Trinity

I’m careful by nature. A woman living alone, walking alone, in the world alone, has to be. Pepper spray is my constant companion because clutching keys in readiness for a good old-fashioned eye gouging isn’t always going to cut it.

I have a residential street parking permit, but sometimes my late hours mean the rock ’n’ roll spaces outside my door are taken and I have to park a block or two away. I’m constantly aware of my surroundings and I have that little canister of pain in my hand as soon as I exit the car. Not a big deal.

Until the night it was.

The weather was a little cool for May, but understandably so at one thirty in the morning. My street is tree lined and invariably quiet, but I ended up parking two blocks away from my condo building. No one was around. All I could hear was my breathing and the soft tread of my running shoes.

The alleys in my neighborhood are wide and well lit. I don’t turn down them for any reason but I’m aware of them, like gaping maws as I pass. A block and a half from where I live, he grabbed me by the hair.

Surprised, I dropped my pepper spray, the sound a heart-crushing clatter as it hit the ground, the sound of my salvation slipping away. My scalp burned but adrenaline rose to soothe it—I swung out with my closed fist and connected.

He let go.

That’s when I should have run. I know. But I was in shock and angry, and I wanted to confront this piece of shit who thought he could frighten me in my backyard. This gangly white guy with dark, greasy hair and burning, bloodshot eyes. He stood there, his palm covering his bloody nose—yes, I’d done that!

They’ll have DNA if they need it. If they need to identify my attacker. My killer.

He lunged but I stepped back, then farther until I was in the well-lit street. My heel brushed the pepper spray canister but no way was I bending down. I was a block from my door but I knew I’d never make it. He was still coming toward me and I was still backing up when I heard it.

A car. It turned down my block and we both looked up as its headlights caught me and my cornered-animal fear. I blinked and my attacker ran back into the alley like the rat bastard he was.

I don’t drive at night anymore. I have a postshift drink with my coworkers and use that as an excuse to always take a taxi. To always ask the driver to wait until I’m inside.

Neither did I tell my friends, because I didn’t want it getting back to Emily. She has enough going on, and while I know she’d sympathize, a teeny part of me is terrified she’ll blame me or the neighborhood or the fact I serve alcohol for a living. I’m supposed to be looking after her and she won’t let Chase stay with me if she thinks the neighborhood is unsafe. Besides, it could have happened anywhere.

It could have, but it didn’t.

It happened a block from my home.

It happened to me.

And I was forever changed.

---

Almost a week after the pub quiz, I’m on my way to Lincoln Park for a little fresh air and sports ball. You might think that the offer of a fun day out in a beautiful park in our fine city would be golden. Alas, none of my friends are interested in accompanying me to watch scruffy fourteen-year-olds play soccer.

Gideon claimed he had to make a Home Depot run for lumber. Lumber? I call liar. The man hasn’t built so much as a house of cards, never mind anything requiring wood. (Insert dick joke here.) Pete asked if there would be any booze involved.

It’s 10 A.M. in a public park with teens, Pete.

He hung up on me.

Even Emily, Chase’s own mother, couldn’t be bothered. She wanted to have a girly mother-daughter mani-pedi day with Ari, the thought of which made me shudder.

So here I am representing the Jones clan and praying to God Brian won’t be here.

The parking gods are shining on me as I score a spot on Stockton, just a couple of blocks from the action. Immediately I spy Chase in conversation with a tall kid over near the sidelines.

“Hey!” I barge in, ready to show my embarrassing love.

“Hey, Aunt Trin,” Chase mumbles.

“Aren’t you going to introduce me to your friend?”

Eye roll. “This is Carlos. He’s on the team.”

“Hi, Carlos. I’m Trinity, the cool aunt. No doubt you’ve heard all about me.”

Carlos flicks a glance of is this for real at Chase. My nephew merely shrugs, then mutters that they have to get started.

“Okay, break a leg!”

“That’s theater,” Chase says with immense patience. “You don’t say that to athletes. You never say that to athletes.”

“All right. Break one of your opponents’ legs. Crush them!”

Another eye roll from my nephew, but I tease a grin from Carlos. It’s probably pity for Chase, who has to painfully endure me, but I don’t care. Connections are being made.

Looking around, I spot parental types several feet off with collapsible chairs and most important, coolers. These look like my kind of people so I sidle over.

A woman peers up at me through unfortunate fire-engine-red bangs, halfway through tapping Franzia box wine into a Solo cup. She scoots an expressive eyebrow. “You here to judge?”

“Nope. Just felt like a weirdo standing over there by myself.”

Mollified, she thrusts out a hand. “Glinda Parsons. My mom had a Wizard of Oz fetish, so yeah, I’ve heard all the jokes.”

“Trinity Jones. My mom had a Matrix fetish, but fortunately pop culture has left that one on the slag heap of history. No more jokes that anyone under forty will get.”

“Aw. So sad.” A big, toothy grin. “I brought an extra chair unless you want to stand through this horror.”

I grab the collapsible lying behind her, uncollapse it, and settle my ass into the minihammock.

“Wine?” she asks, shaking the Solo. A casual slosh of Robitussin red leaps the cup’s lip and lands on the grass.

“No, thanks.” I move on quickly lest she be offended. “So which one is yours?”

“The redhead. Never marry one unless he looks like Prince Harry, know what I mean?”

I chuckle and watch as the kids are corralled into a huddle by a man in shorts with dark, messy hair, oak-trunk thighs, and one of those broad triangular backs framed by big shoulders and trim hips. Nice tight ass, too.

My skin tingles. I recognize that form. It’s haunted my fantasies and kept me awake at night…What the actual fu—tbol?

Lucas Wright here? This is the main attraction Chase was telling me about, who has all the moms in a tizzy?

“Is that their coach?” My voice sounds breathless.

“Oh yeah.” Glinda’s agreement has a lascivious tinge to it. “You think I’m here ’cause I enjoy youth soccer? No chance. We’re all here”—she waves at the phalanx of support on the sideline, all of whom I notice now are women middrool—“for that.”

That is pointing at areas on the field, instructing players to take up positions, I suppose. He probably won’t even see me. I sink lower into my chair, but there’s only so far I can go.

He turns. A pair of shocking blue eyes trap mine. That wicked, kissable mouth curves.

My face burns hot. I want to be anywhere but here.

“How long is this game?”

“They don’t play as long as the pros. Only an hour.”

“Glinda, I think I’ll have that drink now.”

---

“Do you know him? Lucas?”

I’d hoped that maybe the grin he dropped on me might have gone unnoticed, but Glinda is on it like a soccer mom on the Franzia box.

“Vaguely. He’s—” What, exactly? My thwarted lover? An eye-fucker par excellence? The man I can’t stop fantasizing about? “He’s my brother-in-law’s divorce attorney.”

Glinda’s mouth screws up while she connects the dots and draws a fairly fucked-up picture.

“He smiled at you.”

“He smiled at everyone.” Which is true. He arced a pantie-melting grin over the entire group. There were a few sighs and at least one NSFW moan.

Glinda is unmoved by my hedging. “Well, we call ourselves Lucas’s Birds, just a bit of fun. But you got the good stuff. The light-up-his-eyes that lights-up-your-vaj stuff.”

I doubt she could see Lucas’s heated blue gaze from here, but I know what she means. I felt his eyes on me all the way down to parts of me severely neglected of late. We both know nothing can happen here, so maybe that’s why it all feels so naughty. Harmless, even.

The game starts, so I try to be a good aunt and do what I came to do: support my nephew.

Thing is, Chase used to be a demon on the field, but since his parents’ separation, he’s been having more off days than on. Today he’s playing a midfield position, and within the first minute has made a poor pass that the other team intercepted. They score.

Carlos, on the other hand, is single-handedly keeping the team in the hunt with solid passing and flashes of speed down the line that never quite result in goals because he doesn’t have the support. After a few moments of being a good little aunt, I can’t help myself. I have to look at Lucas.

The team bench is on the other side of the field, but Lucas obviously thinks benches are for losers because he stalks the line the entire time. Having seen how parents can become ugly when their kid is playing sports, I expect more of the same, yet even in this, Lucas bucks my worldview. The man throws his entire being behind the kids. It’s full bodied, done with affection, and vaguely unsporting, but only to the other team.

“Come on, mate, don’t be such a jammy dodger!”

“Get in there, my son! Show that tosser how it’s done.”

“Right in the knob, you plonker!”

Half the time I’ve no idea what he’s talking about, but it sounds like the encouragement every child should hear. Maybe every woman. Imagining Lucas calling me a plonker in bed should be the perfect damper on my fired-up lady parts, but I suspect the man saying anything in that accent will have me orgasming in seconds.

I can safely assure you that not one woman is paying attention to the action on the field. I hear snatches of encouragement on this side as well. Lucas’s Birds are in great form.

“Those thighs are giving me life…”

“Lift your shirt…yes, yes, yes…Oh, God in heaven, the brow wipe…”

“He can get me right in the knob anytime…”

That last one doesn’t even make sense! (Unless knob means…oh, I don’t know.)

The first half is over in thirty minutes, the score 3-0 against, and the kids are taking a break with water and fruit gels near the goal. Lucas swaggers over, salutes the moms, and stops in front of me. Those Thighs of Thunder are hairy and look incredibly touchable.

“Ms. Jones, how are you today?”

It’s cheekily formal. Doing my bestest impression of a moody eight-year-old, I peer up and mutter, “Fine, thanks. Didn’t expect to see you here.”

“You sure?”

This puts my back up. “Very sure.”

He turns to Glinda. “Mrs. Parsons.”

“Now, Lucas, I’ve told you a million times. It’s Glinda.”

Out pops the Lucas smile. Sunglasses make an appearance across the board and that thud you hear is the sound of someone keeling over. “Gavin’s playing well today. You must be pleased.”

“What?” Glinda is focusing all her attention on Lucas’s crotch, definitely pleased about something. “Oh right. Yes. Thrilled. You’re doing such a marvelous job.”

“Thanks, Mrs. Parsons. Ms. Jones, could I have a word? It’s about Chase.” Without waiting for my answer, he moves away from the group.

I feel as though I’ve been dropped into The Hunger Games, not because the boys are playing lights-out, competitive football. No, I’m Katniss surrounded by a wolf pack of laser-eyed women who have spotted the threat in their midst.

I shoot a quelling glance at Glinda’s eyebrow and push out of the chair. Lucas waits for me, hands on hips, his gaze tracking my approach.

“Yes?”

“How are you, Trinity?”

“You already asked that.”

He frowns. “I did?”

“Yes, like sixty seconds ago.” I wave behind me to the chair I just vacated.

“Hmm. Right.” He sounds like he disagrees. “What did you say?”

“That I’m fine.”

“Are you?”

“Yes!” I’m irritated that we’re going in circles. I’m especially irritated that he’s smiling at me, which is making me the center of attention—and Lucas’s focus—much more than I’m comfortable with. I’ve always been a sidelines kind of girl. “Are you trying to piss me off?”

“No. A little. I like seeing you fired up.”

“Water bottle over the head if you don’t watch out.”

Another ovary-destroying grin. “So you’re close to Chase?”

“Yes. Very.”

His grin fades. “I don’t think he likes footie all that much, which is a shame because he’s talented. I get the impression he’s here to please his dad, which I understand, but it might not be the best option for him.”

I’m not sure what he’s asking. While I mull it over, I pump him for intel.

“Is this how you met Brian? He heard you were a divorce lawyer and hired you?”

“Correct. We got to talking.”

I’ve done my research on Mr. Wright. If you’re a father who feels maligned by the system, Lucas is your guy. He’s built a reputation as a staunch defender of paternal rights and access. Has even written articles in law journals about it.

“I’m surprised Brian isn’t here,” I say, probing.

Lucas doesn’t take the bait. “I wonder if you could talk to Chase about what he really wants to be doing. He wouldn’t be bad if he applied himself, but he’s missed a few practices and I’m not sure his heart is in it.”

A whistle sounds and Lucas turns. “Okay, back to work! I’ll see you after.”

“What?”

“Pizza party, Ms. Jones. I’m going to need help wrangling the little buggers, especially if they lose as badly as I suspect they will. It would be really bad form to abandon me in my time of need.”

And then he trots off that perfect ass and those Thighs of Thunder, leaving me in serious need of more Franzia.