“I’ll buy you another pair.”

“I don’t need another pair.” Her thighs, still at his sides, pressed deeper. “Anyway, it’s worth the loss to have that memory. Big, bad, scary Joe Callahan, security to the stars, losing control and ripping away my underwear.”

He pushed his h*ps into her and he heard her suck in breath.

“Not a big fan of bein’ teased, buddy.”

Her arms tightened around him and she whispered, “Then whoever did it to you wasn’t doin’ it right.”

Cal didn’t reply and she gave him another squeeze of her arms.

“We got about an hour, Joe, I need to sleep.”

He again didn’t reply but he pulled out and righted her in the bed. He tugged off his jeans, pulled her key out of the pocket, putting it on the nightstand and tossed the jeans aside. Then he stretched out beside her and yanked the covers over them. She settled into him, wrapping a leg around his thigh, her arm around his gut and setting her cheek to his shoulder.

He stared at the dark ceiling and moved his fingers on her hip and ass until he felt her relax into him.

He thought she was asleep when she mumbled, “You okay, honey?”

She meant Bonnie.

He closed his eyes and his hand palmed her ass.

“Go to sleep, Vi.”

“All right,” she whispered on a weak squeeze of her arm.

He felt sleep claim her and he knew he needed to be shot of her. He needed this done. He shouldn’t have started it up again, even with her getting the way it was, he should never have f**king started it again.

But he did and even knowing he should end it, he had no intention of doing that.

None whatsoever.

* * * * *

She slid away from him and his eyes opened as he felt her body leave his bed.

He looked at the clock; it was six forty-seven.

Fuck. They should have set the alarm, they’d overslept.

She was hurrying, standing at the side of the bed, her hands on his tee, ready to pull it off.

“Leave it,” he growled, her body jolted and she twisted to look over her shoulder at him.

“What?”

“Wear my tee home,” he ordered.

“Wear it home?” she asked, sounding confused and turning to face him.

“Yeah.”

“But –”

“I wasn’t askin’,” he told her. “Wear it home.”

“I –” she started, stopped, he watched her face get soft then she whispered, “Okay.”

She bent down and grabbed her robe and nightgown and turned to leave.

“Buddy.”

She turned back.

“Get over here.”

“Joe, I slept late,” she told him.

“Come here.”

She hesitated then walked the three steps to the bed. He reached out, grabbed her hand and yanked hard so she came off her feet, her hands and a knee landing in the bed. As she came down, he dropped her hand and hooked his fingers around her neck, pulling her mouth to his.

He kissed her, her tongue tangling with his in that way he liked, like they were locked in some kind of hot, sexy battle for supremacy, winner takes all and then he let her mouth go but not her neck.

“You kiss me before you leave my house.”

She was breathing heavy and she whispered, “Okay.”

He touched his mouth to hers for the third f**king time in less than a f**king day.

Then he said, “Go home.”

“’Bye Joe.”

“Later buddy.”

He watched as she turned and walked across his room before he called her name.

“Vi.”

She whirled. “Yeah, Joe?”

He reached to his nightstand and hooked her key ring on a finger then held it out to her.

She rushed back, snatched the key from his hand, leaned down, fingers to his cheek and brushed her lips against his. Then she pulled back, grinned at him, he felt that contraction in his left chest again before she straightened, turned and disappeared.

He fell to his back and his hands went to his face, rubbing his skin.

And again he decided he should end it.

His life was good. He didn’t need anything to derail it. He’d worked hard, he kept going the way he was, he could retire to a good life by the time he was fifty.

He travelled a lot, was never home, hated the f**king winters in Indiana, the cold seeped into your bones. He had no idea why he kept the house there except that it reminded him of his Dad, some vague memories of his Mom and then there was the six months when Nicky was there.

His beach house in Florida was in the middle of nowhere, two bedrooms, tiny, a twenty minute drive through the bush just to get to a grocery store, perfect. Vi’d hate it. He’d taken a woman there once, didn’t remember her name, blocked it out because the bitch whined for two full days and he eventually drove her and her suitcase out, dropped her at the airport and left her there.

He had his job, his place in Florida, his plan for his life; he didn’t need Violet’s shit, her problems, her baggage, her kids. He didn’t need to compete against a dead man, a cop, probably a good man. A man he couldn’t win against, not only win Violet but her daughters.

Then there was the time when she found out the whole story of Bonnie, his Dad, Nicky, how sick that all was, how crazy sick it was. He remembered, like it was yesterday, the looks on people’s faces when they saw him after it happened. Their shock, disgust.

No, he needed to end it with Violet. He definitely needed to be done with her.

He knew it and, taking his hands from his face and rolling to his side, smelling her hair on his pillow, he still knew it.

He just had no intention of doing it.

Chapter Eight

Come to Jesus

I opened the kitchen door to see, over the bar opening into the dining area, Kate and Dane going out the front door.

“We’re goin’ to Joe’s, Mom,” Kate called on a wave, Dane waved too and then they were out the door.

I stood where I was and stared at the door, wondering why Kate and Dane were going to Joe’s. I also wondered why my daughter casually informed me of that fact like she went to Joe’s every evening before dinner.

“Yo, Momalicious, what’s for dinner?” Keira asked, wandering down the hall and pulling me out of my stupor.

I closed the door behind me and entered my house, putting my purse on the counter and deciding then to wonder, for the fifty thousandth time since I lifted the ban on Dane coming to the house when I wasn’t there, if I should have lifted the ban on Dane coming to the house when I wasn’t there. This was something Kate had difficulty with now that it was summer and she didn’t see him at school every day so I’d given in but only after I’d given her an honest sex talk which left us both uncomfortable. Hopefully Kate more so or at least enough for her to just say no.