Rooted (Pagano Family #3)(92)
He wanted to f*ck her right there, and he ground his hips against her, letting her feel his need. She groaned and bit down on his lip. They could—they could f*ck right now. Teresa was sound asleep in her car seat, and they were completely alone here in the Wilde Wood. Jordan was joining them for a few days, but not until tomorrow.
Theo pushed his hand into Carmen’s jeans, but she dropped a hand from his head and wrapped it around his wrist.
“No, Theo. Not now.”
“She’s sleeping.” He buried his face in her hair and bit lightly on the skin of her throat. The vibration of her moan on his tongue made him drive his hips against her again. “I finally have you here. I want to have you here.”
“And you will. But I don’t want to f*ck against the door of the truck our kid is sleeping in. It seems…I don’t know. Tacky.”
Laughing, though no less horny, he finally leaned back. “When did you get all proper and prim?”
She punched his chest lightly. “I’ll make you pay for that. But later. Come on. I want to see the nursery. Jordan keeps texting me, asking if I’ve seen it yet.”
“Okay,” he sighed. “But I’m going to take you up on later.” He released her, and she went around to collect Teresa’s carrier from the base buckled into the back seat. While she did, he opened the Cherokee’s hatch and pulled out a couple of bags, including the backpack they were using as a diaper bag. Then he led his girls to their house.
There was a large wreath hanging on the front door, made of pink tulle, with the netting bound snugly around the ring and flaring out all around like a tutu. Little pink and white fabric roses climbed up one side, and small vinyl letters spelled out Welcome Teresa across the bottom and up the other side. A white satin bow topped the whole thing.
It was quite a sight, big and garish and obviously homemade, and Carmen wasn’t really a pink-tulle kind of woman. She looked at it as if it were covered with bugs. Or guts. Actually, she probably would have seemed less disgusted if it had been guts. “Theo, what the hell is that?”
“That, I imagine, is Marijean. Remember her? I asked her and Perry to check in on things while I’ve been running up and down between Colson and Quiet Cove, and I told her we were coming up. She stocked the kitchen and got everything ready for living again. And I guess she might be a little excited about the baby. She has all boys. We’ll probably see a lot of her for a while.”
Carmen made a face. She might not have realized it, but she made a lot of faces. “I didn’t much like her. She’s nosy.”
“Yeah, she’s a gossip, too. So anything she knows, we can expect all of town to know within a day or two. But she’s sweet, and she’ll sincerely do anything she can for anybody who needs it without a blink. She just likes to talk and be involved. And come on, the wreath is a nice gesture.”
Now Carmen made a face and a noise, both demonstrating contempt. “Yeah, I don’t like her.”
“You don’t like most people, Carm. Just remember to keep your secrets secret and give her a chance.” They were still standing outside the door. He unlocked it now, opened it, and stepped back, making way for her to enter first with Teresa.
But she stood where she was. “If you’re trying to make me a nice person, you’re in for a shock.”
“I love you just as you are, beautiful girl. Just as you are. You’re nice when it counts.” He winked. “And I like you naughty, too.”
She rolled her eyes and crossed the threshold. “Lame.”
He laughed and followed her in.
They were home.
The house looked bright and fresh and smelled of pine furniture polish and floor cleaner. The windows gleamed. He’d only asked for groceries and fresh linens, but Marijean had done a full spring clean. And she had draped pink tulle with white satin bows over all the doorways.
“Oh, Jesus,” Carmen muttered.
Theo set the bags down next to the sofa. “Once Marijean comes over to say hi and see the baby, we can take it all down. Come on. Let’s take her back to her room. I can tell she needs a change.”
Carmen wrinkled her nose. “Yeah. You’d think she’d notice that, but she sleeps right through it.”
He led them down to the room that had been Eli’s, where a lot more tulle and satin had been gathered and draped—and there was a little bit of embroidered cloth pinned in the middle, pink and purple threads spelling out Teresa Joy in elaborate letters.
“I’d say Marijean will be an enthusiastic babysitter, should we need one.”
On another harrumph from Carmen, Theo opened the door. “Courtesy of Jordan and Rosa, welcome to Teresa’s room.”
Again, Carmen went in first, and again, Theo followed her.
“Holy shit,” she whispered.
Theo studied her, waiting for her reaction. The room his son and her sister had made up was no less girly than all the pink tulle and white satin Marijean had bombarded them with. But it was perfect, Theo thought. The perfect room to shelter his little girl.
The walls were painted lavender—his choice—and the furniture was a distressed off-white. French Country, Jordan had called it. Theo had liked that, too. She had been conceived in France. The area rug and all of the bedding were lavender, grey, and white. A simple, white Roman shade covered the paned window, which looked out onto the woods. A white gliding rocker with grey cushions was carefully positioned in front of the window. Using skills he’d learned in stagecraft courses in college, Jordan had painted a mural on the wall behind the crib—a large, white tree, its roots growing over the floorboards, its branches extending across the wall, sheltering the crib. He and Rosa had affixed leaves made of different kinds of white, purple, and grey fabric to the branches, and a pretty, white dove, made of fabric and feathers, perched on one branch. A bookcase held nearly a hundred children’s books, new and old, hand-me-downs from Eli and Jordan or dug up in New York bookshops, and an array of stuffed animals. On another wall, over the dresser that doubled as a changing table, hung a large, round mirror framed in mirrored petals. And the pièce de résistance: a crystal chandelier, all draping beads and teardrops, hung from the center of the ceiling. Rosa and Jordan had discovered that and the mirror in an antique shop in Chelsea.