My heart lurches. “I’m ready to go home.”
He reaches past me to throw the damp paper towel away. His arm grazes my boob and he freezes. “Sorry,” he says, blushing.
“You totally just did the boob graze. That’s, like, the oldest trick in the book.”
He laughs. “Yet I’ve never done it before.”
“Liar.”
He arches his brow and looks down at me. “I have never grazed a boob that no one asked me to graze.”
“So I get to be your first.”
Heat creeps up his cheeks again. He’s not a virgin. He has a kid, for Christ’s sake. Not to mention that he fucked the shit out of me that night.
We walk quietly toward the exit, and a few of the residents call out thanks for the flowers. I wave at them and keep walking.
When we get out on the street, I wince and ask him, “You won’t tell my sisters about what happened today, will you?”
He looks confused. “Why don’t you want them to know?”
I shrug. “They worry.”
“They should. She could have hurt you, really hurt you.”
I nod. It’s not anything I’m not used to.
“Let’s make a deal, okay?” He looks at me, his gaze hopeful. “If you’ll bring me with you when you come visit, I won’t tell anyone.”
I roll my eyes. “I told you I don’t need a chaperone.”
“I don’t have to hang out with you,” he counters. “I can go visit the other residents. I like talking to people.” He shrugs.
“That’s all it is? You’re not trying to be a macho save-the-damsel bullshit-slinger?”
He puffs out his chest. “Macho, yes. Crap-slinger? Not right this second.” He nudges my shoulder with his. “Bring me with you. Please.” He puts his hands together like he’s praying.
“Fine.” But a grin tips the corners of my mouth. “Does this mean we have a date?” I nudge his shoulder this time.
“Do you want it to be a date?”
Do I? Two hours ago, I would have said fuck no. But today…after what he did for me with my mom? And after?
“Maybe,” I say quietly.
“Then it’s a date.”My skin feels too tight and my heart trips a beat. “I’ll think about it,” I whisper.
Tag
Fin and I get back to the apartment and I find Benji asleep in his portable crib. Wren borrowed it from Peck, who also has a new baby. I didn’t have more than a pack of diapers, some formula, and a few pieces of clothing that the nurse passed over in one of those giveaway diaper bags.
And no money to buy anything. I am going to have to find a job. Quickly. But in order to find a job, I’ll also have to find someone to care for Benji.
I have to make a lot of plans and figure out what I’m going to do going forward.
I go into the bathroom, turn on the shower, and think.
Benji.
Job.
Money.
Babysitter.
…Finch.
I stop, brace my hands on the counter, and stare at my reflection.
Finch is a problem I didn’t anticipate.
Before Finny, I’d only slept with one woman my whole life. There had never been another for me, so it surprised the heck out of me when just looking at Finch took my breath. I can still feel her wrapped around me. Then when I held her at the assisted living facility… The sixty seconds I held her in my arms lasted for the duration of an eye-blink, it seemed.
An eye-blink that rocked my world.
I knew there was something powerful between us. I just didn’t realize how powerful. I pulled her against me, hoping just to help her calm down, to center herself. But it was me that went sideways when I held her in my arms.
And now I’m naked in the bathroom getting hard again at the thought of holding her in my arms. We were in a public hallway. She’d just been stabbed by her mother. And I was hard as steel then, and hard as steel now.
Finch is a tiny little thing. Her long dark hair was piled on top of her head in that awkward bun, and I know it hangs down over her shoulders when she sets it free. In my mind, I can still see it spread out over her pillow. I love dragging my fingers through her hair. But since it was pulled up in a bun when I held her, I let myself drag my fingertips up and down the ridges of her spine instead.
I’d halfway expected her to slap me, but I’m not even sure she noticed how she affected me. I’m sure I was just something to do. An easy fuck. Right. I hope she didn’t notice the way she affected me. She’ll think I have bad intentions, and I don’t. I don’t have any intentions at all.
Or at least I didn’t.
Now my only intention is going to be to stay the heck away from Finch Vasquez. Because I feel a connection to her. And connections are scary and dangerous and they make you stupid. I can’t afford to be stupid. I have Benji to take care of, and I can’t let anything affect the fact that I currently have a roof over his head, some formula to put in his belly, and diapers to cover his behind, but…
…I could lose everything if I’m not careful. And that means I have to be very careful with Finch.
I push the thoughts of her to the side, because she belongs behind a door labeled Happiness, and that door has been firmly locked to me my whole life. I’ve never been given the key, and I doubt I ever will.
Finch
There’s a quick rap on the front door and I jump up to go to my room, but just as quickly the lock turns and the door opens. Peck and Star walk into the room, and they’re carrying lots and lots of shopping bags. Peck has a carrier with her baby in it, and Wren immediately goes to get him out of it.