Chapter Nine
Jenna
The smell of bleach filtered through the smell of freshly cut grass. I tossed one of the rags I had cleaned the all counters with into the washer. Everything smelt fresh and clean. It was all neatly organized too. The wood floors were swept, polished, and smelt of pine. I had spent the entire week from sunup to sundown cleaning every inch of the house.
My mother would be impressed. Pride filled me before shame came slamming back. I had only cleaned to distract myself from those sinful images.
They replayed teasingly in the back of my head. No matter how hard I had tried to tell myself to look away from that window, I hadn’t been able to. My eyes had been rooted to the pleasure contorting Derek’s face as his hand had pumped up and down his—
Knock. Knock.
I jumped at the unexpected sound. Fanning my flushed cheeks with a hand, I left the laundry room to peer cautiously through the peephole on the front door. I let out a relieved breath the second I recognized Martha’s trim figure on the other side.
“Sorry to come over unannounced,” she said, beaming. “I just thought you might like your mail. The postman gets the mail mixed up sometimes.”
I grabbed the few envelopes from her hand. “Thanks,” I said. I half expected Martha to hurry back down to her house to take care of Julie, but she lingered pointedly on the front porch. “Is there something else that you need?”
“Not particularly,” Martha said. “I just wanted to know how babysitting Owen has gone for you over the past few weeks.”
“It’s going fine.”
That clearly didn’t satisfy the curiosity blazing in Martha’s eyes. “Right,” she said. She leaned in to whisper, “I hope that Derek hasn’t been too much of an ass to deal with. He can be such a prick sometimes!”
I couldn’t help the grin that spread across my face at that. “He can be. It’s honestly going fine. Owen is the sweetest little boy.”
“I wish I could say he got that from his parents.” Martha shook her head with a sigh. “Neither one of them are the friendliest people in the world.”
Curiosity took hold of me then.
“His mom isn’t either?” I asked.
“Oh, heaven’s no,” Martha exclaimed. “You know there are women out there in the world who are not the most pleasant of people.” Her nose wrinkled. “Well, Sidney, from what I understood, was one of them. I heard horrible things from one of the other moms who is friends with the principal of the school.”
“They must be divorced then,” I said. “I never see any pictures of her anywhere in the house. Derek never mentions her.”
“He wouldn’t. He went broke just to get custody of Owen from her.”
I glanced at the house next door. They had arrived back home yesterday, a day early, but Owen had been the only one to wave, promising to show me pictures of the zoo later. Derek hadn’t even spare me a glance. And for some irrational reason, that stung considering the situation. Though what exactly that situation was, I had no idea.
“How are you handling everything here?” Martha asked kindly. She smiled at me when I looked over at her. “All is well?”
“Everything’s fine,” I said, shrugging. “I’m just cleaning up the house is all. Never-ending projects, it seems like.”
“Usually.” She reached out to grasp my forearm. I watched as her fingertips gently covered the marks Leon had left. They were stubborn. They didn’t want to leave. “I don’t mean to put you on the defense, Jenna, but I want to tell you that I’ve been where you are right now.” A darkness briefly clouded the warmness in her eyes. “I know how hard it is to trust people afterward. It took me a good couple of years to trust my current husband, but not every person you meet is going to be like him.” Her fingers squeezed. “Keep that in mind, okay?”
Tears pricked the back of my eyes. I opened my mouth to reply, but the sound of Owen’s voice calling out my name spared me.
“Jenna!” he yelled, waving at me from the front step. “Come over. We’re barbecuing hot dogs. Come look at my pictures.”
“You better go,” Martha said. She started down the front porch step. “You better show me those pictures too, Owen. I know Julie would love to see them. She’s jealous.”
I closed the front door uneasily. I had no idea how Derek would react to me coming over unannounced, but Owen continued to wave his arm impatiently. He motioned for me to follow him down the hallway and through the sliding glass door. The smell of charcoal and igniter fluid filled my nose when I stepped out onto the hot patio behind Owen.
Derek stood in front of a small charcoal grill, scraping the grate. My eyes landed on the strong chords of his neck where a small cross tattoo was. He froze when he turned around to find me there. Heat threatened to sear through my stomach when those images replayed again. I wanted to see his head tilting back in pleasure because of me, not because of his own hand.
Does he know that I watched? His eyes skimmed over me, completely emotionless. I couldn’t even gauge his reaction to seeing me besides surprise.
“Owen wanted me to come over,” I said, resting a hand on Owen’s hot shoulder. “He wanted me to see the pictures he took.”
“He could’ve shown you on Monday,” he said, a frigid quality to his voice that had even Owen tensing. “I didn’t even know you went out of the house, Owen. You know you are not supposed to do that.”
“I just saw Jenna on the front porch with Julie’s mom,” Owen said defensively. He jutted out his jaw at Derek. “I wanted Jenna to see my pictures now.”
“Another time, Owen. We’re about to eat lunch.”
“But—”
“I said no,” Derek snapped. “That’s that. I am not going to repeat myself.”
Owen and I flinched back. His tiny shoulder quivered beneath my fingers before he let out a small cry. Jerking away from me, he darted into the house with surprising speed and grace. The sliding glass door bounced shut.
“Damn it,” Derek muttered, rubbing a hand over his face in visible distress. “Look, I didn’t mean—”
Anger rushed through me so fast that my heart couldn’t keep up. The patio boards were hot under my bare feet as I walked around the small glass table to jam a finger into Derek’s chest.
“You look,” I said as coldly as possible. “That is your son. You can talk to me that way and act like a prick, but don’t turn your son into a version of yourself.”
Derek’s eyes narrowed at that. “A version of myself?” he repeated dubiously. He grabbed the finger I had buried in the strong muscles of his chest. “I’m doing the best I can given what I’m going through. You’re not a parent, so don’t lecture me on how to raise my child.”
“You don’t have to be a parent to realize that your words affect people,” I said. “If you have a problem with me coming around, then why do you have me come over here at night to watch your kid?”
I had him, and he knew it. The frustration boiled in Derek’s face as he let go of my finger and took a step back to put space between us.
“Because I don’t trust you,” he said. “I don’t trust you at all just like you don’t trust me, but damn it to hell, I want you. That’s all I fucking know.”
Those words washed over me in a crushing wave. He wanted me. Derek Summers wanted me. Sweat gathered in the palms of my hands. The logical part of my brain cautioned that none of this was smart. The last time I had gotten involved with an emotionally cold man, I’d ended up fleeing across the country with only what I could grab in thirty minutes.
Still, that searing heat in my stomach roared to life. I wanted him too. I wanted to feel the weight of that muscular body pressing up against mine. I felt torn between wanting to run away and wanting to stay rooted right there as Derek rubbed at his eyes with a helpless hand. He didn’t even bother hiding the desire there now.
“I want you too,” I whispered, and he stiffened visibly at that. “Maybe we could—”
“No,” Derek said, shaking his head vehemently. “You don’t want to even start getting involved with a man like me. You’ve already been roughed up. I’ll do it to you too, just not the physical part.”
I winced at that. “How do you know I was roughed up?”
“I’m not blind or ignorant,” he said, and he gave me a sad smile. “I see it more than you think. I’ve seen it too much that it has made me cold.”
I crossed my arms to fend off the sudden chill I felt seeping through my skin. This was the last thing I wanted to discuss with Derek. I just wanted things to go forward regardless of the past. Frustrated, I glanced up at Owen’s bedroom window, where I saw his little face dart out of view the moment I looked up.
“It wouldn’t hurt us to get it out of our system,” I said. I wanted it out of my system—the sheer temptation of wondering what it was like. I wanted to claw it right out of my skin.
“You’re so young,” Derek said, a whimsical tone to his voice. “You think sleeping with me will make everything better in your world?”
“It’d help me sleep at night. It’d help you too.”
He looked away at the comment. “Maybe,” he said, picking up the lid of the grill. Gray smoke came billowing out. “It can’t happen, Jenna. It won’t solve anything for either one of us. I’m not going to take advantage of you. I’m not that big of a prick.”
I clenched my jaw while Derek continued to scrape the grill as casually as possible. A small part of me agreed that he was right. It wouldn’t solve anything. Still, I felt a surge of defiance go through me.
“I’ll see you Monday night,” I said. He turned to look at me with an arched eyebrow. I pointed up to Owen’s bedroom window. “You might want to go get your son. He’s listening in on us.”
I stepped off the patio without waiting for a reply. I swung my legs over the fence separating our yards to land on the wet grass. What I was about to do was completely stupid and foolish. I knew it, but I didn’t care.
Derek got under my skin. It was time to get under his.
The opportunity arose when I caught sight of movement in Derek’s bedroom later that night. Don’t do this, Jenna. This is stupid. I couldn’t help it though. Indignant anger still radiated in me, and it mingled with the desire bubbling inside. I had to do something to release the tension.
I hesitated for a moment before sliding my shorts and underwear off. How did I end up in this sort of game in the first place? Crawling to the center of my bed, I let my head fall back onto the pillows as my thighs quivered. I ran my hand down my stomach ever so slowly, arching my back a little as if I were lost in ecstasy. I rolled the pads of my fingertips over my clit and cried out as pleasure seared through me. It felt as if it had been forever. Hot summer air puffed over me in a slow and lingering breeze that came through the open window, and my thoughts were scattered everywhere, trying to figure out how to appear sensual in the middle of bringing myself over the edge.
I turned my head to glance at the mirror facing my bedroom window as I rimmed myself, playing with the deep pulsing that was rolling far inside my stomach. I didn’t want my hand. I wanted him, so damn badly that it left me willing to bare myself to him.
My heart slammed into my ribcage when Derek’s face appeared in the mirror. His eyes were dark with desire while the curtain to his room flapped against his face in the late-night breeze.
He’s watching. Smugness filled me at the thought, and I slid my fingers into my body, lifting my hips a little to meet the pressure. A cry left my lips, and I forced myself to watch him, letting him know that everything I did was because I wanted him to watch. Pleasure danced across my stomach as my nipples grew tight and tender.
I reached up and squeezed my breast as I increased the pace, fucking myself faster, harder…just the way I loved it. The bundle of nerves between my legs twitched helplessly in pleasure as I moaned loudly and came. I gasped for air as I watched Derek’s face in the mirror. He was impossibly handsome. It was so easy to bring myself to an orgasm knowing he was watching, wanting me.
He licked his lips once before drawing the curtains shut violently.
I slid off the bed to gather my clothes from the ground. Tomorrow would undoubtedly be an interesting day. A smile played at the edge of my lips at the thought of how he would react. What the hell were we doing?