Chapter 16
COOPER
Dad Joke Of The Day:
Where do you go to learn how to make a banana split?
Sundae School
“So, what do you think, Miss Ally,” Lucas says with a mouthful of pasta, his excitement not allowing him to wait.
But I’m too curious about her answer to interrupt and tell him not to talk with his mouth full—I guess patience doesn’t run in the family. Ally, on the other hand, is polite, finishing her bite before looking over at Lucas with the biggest smile.
“You weren’t joking, bud. This has to be the best Alfredo I’ve ever had in my life!” she says dramatically. I watch with admiration as Lucas just beams at her like she’s one of the best things in the world.
Maybe she is.
“I told you!” he shouts, turning to me with excitement filling his face. “See Dad, I told you it was the best. Now do you believe me?” he says, and I feel my cheeks heat, my four-year-old giving me a pep talk about my cooking somehow feeling a little funny.
Gonna have to teach him what it means to be a wing man one day.
Wait. Do I need a wing man?
Am I trying to pick up Ally?
I know I haven’t been able to stop thinking about her since I helped her out with Quinn and Levi.
Well, I drove, and I stayed with Levi to make sure he stayed in the hotel lobby.
They were fighting and Quinn ran, but even Ally, Levi’s ex, could see how perfect they were together.
She went to help set things right. But Levi couldn’t go up there until Ally had her chance to talk—she gave me very specific instructions on that.
She might have even yelled when I made a joke out of the whole thing as the three of us drove to Quinn’s hotel.
I should have known the second her yelling at me turned me on that I was going to be a goner for this girl.
I guess I just thought my defenses were a little better than this.
They haven’t been though, and that’s pretty apparent because, besides my son and hockey, Ally is the only thing I think about, and it’s starting to drive me crazy.
Then this afternoon when I called this a date?
I must’ve replayed the conversation inviting her to stay for dinner a million times in my mind.
Wishing, praying, that I had said anything other than the word date.
But I did…and the more time I spend with her and my kid tonight, the more I like thinking about this as a date.
“No, seriously Cooper, it’s delicious. This might be the best thing I’ve ever had in my mouth.” She utters the words nonchalantly, but her face immediately heats, the redness taking over her cheeks as she realizes what she just said.
My mind starts playing through all the ways I could change that statement for her, but instead of saying something, I just quirk a brow, letting her sit in the silence of her words.
“Don’t even say it, Coop,” Ally finally mumbles, and I’ll be damned if that nickname doesn’t make me feel something.
Laughing, I raise my hands in surrender. “I didn’t say anything! That was all you.”
We spend the next bit finishing dinner. Lucas and Ally both show me the painting they did today once Quinn left, and then we all work together to clear the table and get the kitchen cleaned up.
“Daddy, can I go lay on the couch and watch a movie? I’m sleepy,” Lucas finally says.
“No problem, bud. I’ll go get you set up,” I tell him before turning to Ally. “Wanna go set up the fire pit and I’ll meet you out there in a few?”
“Deal. But grab us a drink before you come out?” Ally adds, with a twinkle in her eye that has my cock springing to life.
We sit on the patio watching the sunset in comfortable silence, sipping on a blackberry bramble that Ally said was easily her favorite drink so far. I never pegged her as a whiskey girl, but I’m not disappointed.
“So, Ally Cat, should we play another round of our game?”
“I’m in, but let’s make it a little more interesting,” Ally says, her deep, silky voice sliding over my skin and leaving goosebumps covering my body from just the sound.
“What do you mean more interesting? Juicier questions?” I ask.
She sits there thinking, tapping her finger on her lips dramatically as she waits. “I was thinking of juicier stakes.”
My eyebrows raise. I’m immediately intrigued as I realize we’re both just a little tipsy now, each on our second drink. Not drunk by any means, just enough that a little bit of my filter has been thrown out the window, and by the sounds of it, so has hers.
“Go on,” I murmur, my voice low, laced with need.
I need her to take control—to cross that line and prove I’m not just imagining this pull between us.
Because if I’m right, if this heat simmering under the surface is real, then we’re on the edge of something explosive, something I’ve never felt before but suddenly crave more than my next breath.
“Well…” She drags the word out, letting it hang between us as I lean in just a little closer. “I was thinking about that shot, and what if we made it a little more…interesting?”
“What do you mean? Interesting like take a shot upside down and do a little jig without spitting it out, or interesting like body shots interesting,” I ask, desperately hoping it’s the latter, and by the way her eyes light up at my words, I have a feeling it just might be.
“Well, I hadn’t come up with an actual idea yet, but body shots definitely sound like an option,” she says, her eyes scanning my body. A slow smile curves on her lips. “We can, you know…raise the stakes. Maybe add a little reward—or consequence.”
“Game on, Ally Cat. Now who goes first?”
She looks me up and down before jutting her chin out my way. “You go first.”
“Should I call you scaredy cat instead of Ally Cat,” I joke, and she blushes. The fire in front of us illuminates the pink on her cheeks, the bright blue of her eyes reflecting back at me, and it feels like a dare.
“Okay then, hmm…” I say dramatically, trying to decide what to say this time. “Two truths and a lie. One, I got my first pair of skates when I was five. Two, I’m afraid of the dark. And three, my favorite musician is Machine Gun Kelly.”
She looks at me, dumbfounded, and I just smirk knowing she has no chance of getting this one right.
“Hmm. I say number one is the lie,” she says cautiously, her hopeful eyes watching me, but I just shake my head no.
“I’ll give you one more chance,” I mutter quietly, inching closer.
“Number three?” she says hopefully, her eyes dropping to the bottle of bourbon I brought out with us.
“Yes ma’am,” I say, my eyes dropping to her mouth, the tension thickening as we both look at the other like we’re waiting for someone to move.
“So I guess…” she starts, trailing away as she watches me. “You have to take a shot.”
“I do,” I tell her gruffly as I wait for her to back out.
“Off of me,” she adds, her eyes darkening as they drop to my lips.
“Yes, ma’am,” I say again, my voice becoming gravely with lust as I imagine my mouth on her skin.
“Well, in that case, grab the bourbon,” she says quietly, scooting in her seat to get comfortable as she watches me intently.
Grabbing the bottle in one hand, I turn my body in my seat until I’m facing her, feet on the ground as I rest my elbows on my legs. “There’s only one more question, Ally,” I drawl, letting my words roll off my tongue as anticipation builds deep inside me.
“What’s that?” she whispers, her breaths more shallow now, her body still as she watches me.
“Where am I taking it from?” I ask, her eyes still locked on mine as I lean forward.
Hooking her chair with my foot, I slide her towards me until she’s within reach.
Her eyes widen in shock as they follow my fingers, slowly sliding up her bare thigh.
It feels like the entire world stills as I slide my fingers up her skin, up past her jean shorts until I reach the inch of bare skin under her shirt.
“Here?” I ask with my hand on her stomach, and she shakes her head no.
Slowly sliding up further, I slide over the curve of her breasts and slide my fingers over the flesh of her cleavage, scared to ask but knowing damn well I’d hate myself forever if I didn’t put it out there. Raising my eyebrow, I look down at her, my eyes darkening as I take her in.
“Here?” I ask, but she shakes her head no yet again. I keep moving, sliding my fingers over her collarbone, her entire body shivering at the contact as her cheeks flush, her mouth opening just slightly as her breathing becomes more and more shallow.
Interesting.
“What about here?” I ask, my fingers hovering just above her skin, waiting until she nods. “Is that a yes?”
“Yes,” she says, her breathy tone hitting me just right, spurring my cock to life as I try to hold myself back from jumping into action.
Slowly, I lift the bottle of bourbon with one hand while my other slides behind her neck, fingers threading into her hair as I tug gently, tilting her head just enough to bare the curve of her collarbone.
The first drop of bourbon hits her skin, and I swear I feel it in my bloodstream. The caramel colored liquid spills down the slope of her neck, and I watch, entranced and ravenous as it rolls across her pale skin, my restraint so close to snapping.
I lean in, tongue chasing the trail—greedy and feral—licking the bourbon from her neck, her collarbone, down to the swell of her breasts. The burn of the liquor against the heat of her body is fucking sinful, intoxicating in a way that has nothing to do with the alcohol.
When I glance up, her eyes are locked on mine—dark, hungry, almost starved—and damn if it doesn’t light me up from the inside out. Her cheeks flushed, lips parted, chest rising with each breath, looking like she’s daring me to keep going. Begging without words for more and—
Her phone rings.
I blink, the moment shattering like glass.
For fuck’s sake. Next time we do this, phones are staying inside. “Are you going to answer that,” I ask, internally begging that the answer is no.
She looks down at her phone, the name Wilson flashing on the screen, and I feel anger rise inside me that he’s ruining this right now.
But she surprises me when she shakes her head no. “I never answer,” she whispers.
“But he calls? Even if you don’t answer?”
“Almost every day.”
“I’ll answer,” I tell her, raising my eyebrows in question, but she just shakes her head no.
“He’s not worth the time,” she says, her eyes still on me.
I look down at her body, a few drops of bourbon trailing down her breast, a path I’m just begging to follow, my finger tracing it down her body, stopping just as her skin meets her clothes—not willing to push my luck too much.
Right as I’m about to say screw it and drop my tongue back to her body, the sliding glass door opens and Lucas comes out, waking up after I’d already put him to sleep.
Son of a bitch.
“Can we make s’mores?” he says, rubbing sleep from his eyes as he yawns. As he finally looks up, there is nothing but hope in his eyes, and I’ll be damned if I’m not making s’mores.
Yet again we’re interrupted from feeling things out…feeling out this attraction to see just how intense it actually is.
Next time I’m looking for a babysitter so I can be alone with my nanny.