Best of Three (Counting on Love) (21 page)

“Ego thing? Emma—”

“Seriously, shut up, Nate.”

She looked almost…desperate. Like she
needed
him to stop talking about it. That was odd. So unlike Emma. She liked to talk about everything.

He decided to pursue it later. “Fine, tell me about this then.” He held up the scavenger hunt list.

“They’re getting those things here. In Carl-Mart,” she said. “Just because your dirty mind instantly goes to nipple suckers and cock rings when you hear ‘something to use in bed’ doesn’t mean those are the only options.”

Hearing her say cock rings instantly made him hot. God.

Rather than grabbing her, he said, “I thought I was a prude.”

She shook her head like she didn’t know what she was going to do with him. He had a few ideas. And using a nipple sucker on her was only the beginning.

“Look, see what they’re getting. No cocks involved.”

It should probably bother him that she was using the term
cocks
so freely in regard to his son’s activities, but…it didn’t. Again, her matter-of-factness made it less serious and less awkward somehow.

Michael was eighteen, after all. Sex was a part of his life whether Nate liked it or not.

Emma leaned around the corner of the earplug display again and Nate leaned with her, breathing in the scent of her hair.

“What is it?” he asked, not clear what was in the box Michael held. Though he didn’t think Carl’s sold cock rings, and definitely not in the electronics section.

Emma leaned back and smiled up at him smugly. “A book light.”

A book light.

Something to use in bed.

“Very clever,” he said.

“Exactly. So relax. They’re fine.”

“Item number two is something to make him hot,” Nate pointed out.

She sighed. “You want to stick around and see what they come up with?”

He shrugged. Part of him did. But more of him wanted a reason to spend more time with Emma. Safe time. Time away from any temptation to show her that he didn’t need any nipple suckers or cock rings to have a good time.

Not that he’d throw them out if she brought them along.

“They do sell condoms here,” he pointed out.

“But you want them to use condoms, remember? No grandkids yet?”

“You’re right. That makes me feel so much better.”

She laughed. “Come on. But they can’t see us. Because this is ridiculous.”

Maybe. But maybe it was great.

She started down the aisle in the opposite direction. Her sandals were flat today—which was unusual, and it made him roll his eyes that he knew that—but they still clicked on the tile floor and he said, without thinking, “I’m glad you’re here.”

She stopped instantly and turned. “
What
?”

“You’re keeping me from being an absolute asshole. Thank you.”

She blinked at him as if she was trying to decide if she had heard him right. He braced himself for her to say something nice or sweet. If she did that, he might not be able to keep from kissing her.

“Nate, it is my absolute pleasure to help decrease your level of asshole-ishness anytime I can. Honestly, if that level goes any higher, you’re going to explode and there will be casualties.”

Nope, not nice or sweet.

He grinned. That didn’t keep him from wanting to kiss her though.

He strode forward, took her upper arm, pulled her up on tiptoe and covered her mouth with his.

She gripped his shoulders and pressed closer.

Since they were in Carl-Mart, Nate held back from putting his hands anywhere else. Barely.

When they separated, she looked up at him and sighed. “And not a sleeping bag in sight.”

“Just wait ’til we get to aisle sixteen.”

She shook her head. “I need you to stop kissing me.”

“Not gonna happen.”

“You don’t get to not call for three days and then kiss me whenever you want.”

“I warned you this was how it was going to go.”

“And you said that I wasn’t going to like it.”

“Yes, I did.” He didn’t like where this was going.

“You were right.”

Dammit. He’d known that would happen. He’d initially hoped it would happen.

But now…he was willing to hang out in Carl-Mart to be with her. This was absolutely not going according to plan. “I’m sorry to hear that,” he told her honestly.

Emma stood looking at him, looking a bit conflicted if he wasn’t mistaken.

“I get it,” she finally said. “But I’m going to fix this right now.”

She spun away from him and started down the aisle.

He definitely felt hesitant about following her, but his curiosity was stronger.

A woman was standing at the end of the aisle they were in, looking at the blenders.

“Hi,” Emma said.

The woman looked at her in surprise. “Hello.”

“I’m sorry for this.”

“For what?” the woman asked.

Emma glanced at Nate. “I need to confess to a stranger in public that I want to sleep with this guy.”

The woman looked appropriately confused and uncomfortable. “I’m sorry?”

“Me too,” Emma said, sounding very sincere.

Nate crossed his arms and waited. This was…interesting. Strange, but interesting.

Emma took a deep breath. “Okay, you’re the witness,” she told the woman. “He needs to know, officially, that he’s won,” she said, gesturing toward Nate. “I have to admit that he got to me so he’ll stop turning it on and trying to make me all stupid.”

Nate felt his eyebrows climb. This was definitely not what he’d been expecting.

“So here goes,” Emma went on. “I want this guy. Bad. Really bad. He did it. He made me cave first.” She spread her arms wide. “There.” She turned to Nate. “Satisfied?”

Satisfied? Not by a long shot. But this was not where he wanted to have that conversation.

“Not the most appropriate word,” Nate told her. “But if saying yes will get you to stop this, then yes.”

“Great.” She dropped her hands to her sides. “Sorry again,” she said to the woman who was clutching a blender against her stomach like it was a shield.

The woman nodded, then glanced at Nate.

He had no idea what to say or do so he simply waited until she spun on her heel and hightailed it out of the aisle.

“What the hell—” he started.

But Emma slapped a hand against his chest. “Shh!” She walked quietly and slowly the ten feet to the end of the aisle and peeked around the corner.

She turned back and pointed, mouthing, “It’s them.”

Michael and Shannon, he assumed.

Unexpectedly, he was irritated at them being nearby. And wasn’t that perfect? He’d come to keep an eye on them and now that they were close he wished they weren’t.

But he needed to talk to Emma.

She hurried back to his side and motioned for him to follow her. They exited the aisle on the other end and managed to get behind a large stack of plastic storage bins as Shannon rounded the corner.

“Toys are over here,” she called to Michael.

Emma and Nate both glanced behind them to find the toy section. Damn.

Emma motioned to him and they crept around the edge of the bins as the kids started toward the toys. Then Emma pointed at the aisle Michael had come from. Nate felt ridiculous as he slipped into the aisle stacked with alarm clocks and coffee pots, but safely out of sight while Emma stayed crouched behind the storage bins.

She peeked at him, then made a strange hand signal. He frowned and shook his head. She frowned and repeated the hand signal.

He rolled his eyes. They were using hand signals?

Emma finally sighed and straightened, walking toward him casually. “You’ll never make it as a spy.”

Speaking of people who were getting to other people.

“We need to talk,” he told her.

“No.” She grinned up at him. “You’re right—that is a fun word to say.”

“Emma—”

“Come on. We’re here on a mission.”

She started for the toy section, approaching it from the aisle along the far wall rather than the center lane.

Nate wanted to pick her up and throw her over his shoulder. He didn’t care about the kids and the scavenger hunt right now. He wanted to know what was going on with Emma.

“Now be quiet,” she whispered as they moved past the Play-Doh.

“Emma—”

She gave him a frown. “No, Nate.”

How many kids had been told no in that same firm voice in that aisle by their mothers, Nate wondered.

When they got to the end, Emma crept around the edge of the display of action figures. What they were doing with the Play-Doh, Nate had no idea.

They heard a shriek from two aisles up followed by male laughter. They moved closer.

“I’d say that will work for something to make her scream,” Michael said.

Shannon giggled. “For sure. That’s creepy.”

“Okay, next is something to play with.”

“Play-Doh,” Shannon said. “That would be perfect.”

Emma and Nate glanced at each other and in unspoken agreement, slipped down the Lego aisle as Shannon and Michael came around the corner heading for the Play-Doh.

“Why is Play-Doh perfect?” Michael asked.

“It’s so fun and so simple,” Shannon said. “You can do a million things with it.”

“I guess they could make it into obscene shapes,” Michael said.

There was a pause and Nate risked a glance around the corner. He had to look then duck back but he saw Shannon was facing Michael. Michael’s back was to Nate. Shannon stood with one hand on her hip and an expression that was part amused and part what-am-I-going-to-do-with-you.

Nate had
felt
that expression many times. Mostly with the woman who was now next to him. If Shannon was feeling what Nate so often felt, it meant she knew Michael was going to be a handful at times, but also knew being with him was going to be a hell of a lot of fun.

“Name ten obscene shapes they could make,” Shannon said. “I can only think of two that you could do without a lot of artistic talent.”

“There’s at least four. This. And this. And there’s the obvious one,” Michael said.

“Hey,” Shannon said, dropping her voice, “be good. There are kids around.”

“I’m pointing, not saying anything.”

Nate could hear the laughter in Michael’s voice.

And, even though they were obviously talking about making a penis out of Play-Doh—among other things—he couldn’t help but smile. His son sounded happy and, maybe even more importantly, comfortable. He was himself with Shannon. That was big, in any relationship.

Nate turned to Emma. “Let’s go—”

“You know what they do sell here?” she interrupted. Her voice was a whisper but her irritation came through loud and clear. “Duct tape. And I’m not afraid to use it on you. One big piece over your mouth.
That
would be nice.”

“Here give me the pink Play-Doh,” Michael said from the next aisle.

“No way,” Shannon told him. “You can’t open that in the store and you are
not
making something dirty here in the middle of Carl’s.”

“I’ll pay for it,” Michael promised.

Nate could tell he was still smiling.

“Michael,” Shannon said. “Put the Play-Doh down.”

“Sweetheart, you’re gonna have to come over here and take it away from me.”

It was strange listening to his son flirt, but Nate felt more satisfaction than discomfort. Shannon clearly made him happy. Nate couldn’t help but be pleased about that.

“I think I know how to get it away from you,” she said.

Nate shifted. He wasn’t going to be able to listen to all of their verbal foreplay. If they started talking more provocatively he was going to have to interrupt—he glanced at Emma—or leave.

Would he really leave his son behind with the girl who was capable of changing everything about his future, to spend time with Emma instead?

“Pay attention to
them
,” Emma said, nudging him with her elbow. “This is why we’re here, right?”

Allegedly, yes. But his focus was definitely fluctuating.

“You think you’re gonna get physical with me?” Michael asked Shannon.

Nate shifted again. He whispered to Emma, “Maybe we should—”

“There are no sleeping bags over here either,” she whispered back. “Relax.”

“I think I’m going to get you to do whatever I want,” Shannon said, her voice teasingly ominous.

Nate heard a plastic clicking sound.

Michael chuckled. “A Nerf gun?”

“Put the Play-Doh down.”

“No way.”

The next noise was a
thwump
.

“I can’t believe you shot me!” Michael exclaimed.