Chapter 14 Blame it on the Whiskey
Blame it on the Whiskey
WALKER
Fuck. It’s bad enough I’m obsessed with my nanny, like the most cliche man to ever walk the fucking earth.
Now it turns out I’ve been wanting to do unspeakable things to a virgin. An innocent.
I’m going to hell and I deserve it.
I scrub a hand down my face.
“Jesus,” I mutter. Because I need him.
She rolls her eyes again, but it doesn’t disguise her blush. “Oh, come on. It’s not that bad. There’s nothing wrong with me. I just haven’t done it yet. I mean, I’ve done other stuff, but…”
I don’t want to hear about the other stuff she’s done with other guys.
“Of course there’s nothing wrong with you,” I interject. “There’s absolutely nothing wrong with you.”
Just with me.
“So why do you look like I just poleaxed you with that revelation?” she asks.
I down the rest of my drink. “Don’t you worry about me.”
“I just haven’t found the right person,” she continues. “I guess this means I should start dating again.”
Every muscle in me tenses. “Excuse me?”
Her eyes widen at my tone.
Fuck. Tone it way the fuck down, Walker.
“I mean…” I clear my throat. “What’s the thought process there?”
“If I want to have sex with someone I trust, I have to get to know them first, right? That means dating a guy.”
“Makes sense,” I grit out.
She tilts her head, studying me with those big blue eyes that see too much. “Are you... upset about this?”
“Why would I be upset?” The question comes out harsher than I intend. “You're a grown woman. You can date whoever you want.”
“That's what I thought.” But she's still looking at me like she's trying to solve a puzzle. “So why do you look like you want to murder someone right now?”
Because I do. This hypothetical man who gets to touch her, kiss her, be her first…
And then I watch, astonished, as she lifts her dress over her head and tosses it aside.
She’s in her bra and panties. Pale blue lace this time.
She might as well be naked.
“You’re looking at me like I’m crazy,” she says. “Am I not allowed to take a dip in your pool?”
My mouth is dry. My dick is already rock hard.
“You allergic to swimsuits?” I manage.
“I guess I just keep forgetting them.”
I'm still silent, incapable of speech, as she wades in from the shallow end.
The water rises up her bare calves, her thighs.
The lace goes transparent the moment it hits the surface, pale blue turned to nothing, hiding everything and concealing nothing at the same time.
The water comes up to her waist, her ribs.
She takes a breath before she pushes off, her long red hair floating on the surface around her as she swims toward me.
She looks like a mermaid. Except instead of a seashell bra and a tail she's got shimmering lace. I can see her pink nipples. The copper curls at her pussy. It’s the second time I’ve seen her in the flesh like this but it feels like the thousandth, because I’ve been imagining it every single time I wrap my hand around my dick.
Despite my better judgment, despite the fact that I know the wise move would be to get out of this pool and go straight to my room so I can deal with this raging hard-on all by myself, I swim towards her instead.
“You're gonna ruin all your pretty lingerie,” I tell her.
At the last minute, instead of catching her in my arms, I pivot and force myself to swim towards the pool wall. I lean back against it, doing my best impression of a man with functioning self-control. “I’m gonna have to buy you all new things to wear.”
“Or I could just go without.” Her eyes are bright with mirth. “Would that give you peace of mind, Walker? Knowing I’m not wearing any bras and panties that are ready to be ruined?”
She’s gonna fucking kill me.
I wipe a hand down my face, but it doesn't help clear my head. Nothing will help with this woman except distance, and instead of maintaining it, I've let her swim right up to me.
Now we're in touching distance in the deep end of my pool at midnight.
Hands off, I tell myself. Hands off or you’ll hate yourself and someday she’ll wise up and hate you too.
She's drifted a little closer, treading water, close enough now that I can see the droplets of water rolling down her collarbone. To her round, gorgeous tits.
I look away.
“What about you?” she asks. “Ready to get back in the saddle after your divorce?”
“Not interested.”
Not interested in any woman that isn’t you.
She considers me with those blue eyes.
“There have been a number of great songs,” she says, “written by beautiful, talented women about all the ways you broke their hearts. And those are just the ones who had a microphone to tell about it. You had quite the reputation, back in the day.”
Under the water, her feet are moving in slow easy kicks to keep herself afloat. Every few seconds her leg brushes mine. I don’t think she notices. But every time she touches me, the sensation goes straight to my dick.
Down, boy.
“Different time. Different me.”
Except that old devil feels very close to the surface right now. More potent than ever before, because of her.
I close my eyes again, pray for patience. “You should go to bed.”
“Not until you tell me what's going on.” She swims around me, circling me like a siren. “One minute we're having a normal conversation, the next you're acting like…”
“Like what?”
“Like you're jealous.”
The word hangs between us like a lit match near gasoline.
“Jealous,” I repeat flatly.
I should laugh it off. Make some joke about being in protective dad mode. Change the subject. Get out of this pool, safely away from temptation.
Instead, I just stare at her, my jaw clenched so hard it aches.
“That's ridiculous,” I lie. “It’s just… you have a lot going on. And dating adds too many complications.”
She arches an eyebrow. “You're being weird, Walker.”
“Yeah, well.” I swim away, needing to not look at her bright eyes and soft pink lips. “It's been a weird night.”
“I'm sorry,” she says. “I shouldn't have told you about... that. It made things awkward.”
Everything in me wants to turn around. To close the distance. To show her exactly how not awkward I think her virginity is.
How fucking delicate and terrifying and completely off-limits it makes her.
“It's fine. We’re good.”
“This doesn't feel good.”
I let out a breath. “What do you want me to say, Sadie?”
“I don't know. The truth, maybe? Why are you acting mad, then?”
The truth. The truth is I want her so badly I can barely think straight. The truth is she's twenty four and works for me and takes care of my son and I'm the worst kind of bastard for even entertaining these thoughts.
The truth is that now I'm going to fantasize about being the first man to ever have her for the rest of my life.
“The truth is you should date,” I force out. “Find some nice guy your own age. Take it slow. Get to know each other. See if… see if he’s the right one. If he deserves you.”
“Right.” She nods slowly. “That makes sense.”
It makes perfect sense.
So why does hearing her agree feel like a sucker punch to the gut?
I swim towards the whiskey bottle waiting for me on the ledge and pour another drink. A stiff one.
“I mean, there are options,” she continues, almost thoughtfully, swimming around me again. “The new foreman working at the Morrison place, for instance. He seems sweet. And interested. Asked if I wanted to grab coffee sometime when I ran into him at the grocery store.”
My hand clenches around the glass as I take a drink. “Morrison's foreman. Is he the one with that ugly mullet?”
“He doesn't have a mullet, Walker.”
“Spiritually speaking, he does.”
She laughs. “You’re impossible.”
I try to be generous in my assessment of this guy I already hate. “I don't know much about him.”
Except that I’m seething at the thought of him touching her.
“Me neither. But that's the point of dating, though, right? Getting to know someone?”
She's swimming on her back now, casual as anything, like she's not dismantling every last shred of my self-control with her words, her body, the wet lace doing absolutely nothing to hide her curves.
“He seems nice,” she continues, staring up at the stars. “Good with horses.”
Nice? Good with horses? Those are her qualifications?
The man who's going to try to kiss her, put his hands all over her, be her fucking first…
“Walker? You okay?”
“Fine.” It comes out through gritted teeth.
“Okay.” But she's watching me too carefully, seeing too much. “So you think I should go out with him? If he asks again?”
No. Hell no. Over my dead body.
“You don't need my permission.”
I set my glass down hard. The sound makes her jump slightly, and when her eyes meet mine, there's a question in them. She can sense the tension coiling between us but clearly doesn't know what to do with it.
Of course she doesn’t.
She’s a virgin.
And I’m… me. Not that I know what to do with this tension either.
I force myself back to the deep end. Distance, I remind myself, swimming through the turquoise water.
“I suppose getting married and having a child changes a man,” she says.
“I was ready for something more even before that. You can only live young, wild, and free for so long before you start wondering if there’s more to life than what craziness you can get up to on a Saturday night. I thought I found it. I did, in Jonah.”
“Can I ask you something?”
“Shoot.”
“Why doesn't she see him?” She says it gently, carefully. “Jonah’s mom. I know you said she's busy, but... Jonah says she doesn’t even call him.”
My heart fucking breaks for my son.
“She's not interested,” I say finally. Keep it simple. Keep it honest. “I don't understand it. Won't pretend I do. But it's her choice to make. All I can do is make sure Jonah knows he's loved. That he's wanted. That he matters.”
“You're doing a great job with him, you know,” she says. “I see the way he lights up when you come home. The way he runs to you first with every scraped knee and every interesting bug he finds. You’re everything to him.”
Hearing Sadie say it does something to me. I’ve needed to hear that for two years and I didn't know it until right now.
Because I don’t know if I’m doing a good job, let alone a great one.
Some days it feels like I was barely able to pull my son out of the wreckage of that broken marriage.
Sometimes it feels like the damage has already been done.
Every day I’m trying to be enough for a kid who deserves two parents who actually want him.
It’s been two years of wondering if I'm fucking it all up.
Hell, I’ve been wondering that from the moment he was born.
“Thanks,” I manage, throat tight.
“For what it's worth,” she adds tenderly, “I don't understand it either. How someone could choose not to be around that kid. He’s the best.”
“Yeah. He is.”
The water laps between us. I look at her in the starlight and feel that pull go taut in my chest again. That dangerous, inconvenient thing that shouldn’t be there at all and I suspect is there forever now.
“What about you?” I ask. “You care a lot about family too.”
She looks down at her hands. “I know what it’s like when someone walks away. So I promised myself I’d never do that. And I always keep my promises.”
“When you took this job, you said you'd take good care of my son. I'd say you've overdelivered on that promise. Jonah's thriving. He's happy as I’ve ever seen him. He adores you.”
Her cheeks go pink and she looks away, but she's smiling. “He's easy to love.”
“So are you.”
Her feet stop their slow kicks. The only sound is the lap of water against the pool edge as she stares at me.
The words are out before I can catch them. Blame it on the whiskey.
Except I meant every word.