He followed her gaze, which had shifted over his shoulder. There was nothing behind him, yet she clearly saw something. “What is it?”
“A killer clown,” she said, deadpan.
So Piper Tucker had a sense of humor, after all. Brady cracked a laugh. “That’s a good one. Okay, I won’t tell anyone.”
“Thanks.”
His damp skin was starting to itch. The rest of him had been itching for an hour. “Damn, it’s a good thing I’m not staying here long.”
“Why is that?”
He shook his head. “Because I have a feeling your daddy just might shoot me for the thoughts I’m having.”
Her mouth formed an “O” and her eyebrows shot up. Her eyes darkened and her breathing deepened. “My daddy doesn’t need to know.”
Brady almost groaned. She was a foot away from him, damp and delicious, her ni**les still straining against the wet top, her cheeks stained with a pretty blush of desire. This was what he got for playing with fire. The burn of temptation to take what was being offered him, however subtly.
He felt like a total dirtbag. Like the serpent offering Eve the apple. In fact, Piper kind of even looked like Eve with that creamy skin and long, wavy hair.
“I haven’t always done the right thing in my life, but I’m going to do the right thing now and go to sleep in Zach’s bed alone.” He took a step backwards in retreat, which wasn’t easy. His fingers were itching to tweak her nipple. Then he ruined the force of his statement by adding, “But if you come in and join me, I don’t think I could say no.”
“You’re not . . . You’re not really . . . um, attracted, to me, are you?” She looked a little bewildered by the thought.
He had no idea what was so confusing about his erection. He was hard and she had to see that. The tension between them all night had been palpable. Surely she wasn’t doubting it. But given the look on her face, she most certainly was. “Oh, I’m attracted to you, alright. I want to eat you—that’s how good you look to me. You’re like chili con queso that I want to shove into my face.” Maybe that would make it clear.
Those innocent eyes widened with shock and understanding and then a spark of lust, like he’d seen earlier when she had stared at him, wetting those plump lips.
Brady swallowed hard. Rein it in, ass**le. “But that doesn’t mean I should do anything about it.”
“I’ve never had a man want to eat me before. I think . . .” Her voice dropped to a husky, sensual whisper. “I think I would like that.”
Oh, God. He was going to die. He was going to explode from lust and then he was going to hell for having this conversation. Or worse, he would die and be forced to troll this house as a ghost, watching other people have sex while he stood mutely by, a dead eunuch. It wasn’t a pleasant future.
He had always been impulsive. The kind who reacted first, thought later. With concerted effort, he reminded himself of all the reasons he couldn’t just dive onto Piper Tucker’s br**sts like a famine-struck infant. Must. Retreat. Now.
“Sometimes things we like aren’t always good for us. I don’t think I would be good for you, Piper.” Then he bounded up the stairs, two at a time, not giving her a chance to reply, self-preservation winning out over manners.
“Brady?” she said softly, her voice drifting up the stairs in the dark to caress him.
He paused. “Yeah?”
“Zach’s room is the second on the left. The blue bedroom. Try not to wake up the girls, please. They’re light sleepers.”
Oh, yeah, the children who were currently in the house, his cousin’s twins. Now he really felt like an ass for what he had just said. He didn’t even look back at her. “See you in the morning, Piper.”
“Night, Brady,” she whispered, and the words stirred a longing in him he didn’t even know had existed.
A desire for a life where he climbed the stairs in a dark house with a woman and children surrounding him in it. His woman and his children.
Brady just about dove into Zach’s bedroom. My God. Sudden unemployment had affected him worse than he had realized.
His gran had always told him he wasn’t the marrying kind, and she was right.
He was almost sure of it.
* * *
PIPER EYED THE CLOSED DOOR TO ZACH’S BEDROOM and pictured Brady lying behind it on the twin bed with plaid sheets. It seemed maybe he was attracted to her, after all. Either that or he was willing to sleep with any woman who came within two feet of him and was single. He certainly looked at her like he was attracted to her, specifically, and he had compared her to a chip dip. But then, could she really be sure what that meant exactly? Was he attracted to her or just women in general? Her knowledge of interpreting men’s expressions could fit in a thimble. For a mouse seamstress.
In high school she had dated Chris Anders briefly. Then in college she had spent her sophomore year in a roller coaster of a relationship with a smart and attractive business major named Seth who was the president of the Young Republicans club. He should have been the head of the Assholes of America club as well. He had taken every single one of her insecurities and had used them against her until she had finally wised up and walked.
These days she spent her time interpreting the expressions of five-year-olds, which generally included pouting, hunger, the urgent need for the restroom, or post-lunch wild-eyed vacancy. None of which were helpful in determining a grown man’s sexual intention. She didn’t think.
But he’d said he wanted to eat her. Surely she could trust that. Men didn’t just compare women to a meal if they were mildly interested or just feeling the effects of blue balls. He would have sex with her if she pushed the issue—she was almost entirely sort of sure of it.
There was no sound from behind the closed door. No snoring. No tossing and turning. No desperate plea for her to join him.
Exasperated at herself, Piper turned and went into Shelby and Boston’s room, shivering in her wet pajamas as she gently closed the door and leaned against it.
“Get a backbone,” she whispered to herself. If she wanted to go in there, she should have just turned the knob and gone in. But that wasn’t her. She didn’t have the courage to take what she wanted so boldly. She also knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that she would not be woman enough in bed for Brady, no matter how offended she chose to get at his labeling her a woman-child. In that regard, compared to him, she was.
Not to mention the truth she saw constantly in her classroom: that it was never wise to play with toys you couldn’t keep. It was just too hard to let them go.