9
What’d just happened?
Sadie’s heart thumped against her chest as she crawled into bed with Jayden. Dawson had never given her the impression he found her attractive; she’d assumed he didn’t. She’d noticed certain things about him, of course—like his perfect backside, since the fit of his jeans made that obvious, how the corded muscles of his arms and shoulders rippled as he worked, or the way his lips moved when he talked or smiled. Like Sly had said, most women noticed Dawson. They’d have to be blind not to. But he’d seemed completely indifferent to her.
Until a few moments ago.
Remembering the hunger in his eyes took Sadie’s breath away. He wanted a woman—so badly she wasn’t sure he was feeling very particular about which one. Acknowledging that helped her cool off a little. It wasn’t her he wanted; anyone would probably do.
Still, she hadn’t felt young or attractive for some time. She’d become a cliché, had fallen to the unappealing status of “beleaguered mom anxious to get out of a bad marriage” and was happy if she could just get an extra hour of sleep in a night or a generous tip at the diner. Romance hadn’t even entered her consciousness, so achieving the interest of a man who was that good-looking, even though there was still a great deal of suspicion surrounding him, reminded her that she wasn’t too old or too far gone to feel the kind of titillating desire depicted in movies. For the first time in ages, she wanted to make love. And she was so unaccustomed to the arousal flooding her body that she didn’t know how to combat it.
Having Dawson stay probably wasn’t the best way. She had to admit that. Knowing he was in the other room made her want to go back out there, but... God, it felt good to feel attractive again.
Closing her eyes, she allowed herself to imagine what it might be like if he were to kiss her with those full, soft-looking lips, imagined his large hands sliding up under her shirt to touch her breasts—and jumped out of bed again.
Stop, stop, stop! She couldn’t let her mind go there. Allowing herself to fantasize about Dawson Reed wouldn’t improve her situation. What if she acted on those fantasies? If she did, and Sly found out they’d been together—well, she didn’t even want to contemplate what would happen if Sly found out. And that wasn’t the only thing. Dawson was her boss! She needed the job he was providing.
Kneeling by the mattress, she forced herself to focus on the small body curled up under the covers. Jayden. Her son. She had to be smart, for his sake. Working for Dawson gave her an opportunity, made it possible for her to one day get out from under Sly’s thumb so she could build a better life for them both.
She couldn’t do anything to blow that.
* * *
Dawson woke to find a small face staring intently into his. Startled and unsure of where he was, he sat up rather abruptly, and the boy jumped back.
“Mo-om!” the kid cried. “There’s a man in our house!”
Dawson’s ears rang with the unexpected noise as he glanced around, trying to regain his bearings. He’d fallen asleep at Sadie’s—so deeply he hadn’t gotten up and gone home as he’d intended. And now it was...morning? Tough to tell with the blinds down...
“Shh. It’s okay,” he said to Jayden. “Don’t wake your mom. I’m leaving.” Shoving the quilt he’d been using out of the way, he got to his feet but staggered there for a moment. Still groggy, he hadn’t given his sore muscles any warning that they would suddenly be bearing his weight.
“Mom! Hurry!”
Dawson shoved a hand through his hair, trying to get it to stay down. If he had his guess, he looked pretty scary, especially to a small person. But he wasn’t sure there was anything he could do to change that. They were in such a tiny house he couldn’t even back away. “It’s okay. I’m not going to hurt anyone,” he said and started searching for his keys. They weren’t in his pocket. He remembered taking them out because they were cutting into his leg while he was sleeping, but...
“Dawson?”
At the surprise in Sadie’s voice, he whirled around to see her standing in the doorway of her bedroom, looking as rumpled as he was. “I’m sorry to still be here,” he said. “I didn’t wake up as planned. I guess I was more exhausted than I thought. But I’m going now—if only I can find my keys.”
“Who is it, Mommy?” the boy whispered loudly.
“Jayden, it’s okay. This is Dawson Reed, Mommy’s boss.”
Her son gave him a skeptical once-over. “Why’s he sleeping at our house?”
Dawson racked his brain, searching for a safe answer that would also appease the boy. He’d stayed to be nice, to offer Sadie some reassurance so she could sleep, but he knew it wouldn’t look like a favor if Jayden mentioned his “overnighter” to Sly, the landlady or someone else.
Fortunately, Sadie spoke up. “He came over to see Mommy last night and was too tired to drive home. We can share our couch with him, can’t we?”
Jayden didn’t seem too sure about that, but he was calming down now that he could tell his mother wasn’t alarmed. “I guess,” he said with a measure of reluctance.
“What time is it?” Dawson asked.
Sadie rubbed her face. “Almost seven.”
“When do you have to be at the restaurant?”
“Not until eight today. My alarm will be going off in five minutes.”
“So you’ll be out to the farm at one.”
She covered a yawn. “Unless I get done early.”
“One is fine. I’ll see you then.” Spotting his keys on the floor, he stooped to grab them, but Sadie hurried after him, still wearing that darn T-shirt he’d dreamed of pulling off her for half the night, and intercepted him at the door.
“Actually, I was thinking maybe you could stay for breakfast and then...you know—” she lowered her voice “—leave after we do.”
He froze with his hand on the knob. Now that he was on his way, he didn’t want to be held up. He had the feeling he should never have come here. He hadn’t been ogling Sadie at the farm. He’d been able to keep his mind where it should be, for the sake of his sister. “Because...”
“My landlady gets up early, and she...she looks for me in the mornings, for a bit of chitchat before I head to work. After that, no one will be paying any attention to my place, and I wouldn’t want her to, you know, think the worst.”
By seeing a strange man come out of her house... That was the part she didn’t add. “Right. Okay.” He had a lot to do and was suddenly damn uncomfortable hanging out here. But he figured he could tolerate another few minutes.
Letting his breath go in a long sigh, he returned to the couch.
Jayden was still staring at him. “You live on a farm?”
He’d said that as if Dawson lived on a spaceship or the moon or something really exciting. “I do.”
“What kind of animals do you have? Do you have any pigs?”
“I don’t have animals right now. I grow artichokes.”
Jayden looked disappointed. “What’s an arti—What did you call it?”
“Artichokes are vegetables. I’ll have to send one home with your mom so you can try it.”
“I don’t like vegetables,” he said.
Dawson couldn’t help chuckling. “Then I’m glad I’m not depending on you.”
He wrinkled his nose. “What’d you say?”
“Nothing. I didn’t like vegetables when I was your age, either.”
“Jayden, why don’t you go potty and get dressed?” Sadie said. “And please don’t put so much toilet paper in the toilet this morning. If you stop it up again, Mrs. Clevenger is going to want to kick us out.”
“I don’t do that,” he said, but he shot Dawson a glance that was just devilish enough to indicate otherwise.
“Hurry,” Sadie prodded. “We can’t be late.”
“I’m going,” her son said, but he was barely inching along. Clearly, he was more interested in keeping an eye on Dawson.
“Hurry,” she said again. “Breakfast will be ready soon.”
“What’re we having?” he asked.
“How about French toast? You like French toast.”
He clapped his hands. “Yay! My favorite! Do you like French toast?” he asked Dawson.
“Sure, French toast sounds delicious to me,” Dawson replied and hoped Sadie would put on something a little less revealing while she cooked—almost as much as he hoped she wouldn’t.
* * *
Sadie peeled off the T-shirt and the shorts she’d worn to bed and tossed them in the pile to be washed. She was going to take a quick shower, but removing her clothes while Dawson was in the house felt rather...erotic, especially after what she’d imagined last night. She could hear his voice as he talked to Jayden, which made him sound very close...
Something had changed between them, she decided. The attraction that’d flared last night wasn’t gone. He’d grown aware of her in a sexual way—and she liked the attention.
“You gotta be smart,” she reminded herself with a stern glance in the mirror. Then she pushed those feelings of excitement to the side, doing her best to ignore them, so she could get ready and wouldn’t be late. She hated to make Dawson stay until she and Jayden could get out the door, but what had seemed so innocent last night—having him stay for a few hours because she needed the company—felt entirely different now that she’d spent hours dreaming about feeling his naked body against hers.
“Ready, Mom?” Jayden hung on the doorknob with one hand while fighting to keep the bag they took to and from Petra’s each day on his shoulder with the other.
She straightened the apron that was part of her uniform for Lolita’s. “Yeah. Let’s go.”
Dawson was watching the news when they came through the living room. He hadn’t been able to shave, so he had a dark shadow of beard growth on his chin. That together with his wrinkled clothes made him look a little unkempt, but Sadie liked him that way. He looked good sitting there on her couch in those faded jeans and that Tennessee Williams T-shirt. She’d found him attractive from the start, but his sex appeal seemed to be growing fast, which worried her. They’d be spending a lot of time out at the farm alone—and she’d only be spending more time with him once she was finished working at the diner.
“Have a great shift,” he said.
“Will you be here when we come home?” Jayden asked.
He chuckled as he shook his head. “No. You’ll have your couch back.”
“You can use it. We can share,” he said, repeating what Sadie had told him earlier. To her ear, Jayden sounded a little disappointed, which surprised her.
“Thanks, but I should be okay at my place. I’ll be careful not to drop by when I’m so tired.”
Jayden hitched the bag higher on his little shoulder. “Maybe I can come see those things you grow sometime.”
“I’ve already told your mother she can bring you whenever she wants.”
Jayden immediately turned to her. “Can I go today?”
He had been at Petra’s so much recently. Sadie knew he missed being with her. And some of her previous fears seemed unfounded—given that Dawson could’ve murdered them both in their sleep last night and hadn’t so much as given them a threatening look. But she was still worried about Sly’s reaction. Ironically, she was far more frightened of her ex than her new employer.
“Can I, Mommy? Please?” Jayden begged.
If Jayden came only for this afternoon, would Sly have to know?
He could too easily find out, she decided. He’d been keeping such a close eye on her—had always kept a close eye on her, but more so now that she was working for Dawson.
“I’ll think about it while I’m at the diner.” She was so tired of letting Sly dictate what she could and couldn’t do, but she had to be careful or he’d sue her for custody.
She took the bag from him and they walked out to find Maude Clevenger spraying off the stepping-stones in the yard.
“Mornin’!” Maude called and turned off her sprayer in anticipation of their usual chat.
Sadie breathed a sigh of relief that she’d asked Dawson to stay inside until after she left. Maude would go in for breakfast in a few minutes. Then no one should be paying any attention to what went on at her place.
“Morning,” she responded and smiled as Maude approached.
“I’ve got something to show you,” her landlady told Jayden, eyes sparkling with excitement.
He hurried over. “What is it?”
“Only the biggest snail I’ve ever seen,” she replied.
“A snail? Where?”
Sadie put the bag in the back of the El Camino and followed her son to a table where Maude had put the snail in a large plastic bowl. While they oohed and aahed, Sadie pulled her phone from her purse and texted Dawson. My landlady is outside, all right. But she should go in after we leave. Can you keep an eye out for her and make sure she’s gone before you come out?
You got it, came his response.
When she had Jayden in his safety seat and was backing out of the drive, Sadie sighed in relief. She thought she’d pulled off keeping Dawson’s presence a secret. Jayden had been so excited by the snail he hadn’t mentioned the fact that they’d had a visitor, and with as quickly as his mind moved on to whatever was happening at the moment, she couldn’t imagine he’d pipe up with that later—not unless something jogged his memory. With any luck, that wouldn’t happen. She should be in the clear.
But then she caught a glimpse of a black-and-white sedan turning at the corner and realized that Sly had probably been behind the wheel. He’d just driven past her house. Again.
She searched for where Dawson had parked his truck and nearly gasped when she spotted it not far from where the patrol car had turned. There it was, plain as day!
Had Sly recognized it?
He had to have. Like her car, that truck was distinctive...
“Why aren’t we going, Mommy?”
Jayden was so used to her backing out of their drive as fast as was safely possible, rushing to get him to Petra’s so she wouldn’t be late for work, that he’d noticed the hesitation. They were sitting in the street, her foot on the brake as she gaped at Dawson’s truck. She was trying to convince herself that what she’d seen a moment earlier was merely her imagination—fear getting the best of her—and not her ex-husband’s cruiser.
“We’re going.” She gave the El Camino some gas, but instead of heading straight to Petra’s, she rounded the corner and headed toward the center of town. She wanted to know if that was Sly...
“Can I go to the farm?” her son asked.
Her heart was still pumping erratically, knocking against her chest and making it difficult to concentrate. “What’d you say, honey?”
“Can I go to the farm today?”
“I told you I’d think about it at the diner. I’m not at the diner yet.”
“Why can’t I know now?”
She reached California Street—the main thoroughfare in Silver Springs—and looked both ways, searching for any sign of a patrol car, but saw nothing. “I’ll call you on my break and let you know.”
“I can’t wait that long. I want to go to the farm!” he pleaded. “You’ll be there, won’t you?”
She decided to stop by the store while she was heading in the wrong direction. “Yes, I’ll be there.”
“Then why can’t I come? Dawson said I could!”
She wanted to say, “Because your father would use it against me.” But she refused to undermine Jayden’s relationship with Sly. They struggled to get along as it was. “Today might not be the best day, that’s all. There will be plenty of other opportunities.”
Because he wasn’t happy with her answer, he continued to beg her both before and after she stopped to get him and Petra’s kids some fruit snacks for later, but Sadie held fast. If Sly had recognized Dawson’s truck, there’d be a confrontation, and she didn’t want Jayden to have any part of that.
She was still feeling nervous after she’d dropped him off and was pulling into the diner—but a text she received from Dawson brought her a bit of relief.
All is well. Your landlady turned her back to put away the hose, and I slipped right past her. Houdini couldn’t have escaped more cleanly.
She smiled at the image he’d created of himself sneaking away. He made her feel good—from when he stood up to Sly at the door to when he helped her down from the roof to when he tried to fire her, for her own good, and couldn’t quite succeed because he had too soft of a heart. He wasn’t what other people thought he was. He was the best-kept secret in town.
But she couldn’t get too excited. Sly would somehow wreck what she had going, if he could.