It was way-too-early-o’clock. That’s all I knew.

“I gotta go. Give me a kiss,” someone said. The confident, loving, sexy way it was said, you’d think I’d know who it was. Nobody existed at this hour of the morning. I sat up quickly in bed, startled.

“Ow!”

“Fuck, what’d you do that for?” my hot lover swore, rubbing his head. I’d clonked him hard during my panic.

“Oh shit, sorry. Ever since I stayed at your place, I’ve been jumpy,” I told him as I held my skull, not quite seeing stars, but close.

He sighed, putting his hand behind my head and looking at me, checking me over. “You okay?” I was now. Man, he was handsome. I reached up, touching the light scruff on his face, caressing him. He grabbed my hand before I got to touch anything else good.

“I have to get home. Give me a kiss,” he said. I smiled, leaning farther forward. Unfortunately, he kissed me chastely, so I tried my best to turn it into something more. I pulled him with me as I lay back down onto the bed with him on top of me, and we made out like that for a minute until he stopped it.

“I’d love to stay and finish this, but I really have to start my day,” he murmured against my lips. Damn. “Go back to sleep.” He kissed me close-mouthed and then stood up to leave.

“Party pooper,” I called to him as he strode toward the door of my bedroom. He turned, grinning his sexy smile.

“Oh, I’ll get up and drive you.” I suddenly remembered his vehicle predicament.

“My bike is still here in your garage, remember? I’m good,” he said before disappearing into the hallway.

This had been our dance nearly every morning since we got back together, minus the cracking heads part. In all honesty, I was kind of done with it already even though it’d only been a couple of weeks. Of course, we had stayed at his place a few times, but I’d be lying if I said I felt comfortable there. His apartment scared the crap out of me.

At least when we stayed at his place, he could just mosey on over to his laptop and not wake me up. If I did hear him get up, the sound of his keyboard always lulled me back to sleep. Speaking of sleep, I needed more.

With nothing fun left to do at this ungodly hour, I rolled over in my very comfortable bed, grabbed his pillow, pulled it into me, and sniffed it. Mmm, it still smelled like him. There I fell asleep, surrounded by soft, luxurious sheets and the smell of the man I was in love with.

Jason: You up?

My phone bleeped as I was making a to-go coffee mug. I smiled. It made my heart squeeze to know he was thinking of me, worried I wouldn’t be up on time for work. It wasn’t unusual. He did it every workday. But still, I loved it.

I picked up my phone, quickly typing back.

Me: Yep, just leaving. Thanks for checking.

Picking up my coffee, I started to head out when my phone pinged again.

Jason: Any idea where my car is?

Shit.

Me: I kind of told them to take a look at it.

Jason: After I said not to?

Me: Yes.

Jason: We’ll talk about this later. Have a good day.

Me: You too.

Oopsie. What were the chances he’d forget about this before tonight? Not much.

People milled about on my street. I waved to a couple of neighbors who left at the same time I did. In another half hour or so, the road would be nearly devoid of cars.

Traffic wasn’t too bad, so I made it to the office quickly. Had I known a greeting committee was waiting for me, I would have rethought my punctuality.

Before I even opened the door, I could hear the yelling and screaming. It was familiar, so I also wasn’t alarmed. “Get your tiny behinds over here this instant. Just wait until I tell your father what you little terrors did today. We’ve only been here five minutes and you’re already breaking stuff,” Audrey hollered at her boys, who were in fact being little terrors. Again. One of them carried the plastic paper holder for the copier, looking mighty guilty. Harper just sat there sweetly, arms outstretched, inviting the little hooligan to come to her. Auntie Harper would save him from his mean mommy like she always did. She had the maternal gene if there ever was one. Audrey? Not so much. But who was I to judge? If I had to look after those two all day, maybe I’d be as nuts as her, too.

“Give it to me, buddy. I’ll fix it,” Harper said. Hooligan number one handed over the broken piece, then Harper hugged him tight. He put his sweet little thief arms around her neck and hugged her right back.

“Yeah, you better stay over there with Auntie Harper,” Audrey said, pointing to the young offender while hooligan number two watched on with big eyes, not knowing what to do.

“Looks like I’m missing all the fun.” I broke the tension of the moment, all eyes coming to me.

“Oh, I don’t know about that. I’d bet my bottom dollar that you were just having a whole lot more fun than we were.” Audrey laughed, hitting her leg. Oh boy. Looked like I was the focus of attention now, instead of the future juvie offenders.

“Uh-huh. Not so much. He starts his day pretty darn early. Too early, if you know what I mean.” I raised my eyebrows, trying to keep the conversation PG.

“Never too early for that, let me tell you. Once you have kids, you need to adjust to finding time whenever you can. Sometimes early makes more sense than late after you’re dead tired from chasing kids around all day.”

“You never chase us. All you do is sit,” Hooligan number one felt confident saying, still safe in his auntie’s arms. Harper chuckled as Audrey looked beside herself.

“I don’t sit down all day. I’m always busy picking up after you little rats and fixing stuff you’ve broken and feeding your sorry selves. You have a maid at home? Yes, and it’s me.” She gestured to herself. He dug in closer to Harper for protection from his mother’s verbal assault.

“Isn’t there school today?” I asked, suddenly remembering it was definitely a school day.

“Is there ever school anymore? Those teachers get so much time off, it’s incredible. What are my tax dollars going to, anyway?” Ah, her built-in daily babysitter got cut off and she was fit to be tied. Poor Audrey, but I bet the teachers were glad for the break. “It’s a ‘professional day.’” She made quotation marks in the air. “Whatever the heck that is. Don’t they need to be professional every day? I don’t get it. But what it means for me is an entire day home with these terrors when I had an appointment this morning that I booked especially because I thought they’d be at school where they belonged.”

Audrey was frustrated, all right. “I’ll take them for a couple of hours while you go. No client meetings today, so they can have the run of the place.” Harper smiled down at her willing captive, kissing him on the cheek. God, his little cheeks were so cute and chubby, I wanted to reach out and pinch them.

“Yeah, let us stay with Auntie Harper.”

“We want to stay here. You go.”

It was unanimous. “Are you sure it’s okay? Dean won’t get mad?” Dean would never get mad having kids around. He loved kids, even challenging ones like Audrey’s. There was no way he’d say a thing about it.

“Dean will be fine. You go so you’re not late,” Harper said, nodding toward the door with her head.

Audrey stood up. “You don’t have to tell me twice. If something happens—when something happens—give me a call and I’ll come back early if I have to.”

Harper laughed. “We’ll be fine. You go.” Without further encouragement, Audrey picked up her purse, warned the boys with the loss of treats if they were any trouble for Harper, and then practically ran out of the office like it was on fire.

A few moments later, Dean sauntered through the doors saying his greetings to everyone. He gave the boys each a dollar telling them to be good for Harper or he’d take it back. They just looked up at him and nodded like he was some kind of superhero.

That money was pretty safe because under no circumstances would Harper ever tattle on them anyway.

“Vivienne, I need to go over a few things. Do you have time?” he asked me. I followed him down to his office.

We walked in. He threw his briefcase on the floor by his desk, not particularly caring where it landed. “So? How are things going with your young man?” he asked as we sat down. He’d been away on business for over a week, so our only communication had been through email and texts. Dean was my friend, but he was also a guy. The last thing he’d ask me was relationship questions over text messages.

I looked down at the floor, unable to control my excitement. “Good. Really good.” He smiled wide at me, all of his perfect white teeth shining in a perfect row.

“That’s great, Vivienne. I’m so happy for you.” Then he stood up, pulling me into him for a great big hug. Dean gave good hugs. He wrapped you up all secure, holding you tight. Then he’d rock back and forth like he really meant it. “But if he dicks you around again, I’ll hunt that bastard down.” There it was—the protective nature coming out.

I giggled at his shocking statement. “Dean, he didn’t dick me around. I was the one who screwed up.”

“And that idiot could have answered his fucking phone instead of acting like a little ten year old girl so you could have explained shit to him.” True enough.

“We worked it out,” was all I said, hoping he’d drop it. Kissing the top of my head, he let me go.

“You deserve nothing but the best. Don’t ever forget that.” He offered up his wisdom. I really hoped that someday, some deserving woman would catch that man’s attention because he had so much to offer. “Now, let’s discuss where you’re going this morning. The Hermans, right? I have a few things to tell you about them that may help.”

As quickly as that, he switched right to business, and much to my relief, didn’t ask me about Jason again.

Later in the day, I got another text from Jason.

Jason: Can you tell me why my fixed car just got delivered home to me?

Panic filled my body. Shit.

Me: A miracle?

Jason: You driving?

Me: Not right now.

Right on cue, my phone rang, causing me to nearly drop the thing. It was like an alarm, reminding me of what I’d done.

“Hi,” I said, hoping he’d be happy his car was working.

“What the fuck did you do?”

Okay, not so happy, I guess. “You need your car. How are you going to work?” I attempted to reason with him as my insides twisted and turned.

“Do you think maybe that was for me to figure out, not you? How much did it cost?” he asked. Man, I wanted to fudge the truth.

“Two grand,” I said as softly as I possibly could, crossing my fingers it sounded better that way.

“Motherfucker,” he said into the phone so loud I had to move my cell away from my head. “I can’t afford that. Why the fuck did you give them the okay to fix it?”

“I paid for it. Don’t worry about it.”

“You don’t pay for me. That’s not why I’m hanging around.”

I dropped my head to the steering wheel. “Don’t you think I know that? I have money. You don’t need to worry about it.”

“I’ll pay you back.”

“You don’t need to pay me back.”

“I’ll pay you back,” he repeated himself into the phone before disconnecting.

Shit.