Page 4 of Single Dad Problems
“I’m Cole. I’m here with two good buddies. We heard there was a good fishing spot close by and decided to come. We’re doing some night fishing tonight. Why don’t you grab a pictureless book and come along? We have cookies.” He crossed his arms over his chest and winked at me. “Chocolate chunk.Andcowboy cookies.”
“Did you say cowboy cookies?” I gripped my jug tighter. “Why didn’t you lead with that?”
“No one ever taught you to refuse candy from a stranger in a white van, did they?” Cole nodded in the direction of my room. “Get your book.”
“They tried. As soon as I heard the word candy I tuned out, though. Why? Did I miss something? Should I not follow you?” I hurried into my room and grabbed the spicy book Tessa had forced on me. When I turned back to the door Cole’s eyes flicked back to mine from the book cover. I hugged it to my chest and motioned for him to scoot out of the doorway. “If this is a kidnapping attempt or some ploy to get me to bait all your hooks you should know that I’m incredibly hard to kidnap and I’ve never baited a hook.”
“You’re incredibly hard to kidnap?” He put his hand on my lower back as we walked away from my room. “I’m starting to feel actual concern for how seriously you take your safety. You’rejoking about getting kidnapped while following a stranger into the woods to meet his two friends.”
I paused. “The woods? What about ticks?”
He clutched his head and then scrubbed his hands down his face. “Please tell me you’re fucking with me.”
I giggled and winked at him before walking again. “Come on. You have cookies and I need cookies. Supply and demand. I demand you supply me cookies to replace the ones you wouldn’t let me eat off the ground.”
“Jesus Christ.” He seemed more stressed about our situation than I did. There wasn’t much I wouldn’t do for a good sweet and for some reason I trusted him. He’d had my back with Jason and his friends had seemed ready to jump in, too.
“I swear, though, if there are no cookies, I’ll call the cops on all three of you.” I stepped over a fallen limb and silently fawned when he offered me his arm. “Also, if I get attacked by ticks, it’s not beyond my abilities to train them and send them after you. I teach elementary school kids; if I can get them in check, I can surely handle some ticks.”
“Maybe I should be worried about my safety instead of yours.” He somehow saw me about to trip and grabbed me around my waist the moment my foot slipped on the wet leaves. “Never mind. I think I could take you if it came down to it.”
I snorted and nearly choked on my tongue when he picked me up suddenly. He held me pinned to his chest and I either had to wrap my legs around his waist or let them tangle and drag us. It wasn’t exactly a hard choice. It’d been a long, long time since I’d felt a man between my thighs, in any capacity, and the heat of him was nearly enough to make my eyes roll.
“Oh, wow.” I wrapped my arms around his neck and sighed as the masculine scent of his cologne tickled my nose. He smelled rich. And dangerous. With a tease of vanilla that made me want to lick him. “Wow, wow, wow.”
His low laugh felt like a promise in the darkness of the woods. “You’re going to make me love sweets, aren’t you?”
4
Callie
“No, really! I got lost as a kid and while everyone was panicking and calling the police I was sitting in the storage room of a candy shop. They found me in a twenty-pound bag of gummies, passed out after gorging myself on them.”
Luke, the man who’d protested Jason calling me a bitch, turned his beer up and then shook his head. His hair was shaggy enough on top that it fell over his forehead in a dirty blonde mess that he immediately shoved off back into place. “You would’ve given me a stroke.”
I leaned back on the blanket they’d put down for me and grinned. I was having a shockingly good time. There really had been chocolate chunk and cowboy cookies so I was a happy camper. The company was pretty good, too. Each of them were interesting and fun to talk to. They were also allsoeasy on the eyes.
Luke was just as hot as Cole and Ben looked like Scott Eastwood’s hotter cousin. Even in the darkness by the lake Icouldn’t stop blushing whenever they looked at me. And they were looking at me a lot. There were so many muscles on display and my previously dormant libido was singing Ginuwine’s “Pony” at the top of its lungs.
“My parents used to say I aged the entire neighborhood by twenty years just by existing.” I took another cowboy cookie and shoved nearly half of it in my mouth. It was so good that I couldn’t contain a happy moan. “Who made these? I want to marry them.”
“That’d be Mary.” Ben raised a single eyebrow at me. “I think she’s already married, though.”
“The good ones always are.” I laid back all the way and stared up at the stars in the sky. There were so many and without the light pollution from town it was like I could reach up and grab a handful like sprinkles.
“We must not be good ones, huh?” Cole grumbled in that deep voice of his and leaned over me to grab a cookie. “Guess I shouldn’t get my hopes up.”
I blinked as the stars were blotted out by his face. Looking down at me the way he was made me picture filthy things that I had no business picturing. Still, I couldn’t help staring back at him and enjoying the way his breath smelled like chocolate. “Y-you smell like chocolate. I-I think that automatically makes you a good one.”
Ben pushed Cole away and then leaned down to bite the rest of the cookie I was holding. His lips brushed my fingers and his nose bumped into the bare skin on my side where my shirt had ridden up. “These cookiesaredelicious.”
I sucked in a sharp breath and sat straight up. “Oh, wow. Wow, wow, wow. Okay, yep. Wow. I should probably go back to my room. It’s late and you guys are… Yep. So, I’m just going to take these cookies and run along.”
I shot to my feet but the blanket was bunched and in my mission to snatch all their cookies and run I got tangled up and went down hard, right on top of Luke. We both grunted as our bodies collided but while I tried to roll away he gripped my hips and held me still.
“I am so sorry. I didn’t mean to-”
“You were going to steal all the cookies? Little thief.” Luke grinned up at me. “Too bad for you, I’m not done with my dessert.”
