Heartless: A Small Town Single Dad Romance(71)

I should be freaking out but I feel remarkably calm. Something about this is just too right to get worked up over. I live in my head enough to know when I’m losing my shit, and I’m definitely not.

“Handling what?” I reply, as I shift into drive and watch behind myself out of habit. I still check for my old dog, who was always ripping around the farm, burning off his endless energy. The dog Talia took with her. She literally said she wanted “the dog or the kid.” I still can’t believe those words came out of her mouth. There was no question about that for me. Anyone who put those two on the same priority level was sure as shit not going to be raising my child.

“This. What happened between us. All the sex. Are we doing more of that? Or is it a one-and-done scenario?”

One of my cheeks quirk up. “I think you mean six and done, baby.”

“Don’t baby me right now, Eaton. I’m serious.”

“Me too, Red. Should I pull over? We can make it seven and counting.”

“I hate you.” She crosses her arms like she’s pouting. I know better. Willa isn’t a pouter.

“Right. But you love my dick.”

She sucks in a deep breath and then lets out this adorable frustrated growl. “Weeks and weeks of you being a humorless asshole, and all it took was a few orgasms for you to become Mr.

Chucklehead. I should have taken one for the team sooner.”

I twist my fingers on the steering wheel, trying to hold back my laughter. “I think you should continue to take it for the team.”

Her head whips over to look at me. “Yeah?”

I shrug, keeping my eyes on the gravel road ahead of me. “Yeah. Definitely.”

“Why?”

I glance at her now. Her eyes are narrowed, and I can see the insecurity written all over her face.

Goddamn, but this girl puts on a good show.

“Because I like you, Willa.”

She points at me and tries to correct my statement. “You like to have sex with me.”

I stop the truck in the middle of the road. There’s no traffic so it doesn’t matter. And honestly, even if there were, they could all just fucking wait while I set this woman straight.

I turn to face her, one hand slung over the wheel. My posture might seem casual but my expression is not. She must take notice because I watch her shoulders shimmy as she sits up straighter and scans my face.

“No, Willa. I like you. I care about you. I didn’t go without sex for years just to start it back up randomly. I had opportunities, and I turned them down because I wasn’t interested. We don’t need to make a show of it, and with Luke around, we probably shouldn’t. But I’m interested in you. I don’t know where that leaves us or what it all means. All I know is that it’s going to fucking wreck me when you leave at the end of this summer, but I’m too far gone to care.”

Her lips pop open like she’s about to say something, but she closes them again. I can see her processing. She’s so expressive, nothing is locked up with a face like that. I can read her far too easily.

She doesn’t say it, but she looks happy with my response.

What she says is, “Thank you.”

I give her a firm nod, put the truck in drive, and reach across the console, palm open. Within seconds she slides her slender fingers between mine, and I wrap her hand up, giving her a quick squeeze as we drive to the main farmhouse in a stunned but companionable silence.

“Dad!” Luke flies around the corner of my father’s house like a bat out of hell as I stride around the front of my truck to open Willa’s door. I swear this kid never stops running . . . jumping . . . climbing. He’s taken years off my life for sure. “Willa!” he cries, when he sees her step out of the vehicle.

“You’re not my chauffeur, you know,” she murmurs as she takes my hand to hop down.

“I’ll add not opening your car door to the list of offenses—that includes not eating your pussy—

from past men.”

She blushes and drops my hand, stepping away.

Keeping our hands off each other is going to be fucking torture. I can tell by the way her fingers trailed over my palm, like she wanted to hold contact for as long as possible.

Luckily for my ego, Luke launches himself at me first. I pull him up against me, noting how much heavier he’s grown. How much taller. He’s getting bigger faster than I care for. Growing up way too damn fast.

“Hey, pal. You have a good sleepover?”

“The best!” He smacks a loud kiss on my cheek, and I wonder what age he’ll stop doing that.

He pops down and does the same to Willa, except he wraps his arms around her waist. She doubles over, hair fanning around him as she hugs him back and whispers something private to him.

Luke giggles, and Willa rubs a hand across the back of his head before dropping a quick kiss to his crown.

I stare at them like a lovesick fool, imagining something I’ve never let myself imagine. Luke’s had plenty of caretakers over the years—teachers, friends—but he’s never been as taken with a single person as he is with Willa. He’s needed someone like her in his life so badly.

And I guess that makes two of us because I can’t take my eyes off them.

“You having a stroke, son?” My dickhead dad calls from the front porch, actually making me jump.