardrobe. Some of it was hot but all of it was awesome and none of it I needed (really) especially not after paying for four to be accommodated at a five-star hotel and while setting up a new bakery .

“Third,” I carried on talking to Brock, “although I intend to relax I also intend to shop and you can’t shop in a swimsuit. And last, evening will require me in something other than a bikini and who knows what we’ll be up to? We could be going to nice restaurants or local dive restaurants or family restaurants. I’ve never been to Aruba. Maybe we’ll go to all of those kinds of restaurants and each kind requires a different kind of vacation outfit, not just for me, for all of us. Therefore we all have to be prepared.”

To this ling-winded, multi-point explanation, Brock asked, “You don’t wear bikinis?”

I rolled my eyes and headed to the exit doors outside of which my car was parked. “No.”

“Why not?”

“I just don’t.”

“Why?”

I pushed through the doors asking, “Do I actually need to explain?”

He didn’t answer. Instead he asked his own question of, “Do you own a bikini?”

I answered his question. “No.”

“Babe, you’re at a mall,” he told me something I knew.

“Actually, I’m outside walking to my car.”

“Turn around and buy yourself a bikini,” he paused, “or four.”

“Brock.”

“Sweetness,” his voice had dipped low, “you got a great body. Fuckin’ beautiful. Since you told me about this trip, I’ve been imagining you on the beach in a bikini. I’ve also been imagining you other places in a bikini. I’ve also been imagining taking off your bikini. All this imagining has lasted four weeks. I only got two days left to wait. Don’t take that away from me.”

Mm. I liked that. All of it. So much, I started imagining too.

My imagining took all my attention so I stopped behind a car and studied the tips of my high-heeled boots.

Then something else hit me and I asked, “Do you think it’s okay to be in a bikini around the boys?”

I could actually envision Brock’s eyebrows snapping together before he said, “Uh…

yeah.” Then, “Why?”

“I don’t know,” I mumbled.

There was a moment of silence then, softly, “Baby, you just became stepmom to two boys.

That doesn’t mean you gotta go June Cleaver.” Then he ended on a muttered, “Or Christ, at least I hope you don’t.”

I thought about it.

Then I informed him, “Donna never wore a bikini.”

“Did Donna have a great f**kin’ body like you do?”

“Donna was five foot two and liked carrot cake more than Rex and chocolate cake way more than Joel. How do you think I learned how to make them?”

I listened to my man chuckle then he said, “Turn around and buy me some bikinis.”

“I already bought you three nighties.”

More silence, then low, “Fuck,” then, “Make my year, sweetness, turn around and add bikinis.”

I grinned.

He went on, “I’ll swing by, get the boys, bring ‘em into the Station. Can you pick them up here?”

His question and the casual way he asked it made warm gushiness saturate my belly.

This was an addition to my life that I liked. Since Martha started and my load was less but Brock’s hadn’t changed, Brock dropped the boys off at school (on time) and I left the bakery to get them in the afternoons. Usually, they hung out with me at the bakery after school.

Sometimes, I had to take them to baseball practice which had just started and I’d hang while they practiced. Sometimes, I called it quits early and we all hung out at home.

I liked this. All of it. Meeting, even fleetingly, the other Moms and Dads I’d see during school runs, getting to know the boys’ friends and their parents, having chats with the boys about how their day went. I never thought I’d have that, asking two beings I loved if they had their homework done, listening to them chatter in the car while I drove, hearing their voices drifting up the stairs while they fought in front of the television about what they were going to watch, going to the grocery store and buying food enough for a family, not just myself or not just myself and a partner.

I loved being with Brock, he made me feel safe, he made me feel beautiful, he made me feel loved. I loved all he’d given me, more than I could say.

But the best thing he’d given me was a family.

And since he gave me a family, I could give him bikinis.

Therefore, I turned back toward the mall, answering, “Sure.”

“Text me when you’re on your way.”

“All right, honey.”

“Later, babe.”

“Later, Brock, love you.”

“Me too, darlin’.”

I sighed happily.

He disconnected.

I put my phone in my purse.

Then I saw the middle of a man in front of me, I started to scoot by him and say, “Excuse me,” but I didn’t get the “Excuse me” part out.