“Of course I didn’t want you to stop. You were giving me fabulous orgasms.” I wink, keeping my tone light and casual. Maybe if I can keep this focused on the sexy part, I’ll convince him that it was nothing more than a blip in my control.
“I remember every detail, every sound you made, and fuck, I want to hear them again. Just remembering how you felt in my arms, how you opened up for me, brings me to my knees, Caroline. Tell me you don’t think about that night.”
“I do. Every night... and day. Basically all the time.”
Daniel cups the right side of my face in his hand, resting his thumb at the corner of my mouth. A memory flashes in my mind, when he touched me the exact same way. The memory is so vivid that I instantly ache on the inside.
Right, I need him to stop touching me. Otherwise, I’ll never whip my thoughts into a coherent sentence. I swear the spell this man has on me should be illegal. Everything about him is just too intense. Too overwhelming. I step back, sizing him up.
“But we’ll get over it eventually.”
I do a mental fist pump because my voice sounded strong, and firm. It wavered a teeny tiny little bit, but I’m sure only I could tell that. Except Daniel is smiling.
“Why are you smiling?” I ask.
“Never mind, go on. I’m listening.”
“Well, I—for the love of God, stop smiling. It makes me feel like you know something I don’t.”
“Maybe I do.”
I poke his ribs with my finger. “You’re infuriating.”
“Can’t disagree there.”
“Wanna share what’s got you smiling so much?”
“You’re so fucking adorable trying to convince yourself, it makes me want to kiss you right now.”
I take a giant step back, hold up a finger menacingly. “Don’t you dare!”
Daniel smiles even more broadly. “I’d believe you don’t want it if you weren’t licking your lips.”
Whoops.
I open my mouth, close it again, unsure what to say. Do I want to feel the warmth of his body again, hear him murmur sweet nothings in my ear? Of course I do. But the failure of our last rendezvous still looms over me. Besides, I’m not a catch. I’m not whole anymore, and there’s no way around that. No point deluding myself... or him.
“Let’s go back to your family,” I say.
For a split second, he looks like he’s going to call me out on the change of subject, then nods. I take that as a sign he’s going to drop this. Grudgingly, but will drop it.
But as the day goes on, I’m not so sure anymore. Every time we’re next to each other, he touches me relentlessly: my hand, the small of my back, my shoulder.
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The Bennetts spend the entire afternoon with us, right up until we close at six o’clock. Afterward, Dad insists on inviting the family for dinner. I use all my cunning to convince him to order pizza, instead of him “whipping up something quickly.” It would be a poor repayment to the Bennetts to torture them with one of my father’s cooking attempts.
“It’s good to have the house full again,” he comments excitedly. “Feels like when you kids were little.”
Guilt gnaws at me. Dad is lonely, and I have no clue how to remedy it. I can always stop by for dinner more often, but I suspect he needs company of his own age.
The dining room in Dad’s house is far too small for so many people, so we decide to host dinner in the newly built coffee shop. We push the small tables together to form a long one, arranging the chairs around.
“Here you go,” Daniel says, and I nearly jump out of my skin. My arms are full of pizza cartons. They were taking up too much space, so I decided to take them to the trash cans outside before eating. Daniel is carrying the boxes I couldn’t fit in my arms. I was so lost in thought, I didn’t realize he was right next to me, opening the back door.
“By the way, I had an idea,” I say as we step outside. “I could talk to nearby schools and preschools, tell them about our kids’ corner, invite them to do readings.”
“Excellent idea.”