Standing in Milo’s doorway, Natasha stared in disbelief as her son eagerly crawled beneath the covers. Wearing his
Toy Story
pajamas, with his hair still a little damp and his face shining from a good, soapy scrubbing, he looked so much like the tiny toddler she’d chased nonstop around this apartment a few years ago that it made her feel unexpectedly wistful.
Milo had taken to Damon immediately and enthusiastically, it occurred to her. She hoped she wouldn’t regret letting them spend so much time together. After Damon left ...
Well, she wouldn’t think about that now.
Milo seemed to have coped with his father’s absence pretty well. He couldn’t possibly get
too
attached to Damon over the course of a week or two, could he? However long it took Natasha to help Damon, Milo would be fine at the end of it.
She
, on the other hand, might have a more difficult time.
Because being with Damon today had been like being with her dream man. All during their impromptu picnic, during the drive to and from rocky Point Loma, and during their time together at Belmont Park, Damon had smoothly segued from sexy companion to jovial jokester; from handholding tease to piggyback-ride-offering helper; from bantering, smiling,
admiring
playboy to backpack- and bag-toting, stuffed-animal-winning, generous,
protective
family man in disguise.
With no effort at all, Damon had sparked all Natasha’s fantasies—even ones she hadn’t known she’d had. He’d been the ultimate seducer
and
the perfect platonic companion, in fast succession and with evident willingness. He’d been ... remarkable.
He was still doing it, even now, Natasha saw as she drew in a deep breath and prepared to join him and Milo. Seated on the chair beside Milo’s bed, Damon was cracking open a copy of
Yertle the Turtle
, making a joke with Milo before reading it ... and flexing his biceps in a way that made Natasha imagine what
else
Damon could do with all that strength of his. He could do a thousand pushups. He could open stuck pickle jars. He could balance himself atop her, all those muscles flexing and working, and make love to her in her big double bed in the room down the hall.
Feeling a surge of raw lustfulness sweep over her, Natasha grabbed the doorjamb. With effort, she wrenched her gaze away from Damon. She wished she could blot out his voice, too. Maybe then she would quit imagining Damon using that sexy, husky voice of his to whisper sweet nothings in her ear as he slowly undressed her, urgently touched her, kissed her and kissed her—
Suddenly becoming aware of exactly the silence she’d been longing for, Natasha started. When she glanced up, her son and Damon were both staring at her expectantly. She had the sense they’d been doing that for some time now, while she’d been lost in another erotic reverie about her, Damon, nakedness, heat ... .
“Ready for a good-night hug?” Injecting some deliberately casual cheer into her voice, Natasha bustled into the bedroom and forced herself to switch gears.
Mom Mode: On
. She sat beside a yawning Milo, smiled at him, then swept back his hair. “I hope you had a fun time today, Milo. I know I did.”
He nodded, eyes shining. “Today was my favorite day ever!”
“Good.” His enthusiasm felt surprisingly bittersweet. It hadn’t been
that
uncommon of a day, had it? They were usually happy together. “We have fun together most of the time, right?”
Milo nodded again. “Especially with Damon! He’s the best.”
Uh-oh. Maybe Milo
could
get attached to Damon in a matter of days. God knew, it hadn’t taken long for Natasha to love him.
“Yes, he’s pretty awesome,” Natasha agreed, resisting an urge to punctuate that statement with a glance at Damon. She gave Milo a hug and a good-night kiss. They exchanged I-love-yous. Then she added, “Even though Damon will only be here for a little while, we can still enjoy our time with him, right?”
“Right.” Emphatically, Milo nodded. “Now, story time.”
At his imperious tone of command, Natasha laughed. “I hear a ‘get lost, Mom’ in that remark. I can take a hint.”
“No!” Milo protested. “It’s just that while you’re talking Damon can’t be reading. And I like
Yertle the Turtle
.”
“Personally,” Damon said, “I can’t wait to find out why they named him Yertle. There’s got to be a story in there.” He waited for Natasha to glance at him, then gave her an unswerving look. “I can handle things here if you still want to spend some time out in your workshop. Don’t let me stop you.”
“You’re not even pretending it’s a garden shed anymore?”
Damon shrugged. “I told you—honesty is important to me.”
Vaguely, Natasha remembered him saying words to that effect. At the time, she’d been slathering Damon with sunscreen. She’d been exploring all the intriguing contours of his muscles. She’d been learning the warmth and texture of his skin. She’d been trying not to drool on his six-pack abs. She hadn’t really registered Damon’s apparent insistence on honesty ... which, to be honest
now
, didn’t bode well for her: a person who’d fibbed to him a while ago and was still fibbing to him by omission.
Frankly, though, her discomfort over that lie was small potatoes compared with the guilt she felt over leaving Damon to face his biggest career crisis alone. In Las Vegas, Natasha knew now, she’d accidentally chosen the worst possible time to leave Damon to sink or swim without her. Jimmy had shown her the infamous video today. He’d told her what it was like to be there, in Damon’s varietal chocolate workshop, while Damon inexplicably stammered and sweated and tossed off rude, off-the-cuff comments while struggling to create a new truffle flavor on the spot.
He’d been drunk, Natasha had recognized instantly as she’d stared in shock and horror and commiseration at the video. He’d been desperate and fearful and overconfident, all at the same time. Because of that, he’d made one mistake after another.
He’d insulted Tamala, the pastry chef who’d unluckily drawn the workshop presentation spot with him. He’d berated attendees. He’d stumbled over the cables and lights set up by Wes Brinkman’s company, B-Man Media. Then, while being broadcast worldwide (and later on several dozen attendees’ YouTube channels and Twitter feeds), Damon had seized the chocolate he’d ruined, hurled the hot, sludgy mass at a camera, then walked out in a torrent of crass language and one very obscene gesture.
The whole performance had been the complete opposite of what the world expected from ultra-cool, super-smart, charming Damon Torrance. It had been ... disastrous. It had been a public meltdown of epic, gossip-worthy proportions. The fact that there were rumors of a kinky sex tape featuring Damon, Tamala, and fifteen pounds of melted chocolate only added to the problem.
And what had Natasha done when she’d discovered Damon at the close of that awful day in Vegas? She’d walked out on him.
No wonder Damon had suffered nothing but bad luck since then, Natasha reflected now. She’d practically put the whammy on him herself! She certainly hadn’t been sympathetic or even curious about what had happened to him. She’d simply ... left him.
She’d been selfish in a way that she hadn’t intended or even understood. She’d hurt Damon. She’d abandoned him.
She didn’t know what it would take for her to forgive herself for that. But as she looked again at Damon generously preparing to read a bedtime story to her son, Natasha figured helping Damon to regain his lost life—and his place at Torrance Chocolates—would be a good start. Even if doing so took him, as it inevitably would, away from
her
and her ordinary life.
It would do both. Natasha had no illusions about that. As soon as Damon could, he’d go back to his regular luxe life.
Which only lent a sense of urgency to her own life right now. Because as long as Natasha had Damon, she meant to make the most of the opportunity.
That
didn’t begin in a shed.
“Nope.” Nonchalantly, Natasha rose. She stretched again, knowing that her luxuriant movements would draw Damon’s eye. “Thanks, but I don’t feel much like working. I’d be crazy to give up a freely given offer of me-time.” She gazed directly at Damon. “Right now I feel like having a nice, hot bubble bath.”
As she’d expected, he perked up. “Oh. Take your time.”
“I will.” Natasha rubbed her palm over her jeans’ back pockets again. “For some reason, I feel really
dirty
tonight.”
Damon swallowed hard. He followed her movements exactly as she’d hoped he would. He clenched his book harder. “Mmmm.”
His thoughtful tone didn’t fool her. He wasn’t new at innuendo; he knew she was teasing him. He knew ... and liked it.
Natasha liked it, too. It was fun. Feeling liberated by the effects of her lie, she smiled at Damon. As long as he believed she was still married, she could tease him with impunity. She could protest her innocence and use her supposed status as a
non-
divorced woman as a trapdoor if things got out of hand.
“You probably feel dirty because there was gum on the seat of the roller coaster,” Milo piped up. “It’s on your pants.”
“Really?” Spinning like Finn chasing his tail, Natasha tried to look. “There’s
gum
on my pants? Where?”
“Right here.” Damon’s hand suddenly smacked her derrière.
Frozen in shock, Natasha felt herself flush.
Damon had touched her butt
! His hand was
right there
, right now! He—
“Got it.” Blithely, Damon deposited a tissue-wrapped lump in the trashcan near Milo’s bureau. His eyes sparkled as they met hers. “You might still be feeling ... dirty, though.” He seemed to suppress a laugh. “You probably still want that bath.”
“I ... I do.” Filled with stupid gullibility, Natasha stared back at him. She was insane to think she could actually keep up with Damon Torrance in the seduction department. And yet, primed by the intimacy they’d already shared, she couldn’t resist pushing him a little farther. “Let me know if you need me,” Natasha said in her sultriest voice. “I’ll be the one who’s all wet and soapy, wearing nothing but a towel in the next room.”
Her seductive moment was wrecked by Milo’s chortle.
“He
knows
where the bathroom is, Mom!” her son told her. “And
everybody
wears a towel when they’re done having a bath.” He traded an exasperated, knowing look with Damon. “Sheesh.”
“Yeah,” Damon agreed, deadpan and handsome. “Sheesh.”
Well, in a world where single motherhood and irresistible longing to get lucky lived in the same, recently washed-in-a-tide-pool body, these things happened, Natasha told herself.
“Have fun, you two,” she said with a wave as she made her escape. “I’m off for a long-awaited date with Mr. Bubble.”
In the end, Damon didn’t require an ounce of subterfuge to find out what he wanted to know about Natasha and Pacey. Because in the end, quite by accident, Damon couldn’t stop gregarious, four-foot-tall, eight-year-old Milo from spilling the beans about his parents’ relationship ... unintentionally, of course.
Fraught with visions of Natasha naked in the bathtub next door, Damon did his best to lose himself in
Yertle the Turtle
. Helpless to ignore the occasional splashes coming from Natasha’s bubble bath, he read the whole book to Milo. He told him good night. He gave the boy a tentative hug, pulled up the covers, scanned the jumbled bedroom for signs of duties he may have missed ... then spotted Milo’s backpack at the foot of the bed.
“You forgot your backpack down here,” Damon told the boy as he grabbed it. “I’ll put it away for you.”
“No, don’t!” Instantly alert, Milo sat up. “I put it there so I’d remember to get out the seashells I got at the beach today.” He gestured at his backpack. “In the side pocket.”
Damon smiled. When he’d been a kid, he’d collected things, too. All sorts of oddities had caught his eye, especially at the beach. He guessed he was still collecting things even now. Except these days Damon accumulated cars and partnership deals instead of seashells and coins and shiny, interesting rocks.
“I’ll get them.” Damon fished out several chipped shells, one sandy Lego mini-figure that may have been in Milo’s backpack already, and a perfect sand dollar. “Wow. This one looks cool.”
“I know, right? I’m going to give that one to my dad.”
“Oh.” Damon went still, his hand still on the sand dollar. He didn’t know why he felt gutted by Milo’s devotion to his father, but he sort of—undeniably and rrationally—did. “Okay.”
“Put it over there, on my bookshelf, with all the rest of them,” Milo directed him with clear authority. “That way I won’t forget to mail it. My mom will have to pack it up, but I can—”
In the midst of Milo’s musings, Damon felt strangely as though he’d misjudged things. How could he be fantasizing about Natasha’s sexy bath-time routine while Milo was pining for his dad? While he was choosing spontaneous gifts to surprise his dad?
“—do the wrapping and write a note to my dad myself,” Milo was saying in an animated tone. “He’ll like that. And—wait, not there,” the boy instructed. “Over to the side a little more.”
“Beside all these other shells?” Apparently, Milo collected all kinds, Damon realized, looking at the variety on the shelf.
“Uh-huh. Those are all the shells my dad already sent me from Mexico. That sand dollar might as well live there for now.”
Damon dutifully put down the shell. “There. All set.”
He turned, getting ready to leave so that Milo could go to sleep. But the boy seemed to have found a second wind.
“My dad knows
everything
about seashells,” Milo told Damon with a boastful air. “He and Juanita send me new kinds of shells all the time. They live right on the beach in Mexico, so—”
“Wait.” Damon stared. “Who’s Juanita?”
“She’s my dad’s girlfriend,” Milo blabbed. “She’s really nice. She bought me frozen fruit drinks when I visited her and my dad last summer. With strawberries and pineapple. I think I’m going to go back this summer, too. I hope they still have those drinks where they live, because—” Milo broke off, giving Damon a puzzled look. “Are you okay? You look weird all of a sudden.”