Never Been Loved (24 page)

Sera’s smiling the whole time and gets up, leaning over the kitchen counter following Matty’s orders to get the napkins and cutlery. She’s so damn adorable right now, listening to him like he isn’t four years old and doesn’t have a say in what she does, but just follows suit like it’s no big deal.

I swipe her hand and land a kiss in the middle of her palm. Her fingers curl over it like she’s trying to keep it safe.
Don’t beat your chest, don’t do it.

She actually looks surprised, her eyes are wide and her voice soft when she says, “Uh...what did you do that for?”

Because you’re hot enough that if we were alone right now, I’d have you over this counter, uh, if you’d let me. Because you’re sweet to the kid, because you’re sweet in general, and I never wanted to OD on sugar so bad.

I can’t stop touching her, my thumb tracing the bumps of her knuckles, hoping she feels a sliver of what she gave me last night. I wouldn’t mind seeing Sera out of control; hell, I wouldn’t mind it one fucking bit.

“I invited you for dinner, not to set my table. Matty can do it. Have a seat.”

Sera gets to the table without saying another word to me, and I give Matty the rest of the plates when he comes back for them, pretending the floor’s ice in his sock-feet. I pay for the pizza, and bring the box over to the table after having re-cut all the slices.

The kid starts with his daily adventures, and he looks happy enough that Sera seems to be the only one listening. I can’t help but watch her face for reactions, her expressions, the way she doesn’t mind having a legit conversation with a little kid.

“We made Play-Doh, but it didn’t come from the yellow jar!”

Shit, she actually looks completely interested. I can’t even fake it that well.

“Then, where did it come from, little man?”

“I
made
it!” Matty points at himself. Sera’s eyebrows pop high like she can’t believe it. “Yeah! I made it. Out of flour and some other stuff, and I painted it blue with red swirls. Then it turned purple!”

“Sounds like fun,” she says, nibbling on her slice of pizza. Oh, man, does she not like it?
Hawaiian pizza isn’t for everyone, you asshole, why didn’t you get an all-dressed one, too?
Then I get distracted by her teeth tearing the pizza and I’m having a hard time concentrating on keeping the blood above my waist.

“It was. It was.” Matty chews on his piece then looks at me like he’s waiting for story-time.
Kid, don’t do it, I don’t want to talk about it…

“And you, Daddy? What did you do?”

Shit! He conned me, my own nephew conned me! Stall, here, wipe your mouth, and think of a good answer.

I’m not coming up with a good answer.

“Nothing special, buddy.” My pizza’s really interesting. Check out how much cheese they piled on top this time around. Which means I gotta adjust my insulin later - don’t forget, MacLaine.

“What did you do today, Hunt?” Sera asks, and I have to look up, making sure my mouth’s not open and she can’t see what I’m chewing. I’m grabbing my napkin like it’s personally called my mother a whore, and the plate was in on the name-calling, too.

Stop it. Just say the truth. Worst she can do is laugh. And laugh some more.

“Construction. I work in construction.”
That’s what happens when you barely finish post-secondary education ‘cause your body’s fucking with you.

I look at Sera’s face, the way the colour blooms on her cheeks, the way she’s stopped chewing and isn’t really looking at me, but stuck somewhere in her head – hopefully with me front and center.

“Cool,” she murmurs, taking a chug of her water… like she’s trying to cool down.
Jesus Christ, is she thinking about me?

“Sera? Can you read to me again tonight?” Matty asks, completely stealing all her attention, when all I want to do is press the advantage, and press, and press…

“Sure, kid. Peter Pan again, or something else?” She looks at me and I give the nod, because hell yeah, I want her here as long as possible. After she reads to Matty means there’s time for adult conversations, or hell, zero conversations at all. My skin’s tight and I can’t look away from her mouth.

I hardly hear Matty having a hard time.

“I...” Matty blows out air, carefully placing his pizza down on the plate. The kid doesn’t stop eating unless it’s important. Rewind – what did she ask him?
C’mon, man, you can’t have blanked out this bad.

“I don’t want the story to end just yet. Can you read me something else?”

Sera’s eyes get wide and big, and she has this little smile in the corner of her mouth that somehow goes straight to my dick.

“Ever heard of a boy named Harry Potter?” she asks, looking like she’s hoping for a no.

Matty shakes his head, and Sera’s smile gets even wider, showing off her teeth. She looks so adorable, and the clothes she’s wearing are driving me wild. But it’s like I’m not even here, with the two of them, all her focus is on the kid.

“Right. We’re going to read that tonight.” She finally looks at me. “How could you not read him Harry Potter? What’s wrong with you?” She actually looks at me like I’ve done a horrible thing.

If only she knew.

“Sorry. I got carried away,” she says, looking at me with understanding. “Harry Potter has a very special place in my heart and to not read it to a kid is like blasphemy.” Colour blooms on her cheeks, and I wish I had the balls to reach out and stroke her skin there. “I don’t just wear the nerdy shirts and shoes. I have nerdy blood, and a nerdy heart.”

I jump when she reaches for my hand, and I’m reminded at how bad I’m strangling my napkin like it’s gone and revenge-killed my family.

“Maybe you shouldn’t pulverize your napkin,” she tells me, smoothing out my fingers and I’m not holding paper anymore, but the flesh of her fingers instead. “I’m really happy you’re letting me read to him. Thank you.”

C’mon, man, say something intelligent. Do something. Anything. She’s on the same page… I think.

I watch her put the mandatory space between us, but I flip my hand over quick enough and get our fingers wound together, making sure she can’t pull away from me, not now, not when there’s so much to do.

“As long as you promise to stay after he goes to bed. We need to talk.”
Right, give her ultimatums, idiot.
But she snorts, and then hides the sound behind her hand, cheeks glowing red. The kid adds his laugh to the mix, and I can’t help it and follow suit.

“That was adorable,” I say, kissing her knuckles, like some prince or some shit, but Sera seems to like it by the way her mouth parts, and a breath comes whooshing out of her.

“Why do keep kissing her hand, Daddy?”

Busted, MacLaine. You’re in trouble now. How are you going to explain this?
“I’m showing her respect, buddy. I like Sera. I want her to be my girlfriend.”

“I don’t get it,” the kid says, frowning at me.

“When I do this,” I tell him, grazing my mouth against her knuckles again, “I’m saying I like her.” I’m probably doing all this wrong.

“Is it like when Peter kisses Wendy’s hand?”

“Yeah, buddy. That’s exactly it.” Anything to get him to stop talking about it, anything to get his attention away from me and Sera together. Fuck, I don’t know if there’s a ‘together’ yet.

“I think I understand.” Matty nods a couple of times, then looks at me like he’s filed away that info for later. “Daddy, can we go to the park now? You said after supper we could go. Sera, wanna play soccer?” he asks her without waiting for my reply. The kid knows how to get what he wants all the time.

“Pffft. You don’t want to play me, buddy. I’ll kick your little bum,” Sera says, getting into it. Most girls would probably knock it off, having to play with a little kid, but she’s all for it. She even blows air on her knuckles like she’s hot shit.

Well, she is.

Matty looks to Sera, then smacks his hand down on the table, all pissed that she used a synonym for ass. “I thought you said a bad word. So? Wanna play? I bet Daddy’s better than you!”

The challenge has been issued, and all Sera does is look over to me and say, “I’ll kick your bum, too. Game on?”

She shouldn’t be allowed to play soccer dressed like that. How am I going to concentrate on the ball when I’d be looking at some particular female parts of her body?
“You’re playing dressed like that?” I ask, looking her up and down, rubbing my mouth with a hand. My jeans are uncomfortably tight, and I have to think of corpses to get myself to calm down.

“I’ll show you
and
your boy how a lady can kick gluteus!” She shrugs. “I’m trying to avoid losing quarters.”

I keep rubbing my mouth, more slowly now. “Game on, then. When I kick your...bum, even in those fine clothes, we’re going to talk, aren’t we?”

I watch her fidget, running her hands over that fucking skirt, not looking at me behind the curtain of her hair. Then she tells me what I want to hear.
“Yeah. We’ll talk. But not before I score a hat-trick!”

Chapter 17

She has skills, I’ll give her that, but Christ, she doesn’t play fair. She just
had to
roll her skirt up, just fucking had to.

Her long hair is flowing in the wind, distracting me with its vanilla frosting scent, and she keeps laughing and pulling these moves that got me having to physically use my brawn to keep her from shredding my ego. Not that I’d mind.

Matty gets into it, too, practically trying to break her leg when he fans the ball and tries to get it away from her. I call a penalty kick ’cause in whatever game you’re playing there have to be consequences, and the kid needs to learn that, sooner rather than later.

Still makes me feel like a shit, though, especially when he gives me that wounded look that reminds me so much of my sister.

But the kid notches his chin up and gets in net, and stares down at Sera like he’s willing her to miss.
Sorry kid, that’s not going to happen.
Consequences and all that shit
.

I don’t know what I’m doing half the time – I don’t know how to be a parent. The way I was brought didn’t help me none. I have no pointers from my mom and my dad’s been long gone for a while. So yeah, I have no idea what I’m doing.

But I don’t think it’s impossible to figure out.

Kids nowadays, well, ninety percent of them are little shits, lack respect and don’t know their asses from their elbows. Matty’s not going to be like that – he’s going to grow up to be the man I could never be.

It’s not a hardship to step close to Sera, to watch the wind play with her hair, the sun turn it bright. And Christ, that skirt, rolled higher up on her waist so I can see her bare knees – she has scars on both of them, maybe battle wounds from an overactive childhood. At least, that’s what I’m hoping for.

I’ve known Sera for only a short while, but it sure as hell didn’t take long to tell that she’s extremely kind, maybe too kind. She’s going to want to miss. Staring at her profile, I catch her eyeing the far post, and not the angle where the ball should get in the net, either. Nah, she’s going to miss on purpose, because that’s who she is.

I’m not going to let her.

I step in close, her ass almost flush with my dick, the thing pulses, practically waving ‘hello, nice to meet you’ in my jeans, and I get my mouth on a sweet spot on the side of her throat, feel the pulsing of her vein and her sharp intake of breath.

Now I’m thinking of a bed, and her and me in it.

It is not cool to be sporting a stiffie in the middle of a kid’s park. Get that shit under control, man. Now!

My scheming plan worked; Sera actually scores a goal, and Matty starts going mental. The kid keeps kicking the ball in the net, screaming incomprehensibly. The hole in my chest blows open wide to swallow me whole, and I move over to him, speaking to him softly.

“Matty, Matty you have to stop what you’re doing, before you hurt yourself. Come here.” Jules’ kid lets himself get corralled by my long arms, and closer to my body.

The kid’s face is crumpled until his features have twisted in agony. At four years old, Matty knows there’s something wrong with him, and sometimes, he crashes into the wall that are our limitations of what we can do. Until the careful dieting and watchful doses of insulin aren’t enough anymore.

Until every little thing, just like a goal that was scored on you in a game of pick-up soccer is enough to destroy the very foundations on which you stand. Because that’s all it is in the end, a game of pretend, our lives – pretending that we’re normal, that we’re healthy – when we are not. And that the kid has to learn that at such a young age has enraged me since we found out he was diabetic.

This shouldn’t be happening, not to him, not to me. Why can’t the scum of the earth get sick? Why do they get to keep breathing the same air as I do and continue to hurt people?

Gritting my teeth, I pull the kid in for a hug, and while I’m not used to giving hugs, I know he needs it.

What I wouldn’t have given for my dad to have hugged me when I was a kid. Shit, if the old man showed up now, and really looked at me and hugged me while thumping me on the back, I might disgrace myself and bawl my eyes out.