Page 41 of Summer Affair
“I think we have.” And she didn’t know how she felt about that. She was having so much fun talking, really talking with a man, she didn’t want it to end.
Oh, who was she kidding? It was because ofthisman that she didn’t want the night to end. He must have felt the same way because this time when he took her hand, he laced their fingers. “Besides football, what do you like to do?”
“Ball, ball, and ball. You?”
“Bake, bake, and be a mom.”
They both laughed, and an intimate stillness fell over their table. It was as if the bar disappeared and it was just the two of them, alone, sharing their lives. “Tell me one thing I’d never guess about you.”
He didn’t even hesitate. “I’m thirty flying hours from getting my pilot’s license.” Wow, she’d been expecting something like golf or travel. “Why do you look so shocked?”
“Not shocked. Surprised maybe, but not shocked.”
“How so?” he asked. “Dazzle me, Cupcake.”
Her belly fluttered at the idea that he found her dazzling, and flutters erupted in some other, more unsettling, places at the use of his nickname for her. They were still holding hands, which were now completely intertwined. As far as dates went, this one would be hard to beat.
“Well, your family is your world, and you value your privacy and quiet time. You could fly yourself between here and Seattle anytime you wanted and not have to deal with airports.” Now he was the one who seemed shocked. “You also have a sticker of airplane blades on the back of your car.”
“Beautiful and smart,” he said quietly. “How about you?”
Jillian never considered herself a blusher, but around him it was like a natural state of being.
“Back in college, I used to have a big bucket list. Visit all fifty states. Learn how to speak Italian. Read all the classics, although I’m thirty-six books into the top one hundred. Run a marathon. Skydive.”
“Hold up, skydive?”
She shrugged. “That was before I was a mom. Now I wouldn’t dare volunteer to do anything that could go horribly wrong.” There were a lot of things she’d put on the backburner when she became a mom. Not that she regretted even one moment, but talking about her bucket list reminded her of the fun-loving, adventurous woman she used to be.
“Current hobbies, I play in a local moms’ softball league.”
“You play softball?”
“Now who looks shocked. I played from middle school through college. I was the sweeper.”
“Oh, I am not shocked. Just understanding where your amazing ass comes from.”
She burst out laughing. “I don’t know about that but thank you.”
He let loose one of those boyish grins filled with mischief and humor. “Oh no, thank you.” Then that humor vanished, leaving behind heat and a whole lot of want.
His thumb slid over the inside of her wrist, ever so slowly, back and forth, making her pleasure parts light up like stadium lights. His gaze did a slow once-over and she felt her nipples practically pull out the party poppers.
It was as if they were two magnets who had defied science as long as possible and were finally giving in to the pull.
“What does the M mean?” he asked, his voice soft. “Please tell me it’s for massage. If so, we should have started there.”
This time when he flirted, it was different than the play-it-cool ladies’ man he’d been before. It had this soft genuineness about it that spoke to her, that drew her in and made her forget why this thing between them had nowhere to go.
“Message. And it can mean whatever I want it to. From, ‘I had a good time; I’d love to go out with you sometime’ to ‘Thanks for the drink; it was nice to meet you.’”
“The last would have been Ken’s message,” he said, and she nodded. “And what would Clay’s message be?”
She leaned close. “That I had a great time and would you like to come home with me?”
His eyes heated. “How many froufrou drinks have you had?”
“Too many to ask you to come home with me.”
