Page 33 of Studfinder

Suddenly, the air around me fills with heaviness. “I don’t know. I don’t recall every case, but if you give me more details, I can try to remember.”

“He was—” Her phone vibrates on the counter, and Rita glances over at it. With my arms still around her waist, she reaches for the device and answers. “Hey, Scarlett.”

A feminine voice filters through the phone, and I shift to release Rita from my hold, but she catches my forearm around her middle, and I still.

“I’m with Jake.” Her voice softens as she says my name, and I’m assuming her friend knows a bit about me. I’m curious what she’s told her, and I smile into the curve of her neck again. Tenderly, I pepper her skin with kisses before reaching the shell of her ear and nipping at it. Rita tips her head against mine, and a smile fills her voice.

“Yes,” she says at first.

Pause.

“Not yet.” She giggles.

Pause.

“Okay, next weekend.” She laughs again and then hangs up after saying, “Bye.”

“Scarlett?” I murmur into Rita’s neck, working my way to her shoulder and tugging her shirt to the side to suck a trail along her skin.

“She’s my best friend and wanted to know if I wanted to go to the farmers’ market next weekend.”

“That was a short conversation. Why were you giggling?”

“I don’t giggle,” she retorts, and I spread my hands over her belly, digging in my fingertips. Rita lets out a squeal and then that heavy snort she has on occasion.

“That sounded like a giggle.”

“I sound like a piglet,” she says, spinning in my arms and imitating the snort that escapes her on occasion.

“Here, piggy, piggy,” I tease to her face, rubbing my nose against hers before pressing my lips to hers. Her arms wrap around my shoulders. “Tell me what she said that made you blush.”

“She asked me if you were the same Jake I might have mentioned once or twice.”

“Ah. Did you tell her I was handsome?”

“I might have called you a stud.”

My lips curl as a brow hitches. “A stud, huh? Gonna ride me?”

“That was the not yet part.”

I stare down at her before rubbing my nose along hers again. “Are you hoping to get something from me?”

“Whatever you’re offering,” she says, her voice dropping with an edge of seriousness. What am I offering her? I’m an ex-con without a job, living with my brother. I don’t know what she could see in me.

“Should we finish talking about what we were discussing before the phone rang?” I ask, not wanting to return to a conversation about her ex but also not wanting her to think I’m blowing it off.

Rita’s eyes focus on my mouth, and she shakes her head.

“Good,” I state. “Because you have a riding lesson. Right now.” With that, I scoop her up, and she squeals again. Reaching awkwardly over at the oven, I turn it off and carry Rita to her room on the upper level.

14

Rita

It should have felt strange to have Jake in my bed. I’d lived in my parents’ home until I moved out in my thirties to live with Ian. Their house was large, and we didn’t get in each other’s way much. My parents moved their room to the first floor when my father had his first heart attack, and I moved home to help them out. Ian never spent the night here, never slept in my bed with me, so this was a new experience—just like everything else with Jake.

I hadn’t ever had sex at a project site, and I certainly never had sex against a fire pole. I didn’t make out under a covered bridge or kiss between fishing casts. Jake didn’t keep his hands or his lips off me, and it was a new sensation. Ian and I weren’t reserved, but PDA wasn’t something he often did. He had a reputation to uphold, and I respected his position.