DREAM ABOUT ME tonight.
Those four words kept replaying in my mind as I drove home. I would never tell him, but I’d been dreaming about him almost every night. Actually, it was more like a memory than a dream as my brain looped every detail of the night I spent wrapped in his arms. Even in sleep my brain was trying to tell me how good it was with Hayes—how what he made me feel shouldn’t be denied.
My thoughts and feelings were a complicated and twisted mess.
I’d spent enough time with Hayes, before I started avoiding him, to develop real feelings. But it was difficult to decipher exactly what those feelings were. Was it simply lust? Or was it more?
The way my chest clenched and my body hummed with electricity I knew it was more than lust.
Sweat dampened my skin.
I was so screwed.
This was bad, really bad.
I pulled into the driveway of my modest two-bedroom house. It was small, with only one bathroom and a kitchen you could barely turn around in, but it was home and I loved it.
I pulled a sleepy Mia from the car and carried her inside and straight to the bathroom. I started a tub of warm water and stripped off her icing covered dress.
I lifted her into the bathtub and the bubbles foamed around her.
She giggled, grabbing some and making a fake beard around her chin.
“Look at me, momma! I haz a beard!”
“Yes you do silly girl.” I tweaked her nose.
“Read me a stowy,” she pleaded with wide blue eyes.
I narrowed mine on her. “What do we say?”
“Pwease and tank you?”
“That’s right.” I smiled down at her.
I was so thankful to have my daughter. Despite the shit I was put through by my ex I couldn’t regret Mia. She was the bright light in my otherwise dull life. “Which story do you want?”
“Um…” She put a finger to her lips. “Ariel!”
“Ah, The Little Mermaid. I should’ve known.”
I grabbed the large storybook and sat down on the tiled floor.
“I wanna be a mermaid when I grows up,” Mia chimed, kicking the water.
“Don’t do that baby,” I scolded lightly. “You’ll get the book wet.”
“Sowwy.” She ceased her kicking and sat still, waiting for me to start reading.
I flipped to the right page and began to read. Mia sat, listening with rapt attention despite the fact that she’d heard this story a million times.
When I finished the story I set the book aside and washed her hair.
Once she was clean I dressed her in pajamas, even though it would still be a while before she went to bed, and put a movie on for her in the living room.
I showered as quickly as I could, hating to leave Mia unsupervised for even a second, but it was necessary to remove the hardened icing from my hair and skin.
Once I was clean I put my hair up in a messy bun and dressed in a pair of sweatpants and an old t-shirt.
Mia was still right where I left her and I sat down on the couch beside her. Immediately, without tearing her eyes away from the screen, she crawled into my lap.
I grabbed the fluffy blanket off the back of the couch and fixed it around us both.
Mia snuggled even closer to me and I brushed my lips against the top of her head. “I love you baby girl.”
“I know, momma.”
I couldn’t help but grin at her response. It warmed my heart to know that my daughter knew I loved her. I never wanted her to ever doubt that. She was my world. She had been since the moment I knew she was growing inside me, and it would remain that way until I took my last breath.
I eased the door closed to Mia’s room and backed down the hallway.
I turned the lights off in the living room and grabbed a bottle of water from the refrigerator.
I’d started in the direction of my bedroom when I heard a soft knock on the front door.
I froze mid-step. No one knocked on my door.
I set the bottle of water down and tiptoed into the living room and stood by the window beside the front door in the small foyer. I edged back the curtain, barely risking a peep out the window.
When I recognized the tall figure all of the worry seeped out of my body.
I threw the door open and hissed, “You scared me!”
“Sorry.” He raised one hand in surrender, a box clasped in the other. “Can I come in?” He swept two fingers to the side, indicating the living room.
“Uh…”
“Excellent. You’re so kind.” He breezed right past me, through the living room, and into the kitchen.
Stunned, I closed the door and followed after him.
He’d set the box on the kitchen table and proceeded to poke at my coffee maker.
“What are you doing?” I stepped up behind him, trying to peer over his shoulder but since he was a giant my efforts were futile.
“Trying to make coffee, obviously.” He said in a sassy tone.
“Don’t break my coffee maker.” I shoved at his heavy body, but didn’t succeed in moving him even an inch. “Move. Let me do it.”
He sighed and stepped aside.
“Why exactly am I making coffee?” I asked as I reached for the filters in the cabinet above.
“I brought cake.”
“Cake?” I glanced over at him. “Why?”
“Because you ended up wearing it, not eating it. I thought you and Mia might like some.”
I leaned back, scrutinizing the box on the table. “That looks like a new cake.” While the coffee began to perk I walked over to the table and picked up the box. Yeah, it was definitely a new cake and not the remnants of his original birthday cake. “Why does it say Happy 50th Birthday Barbara?”
Hayes bent over me to look at the cake. “Shit, I must’ve grabbed the wrong one. I was going to get one with the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles on it but then I got distracted.”
“By what?”
“Well, someone recognized me and then there was a lot of screaming, some tears, and some declarations of desires to birth my children. So when that happened I grabbed the first cake I could get my hands on and ran out of there…I also forgot to pay. Fuck. I should probably call the store.”
“What store was this?” Curiosity was taking over.
“Walmart.”
I snorted. “You mean to tell me that you, Joshua Hayes, willingly went into Walmart to buy a cake?”
He paused, scrutinizing my face. “I also had to buy toilet paper. Forgot that, though.”
I snorted, covering my face with my hands. “I can’t take anything you say seriously.”
“Hey, I can be serious,” he defended, the warmth of his body leaving mine as he began opening cabinets in search of coffee mugs, “but life would be pretty miserable without laughter. Aha!” He cried, finally finding the mugs. He grabbed one and began to laugh. “Mickey Mouse? Really, Arden?”
“Mia saw it and insisted I buy it. She’s a bit Disney obsessed. Hopefully I’ll be able to take her to Disney World sometime. Although, she might pass out from excitement.”
He chuckled and set the mug down, pouring the steaming hot liquid inside. “Where is she anyway? With her dad?” He looked around.
I swallowed thickly. I didn’t know how much Hayes might know from Sadie about my ex, but I figured it couldn’t be a lot since even she didn’t know the whole story.
“He’s not in the picture.”
Hayes stared at me for a moment, seeming to read so much in the hollowness of my eyes. “I’m sorry.”
“I’m not.” I shrugged.
He shook his head. “I’m not sorry for the reason you’re thinking.”
“Then what are you sorry for?” I asked, confusion coating my words.
He stepped towards me and my small gasp echoed through the kitchen as he smoothed his calloused fingers against my cheek. “I’m sorry that he hurt you, but I’m not sorry that he’s out of your life. Because if he wasn’t gone I wouldn’t be standing right here with you, where I’m meant to be.”
“Hayes—” I started.
“No,” he said firmly, clasping my face between his large hands, “don’t try to deny it. I see it in your eyes. You know we belong together just as much as I do. You’ve been skirting around this for months. Remember this summer? At the beach house and all the time we spent together? Not once did I try to make a move even though I wanted to. I know you want to believe that this is just sex for me, but it’s not. That night with you…” He closed his eyes briefly, swallowing thickly. “It was fucking amazing, but one night will never be enough with you. Hell, I’m not even sure the rest of my life would give me enough time to get my fill of you.”
“This is…it’s too sudden.”
He dragged a breath into his lungs and nodded his head as he stepped away.
“You’re right. I’m sorry. I’m getting ahead of myself.” He smiled wryly. “My mom always did tell me I liked to push things too far, too fast, and that the most important things in life take time.” He nodded at his own words. “You owe me one date and I’ll stick to my word that after that date the ball’s in your court. But Arden?”
“Yeah?”
“I don’t promise to fight fair.”
Before I could blink he shoved one of the coffee mugs in my hand.
“Enough serious talk. It’s time for us to gorge ourselves on poor Barbara’s cake. I should really send an apology letter.”
“What is it with you and letters?” I mumbled, grabbing two forks and not even bothering with plates.
“It’s a lost art form. People are too impersonal these days,” he mused, taking the fork I offered him.
I sat down and removed the lid. We both took a bite of cake and sat in silence.
Finally, I spoke. “You know…you’re kind of a strange guy, but I mean that in the best way possible. You’re nothing like I thought you’d be.”
He grinned, his adorable dimple making an appearance on his cheek. “I’m full of surprises, Arden. Appearances can be deceiving. Never forget that.”
Little did he know, but I had already been schooled in that thanks to my asshole ex.
We continued to sit, even after we’d finished with the cake and our coffee had long since grown cold.
It was like both of us were content to sit there and simply enjoy being in the presence of the other person.
As much as I might fight my overwhelming feelings for the cocky rock star I couldn’t deny that in his presence I felt that I’d finally found where I belonged.