Page 42 of Manhattan Kiss

“Enough with the maybes. Go have some sex. Have fun. And then come home.”

Home. Darcy’s home to me. Talking to her was like teleporting back there for a few minutes. Even though I’ve been gone a month, I don’t feel homesick like I expected to. I feel excited. It’s good being in a new hotel where I don’t know every nook and cranny like the back of my hand, where I don’t know everybody who works there as well as I know myself. I can be a new version of myself. The kind of woman who dates, takes risks, goes to brunch, and kisses strangers.

New York is exactly how it brands itself—new. Darcy’s right, I need to squeeze out every last drop from this Big Apple.

SIXTEEN

Deacon

Just before I put my key in the lock of the townhouse on Wednesday evening, I check my phone.

Still no message from Aurora.

I really thought she’d agree to dinner. It’s just dinner, and we’ve done that before, even if it was by chance.

The chemistry between us is… Maybe she doesn’t feel it like I do. I just can’t imagine that’s the case. The way she kisses me. Her fingers in my hair. Her hot breath on my neck. I shake my head. It doesn’t make sense that she wouldn’t call.

Willow squealing “Daddy” as I open the door shifts everything, and I shrug off my jacket, just in time to catch her as she jumps into my arms. “I missed you!”

“I missed you,” I say, burying my face in her mass of curls.

“I’m eating dinner. Baked potato and broccoli.”

“Any protein with that?”

She pushes out her bottom lip. “I ate two mouthfuls of steak.”

“Good,” I say, and her face breaks into a smile. Two mouthfuls of steak is better than nothing. I gotta take the wins. “Let’s go and finish dinner. You can tell me about your day.”

With Willow in my arms, we head into the kitchen, where Willow eats.

“Hi, Lucia,” I say to Willow’s nanny.

“Hi, Mr. Black. Willow’s being a very good girl.”

Willow smiles, as if to say, I told you, Daddy.

“Has your mommy left?” I ask. Usually Gabby will stay until I arrive, but maybe she’s busy wedding planning.

“She’s in the loo,” Willow says, and I smile at her English turn of phrase. That’s my girl.

“You sit,” I say, sliding Willow onto a chair.

“But you sit too,” she says.

It’s only ninety minutes until Willow will be tucked up in bed, asleep. If she wants me to sit, I’ll sit. If she wants me to juggle baked potatoes, I’ll do it. I’m just pleased to be here with her.

I slide into the bench next to her and she starts eating her dinner again.

“Tell me about school.”

“It was good,” she replies.

And that’s it. There’s no more meat on the bone. Willow likes to chat. But she’s never particularly forthcoming about what happens at school.

“What did you have for lunch?” I ask.

“Pasta,” she says, which is what she says every day. I wonder if there’s anything else on the menu. The amount I’m paying, they should be serving my kid foie gras and caviar every day.