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Irritation at Lleyton prickled the back of my neck. I didn’t like the way he just walked into Lyric’s life and made demands of her. From everything I’d seen of him, the man was a spoiled, rich brat. “That wasn’t very polite of them. Did they at least offer you some compensation for your time?”
Lyric sniggered. “No. It was more of a, ‘Do this for us or we can’t go and then Amelia misses out,’ sort of situation.”
She was smiling, but I was irked Lleyton and Kat would take advantage of her like that. Especially when they clearly knew how she lived. With one glance around her apartment, I could see a dozen things she needed fixed. The faucet dripped. The walls needed painting. There was a section of carpet that had been nearly worn through. All things Kat and Lleyton would have replaced or fixed within a moment’s notice because they had the money to just call someone up and do it. And yet they hadn’t even offered Lyric compensation for going out of her way?
If she’d been mine, I would have taken any opportunity to help her. To provide for her and for Amelia. Lleyton had the chance and the money and chose not to.
My irritation flared into anger. Instead of letting it get the better of me, I thrust the record player toward Cheryl. “I brought you this.”
Her gaze flickered over the gift, and she stood, taking it from my arms, her mouth a little round ‘O’ of surprise. “It’s for me?”
I nodded.
Lyric’s eyebrows bunched together. “You didn’t buy that for us, did you? It looks expensive.”
I shook my head, thinking fast to come up with an excuse. “No. It was lying around at the church and never gets used. I thought it would do better over here with you two.” I didn’t like lying to her, but I knew she wouldn’t accept it if I’d told her I’d bought it. If I’d explained I’d lifted it from some rich asshole’s house, she probably wouldn’t believe me.
Cheryl, no such qualms about accepting my gift, was already busily plugging the thing in. She grinned up at me from her hands and knees on the floor, plug grasped between her fingers. “My husband and I used to have one of these. Oh, how I loved it. Until he threw it out one day after we had an argument. I’m still cross about that.”
“She’s having a good day,” Lyric whispered in explanation.
Cheryl crawled slowly out from beneath the table, player now plugged into the wall outlet, and she smiled happily. “I wish I had some of my old records. We’ll have to go to the thrift stores to try to find some.”
I held up a plastic bag hung around my wrist. “Beat you to it. But of course, the thrift store has more if you don’t like these.”
Lyric’s gaze warmed me as she tracked me across the room, watching quietly. I handed her grandmother the bag, and she rifled through it. I’d searched four thrift shops, going as far as the city to source the Elvis Presley album I knew she loved. I’d put it right on the top so she couldn’t miss it.
She pulled it from the bag, a small gasp on her thin lips. Slowly, she lowered the bag with the rest of the records and glanced up at me. “My husband used to play this record to me. We’d dance for hours in the living room.”
Even though she was lucid this time and knew I wasn’t Lyric’s father, I pointed to the record player. “Put it on and dance with me?”
She put it on but then pointed at her granddaughter. “Her grandaddy used to dance with her before he died too. I think she’d like to dance with you now.”
With a small smile on her lips, she hummed her way down the hallway to her bedroom, closing the door behind her.
I glanced at Lyric, surprised by her expression.
Her cheeks and the tip of her nose were pink. “That was a really nice thing you did. Thank you. Sometimes music is the only way to keep her calm on her bad days. This will help.”
I held a hand out to her and lifted her to her feet. She wasn’t a short woman, probably five foot five, but she had to crane her neck back to look up at me. With one hand clutched around hers, I brushed her hips with my other. The chemistry between us crackled, and my palm itched to connect with the tiny strip of skin showing between her sweats and cropped T-shirt.
Her gaze turned heated, eyes lowering to half-mast. “What are we doing here, Zeph?”
The question was a whisper, but a loaded one. I knew she was asking more than just what we were doing in that very moment. But I didn’t have an answer for that. So I answered the question as if she’d asked it literally. “I think we’re dancing.”
“You need to hold me properly then.” She put her arms around my neck, and mine slid to the curve of her hips, unable to resist, and then to her lower back, palms pressing just above her ass.
I stared down at her, heart thumping too fast because there was no way I could have explained this to anyone in the priesthood. There was no way I could have explained this to myself, other than I was doing what felt good and natural for the first time in so fucking long.
I didn’t want to stop.
We swayed together in her run-down living room, Elvis Presley crooning in my ear, Lyric’s warm breath misting across the open neck of my shirt and so sweetly brushing my skin. I inhaled the scent of her hair, marking it to memory, and tugged her just a little closer.
“I don’t like that Lleyton and Kat are taking advantage of you.”
Lyric sighed and twisted her head to lay it on my chest. “He’s Amelia’s dad. He’s trying.”
“He’s doing the bare minimum.”
