Birthday Girl(131)

“Okay.”

I sit down in the seat and pull off my muddy boots, throwing them in the bed with Pike’s shirt, and I take off my hat, my hair falling around my face.

“You know…” I start, “I’m a little nervous.”

“Oh?”

I shake my head, tsking. “Marrying an older man with so much more experience…”

He comes up to me, grabbing my hips and pulling me to the edge of the seat and into him. I run my hand up his naked chest.

“I don’t need my wife to know what other men like,” he states. “Just what I like.”

My eyebrows shoot up, getting an idea. Slowly, I unbutton the flannel shirt I’m wearing and watch his eyes go round when he sees I have nothing on underneath it. I open it slightly, inviting his eyes to rest on my bare breasts.

“And what do you like?” I taunt like that night in the kitchen when I put a Band-Aid on his finger.

His gaze is locked on my chest, and I let the shirt fall down my arms, my nipples hard from the chill of the rain in the air.

I drop my voice to a whisper. “I think I need more practice.”

His eyes grow dark and full of desire as he looks up at me. Pulling himself up on the step, he dives into the truck and out of the rain, his body coming down on top of mine. I fall back on the seat, opening my legs for him as I work to open his belt.

Our lips hover over each other.

“Whatever the birthday girl wants,” he whispers.





Pike

Nine Years Later



A crack of thunder pierces the silence, and I blink my eyes awake as lightning flashes through the room. I sigh, sticking my thumb and a finger in my eyes, rubbing.

More rain, dammit.

Nope. It’s not my job to worry about it for the next two weeks, so I’m not going to. Dutch can handle it. (I have to believe that.)

Jordan and I are out of here in the morning, and he’s in charge while I’m gone. I promised her she and the boys would have my complete attention while we’re away as long as she leaves her laptop home and doesn’t try to sneak in any work, either. The problem with her is that her work is also her hobby, so I kind of felt bad asking her to stay away from something she loves for that long.

But she’s right. The kids need to see us without our eyes buried in some screen.

I turn my head, looking down at her next to me. She’s curled up on her side, her nose and lips buried in my arm with one hand draped over my chest and shoulder. Her shoulder-length hair is swept over the top of the pillow, and I reach down and pull the sheet back up over her bare legs and white panties. She wears the yellow T-shirt she got on our honeymoon in Mexico, and I still can’t tell she’s four months along with our second kid. Our first, Jake, is asleep in his room down the hall. Jake Ryan Lawson. She named him after some guy in a teen movie from the 80s, but I don’t tell people that. She can tell them, but I’m certainly not going to.

I rest my hand on her thigh and stare up at the ceiling.

I’m forty-eight years old. What business do I have with a six-year-old son and another kid on the way?

But fuck, I’m happy.

The pitter-patter of the rain hits the window panes, and I feel Jordan breathing so peacefully next to me. I close my eyes. Mine. My house, my wife, my family…mine. Sometimes I’m so overwhelmed by how lucky I am that I can’t wrap my head around this all being real. I still can’t stop reaching for her when she’s close or stop being anxious to crawl into bed at night, knowing we’re finally alone.

I suddenly remember the wash drying out on the line in the backyard and pop up and out of bed. “Shit,” I mumble, pulling on some lounge pants.

Leaving the room, I walk down the hall, stopping at Jake’s door and quietly cracking it open. He sleeps in his bed, while Cole’s son, Parker, is passed out next to him. Both of them looking like a spider web of arms and legs, and I laugh under my breath. We’ve explained to them that Jake is Cole’s brother which makes him Parker’s uncle, but it’s hard for them make sense out of something like that when they’re the same age.

My chest tightens every time I see them like this, though. My son and my grandson are more like brothers, and I really don’t give a shit if it seems weird to others, because we’re a lucky family.

Cole met his wife, Kotori, when he was stationed in Okinawa, and both of them are currently attending some convention her company sent her to in Las Vegas. We invited Parker to join us for a couple weeks, so they could go on their own.

Closing the door, I jog down the stairs, passing all our family pictures on the walls, most of which I’m in, and walk through the kitchen to the laundry room. I grab a wicker basket off the dryer and make my way into the backyard. The rain is small, but it hits my back like little darts, sharp and fast. I run over to the clothesline and start yanking beach towels and any other last-minute clothes Jordan wanted washed in order to throw in the suitcases. We probably have more than enough packed for the road trip north, but my luck, we’ll get to the lake house, and she’ll be pissed off for two weeks because she doesn’t have her other-other-pink shirt that goes better with the sneakers she got that time on that one trip.

I clear the line, stuffing all the pins into the bag, and carry the basket back inside. Opening the dryer, I stick everything in and turn on the machine, making sure it’s ready for when we wake up in the morning.