Two hours, several bowls of popcorn, one emergency trip to the bathroom and one meltdown later, they emerged from the cinema. Everyone seemed happy to have gotten their bunny on. The youngest kids were sleeping, and Alicyn looked as if she was headed in that direction as well.
Willa was completely taken by Maxim, Sienna thought as she smiled to herself. She couldn’t help but notice that the young girl managed to position herself in the seat next to him and had spent half the movie giggling and flipping her hair. His appeal was magnetic, that was for certain. As a matter of fact, Sienna was almost relieved for the physical space this seating arrangement had brought, especially since she arranged the other kids in a row between them.
They stood outside the theater, and Max’s mocking grin made it clear he knew exactly what she’d engineered. She made a face at him. “Thanks for the company,” she said loudly for the benefit of all.
“Thank you,” he responded. He seemed to be waiting.
She made the appropriate noises and then said, “I guess we’ll be going.”
He shook Willa’s hand gravely, and then leaned forward and pressed a kiss on Sienna’s cheek. At the same time, Sienna realized, he was slipping her a small rectangular plastic. She glanced down at it. It was a hotel key card. She recognized the hotel as it was the one Alexandre bought years ago to house the guests for his wedding to Jacyn. Sienna wondered how he could afford to rent out a room there.
Eight o'clock?he mouthed silently.
She shook her head, whispering that, although the other kids were going back to their respective parents and Alicyn had a nanny, she wanted to be there to make sure the little girl enjoyed her bedtime story and asleep before she went anywhere.
He nodded sagely. “Well, call me when you are free, then. I can be flexible.”
That you are, she thought as her mind went racing back to that night they spent together with the determination of a bloodhound chasing a rabbit. As she watched him wind his way into the thickening afternoon crowd of shoppers, her brain was abuzz.
She knew she’d agreed to this no-strings-attached arrangement, yet it took a great effort for her to quell the sprinkling of doubt that was turning up among her excitement. Never in her life had she been so thoroughly pleasured by a man. Hell, she couldn’t even do things to herself that he had done, and she knew her body very well.
But he was a whole five years younger than she was. Not a kid by a long shot, but when she was fifteen, he was ten years old. She had no intention of falling for a guy that age, because that would be idiotic.
At least, she reassured herself, this arrangement had a short, predetermined shelf-life. And furthermore, once Jacyn was back home with the new addition to her family, Sienna would return to the States and her life, leaving this all behind.
What was the harm?
“I like him,” Willa chirped as Max disappeared from view.
Sienna shrugged. “Eh. He’s aight.”