Page 16 of Beating Heart
She approached our picnic table with her hands on her hips as she glared at her dog. “What is going on with you, Winnie? This is so unlike her.”
“What? Greeting people?” I teased. “She’s not bothering anyone. She’s just saying hello.”
Unlike her owner, who appears to keep to herself.
She sighed. “I guess after living in an apartment in the city, she’s enjoying this big open space.”
“Yeah, it’s tough for a dog to be confined all day. Let her run around and have some fun.”
“Can she have a bite of my hot dog?” Cutler asked.
“Oh, that’s okay, sweetie. That’s for you. She just had dinner.” Emerson snapped her fingers, and Winnie jumped down off the bench to sit on the ground.
“Can Dr. Emerson have dinner with us, Pops?”
This fucking kid.
He was always pushing, especially if a pretty lady was involved. That tinge of guilt, knowing Cutler didn’t have a traditional upbringing, was always there. He didn’t have two parents that were in his life. He had one dad who didn’t know what he was doing most of the time. I prayed like hell that I wasn’t messing this kid up.
“Sure. There are a few hot dogs and burgers left over if you’re hungry.” I reached for my beer.
“No, I’m fine. Thank you, though. We’ll get out of your hair.”
Cutler finished eating, and he and J.T. jumped up and started running around with Winnie, who sprang to life and started chasing them.
Emerson slapped her forehead in frustration and started calling out to her dog.
“Hey, how about you just relax for a minute, huh?” I asked, wiping my hands off with my napkin. “Chill out. Look at the water. The sun’s going down.”
She gaped at me. “Really? I’m quite aware of the gigantic lake sitting in front of me. I swim in it every morning before I go to work. And I watch the sun go down every night from my back porch. I’m not oblivious.” She huffed.
Thoughts of her wearing nothing but a swimsuit flooded my mind.
Pull your head out of your ass, dickhead.
She’s Cutler’s doctor, and she’s only here for a few months.
“Are you always this uptight? Is it a big-city thing?” I asked, taking another pull from my beer.
“What? No. I’m not uptight. You’re the one who had an attitude with me the first time we met. I just don’t want to take advantage of living next door and letting my dog run in your yard. That’s not a big-city thing; it’s a considerate-human thing.”
“I did not have an attitude the first time we met,” I said, pushing to my feet and walking to the cooler to grab another beer. We were home for the night. I’d get the boys showered after they played for a while, and we’d call it a day. I held up a beer and shook it in invitation. “You want one? I mean, even considerate humans can have a beer with their neighbor.”
“Fine. One beer. Winnie does seem to be having a lot of fun with the boys.”
I popped the top off of each one and handed her the bottle, motioning for her to sit because having her stand there, all stiff and awkward, was making me uncomfortable. She sat down across from me, and my dick sprang to life when her lips wrapped around the bottle, and she tipped her head back. Damn. I’d never seen a woman drinking a beer look this sexy, but this woman oozed it in spades right now.
It had been a while since I’d been with a woman, as raising my son on my own and running a company with Kingston took most of my time. So reacting to a beautiful woman was perfectly normal, even if we seemed annoyed every time we saw one another.
“Wouldn’t have taken you for a beer drinker,” I said, chuckling when Cutler and J.T. helped Winnie climb the steps up to the slide and pushed her through. She ran around to do it again, so apparently, she liked it.
“You sure seem to have a lot of preconceived notions about me.” She shrugged as she shook her head and smiled while she watched Cutler lead Winnie back down the slide.
“You don’t seem all that hard to read.”
She glanced back at me. “Really? That’s quite the confident statement, ole wise one. So, tell me, then—since you think you can read me so easily—what do you see when you look at me?”
A hot-as-fuck woman. But I’d keep that to myself.
