Ty hadn’t called Millie. He didn’t text, or email, or send up a smoke signal. He’d switched his phone off, both to save himself from temptation and because his ex-wife kept calling but hanging up without leaving a message. As much as he wanted to call Millie, he felt absolutely no compulsion to call Mari back. They’d said everything they needed to say to each other weeks ago, and what they’d said had been pitifully little. If whatever she had to say was important, she’d eventually give him a hint.
The fact that he had such an easy time ignoring the girl he’d married but couldn’t trust himself not to prostrate himself at Millie’s feet spoke volumes. He didn’t allow himself to drive past Millie’s house, even if the little bungalow was sort of on his way home.
She’d set up pick after pick, using one lame excuse after another to stop their relationship from progressing past square one. Fine. He’d wait her out. Riding a big, fat pile of mad, he showered, changed into a pair of the baggy shorts Millie hated so much, and went to the fridge to rustle up something to eat.
The only things he found were cartons of leftover Thai food.
Letting the door slam shut, he dug his phone from the pocket of his shorts, powered up, and ignored the series of alerts flashing across the screen. Barely paying attention, he scrolled to the number for his favorite pizza joint. Thanks to the magic of caller ID, his pal Mickey was making up a large coach’s special before Ty disconnected.
Almost immediately, the damn thing rang. Blowing out a sigh, he stared at Mari’s smiling face. The phone buzzed and bleated, but he didn’t take the call. A few seconds later, the persistent noise stopped. Eyes locked on the Warrior logo on his wallpaper, he waited for a voicemail alert. The chime never came. Neither did a text, which was odd. If Mari was truly intent on speaking to him, she’d have no compunction about pulling out all the stops. When they were married, she’d had no problem upgrading a toilet paper run into the mobile equivalent of an all-points bulletin.
Restless and reluctant to stray too close to the wet bar, he stayed in the kitchen. He hopped up on the counter, because he had no woman around to tell him not to. To pass the time, he scrolled through the headlines on his tablet. He’d worked his way down to the entertainment section and resorted to tapping on a quiz designed to reveal which Full House character he was when the doorbell rang.
“Oh, thank God.” He hopped down, grabbed his wallet, and beat a path toward the front door. “Man, you have no idea how close I came to being Uncle Jes—”
He stopped when he found Millie standing on his welcome mat. Sadly, without a pizza. Gripping the edge of the door, he took a half step back before he caught himself. His ears burned, but he tried to pretend he answered the door shirtless every damn day.
“Hey.”
“So here’s the thing,” she said, pushing past him without further preamble. “I’m not a ‘we’ kind of person. I don’t like other people making plans for me. I don’t…function as a unit.” She spun on her heel, lost her balance, but corrected before he could even get the door closed. “This is not a long-term thing for either of us. I like you. You like me. I’d like us to still like each other after all this is done.” She waved a hand in an all-encompassing gesture. “We probably won’t like each other much if we let things get all messy and emotional, so here’s what I’m proposing…”
She paused, and he crossed his arms over his chest. Her eyes gleamed in the light from the chandelier. “Are you with me so far?”
“I’m riveted.”
And he was. No power in heaven or on earth could distract him from hearing this mysterious “proposal” of hers. Not even the roar of a muffler-less motor pulling to a stop in his driveway. He made an impatient gesture for her to continue.
“How many condoms do you have?” she asked.
Within seconds of showing up, she threw him completely off his game. Letting his arms fall to his sides, he moved toward her right as the doorbell rang. “What?”
Millie glanced from him to the door, then back again. “Oh. You had plans.” Holding up both hands as if to indicate a foul, she tried to shrug the strap of her bag back up to her shoulder. When she started for the door, he shifted to block her path. “Ah! Right. Sorry.” She swung around and took off into the house. “I’ll go out through the back. We’ll talk tomorrow.”
He caught her arm. “That’s the pizza guy.”
She looked up, her eyes wide but brightening. “Pizza guy?”
Ty was ninety-nine percent sure that if she could see the flash of hope in her own face, she’d have bolted for the door and never come back. The woman had no idea how much she gave away by working so hard to conceal even the smallest hint of emotion.
“Pizza guy,” he repeated as the bell rang again. “Stay. We’ll have pizza—” A mulish frown tugged at the corners of her mouth, and he backpedaled. “I’ll have pizza, and you can tell me all about your proposed safe-sex campaign.” She huffed a laugh, and he gently unfurled his hand, relaxing his hold on her millimeter by millimeter. “Okay?”
His phone started blaring. He cast an exasperated look at his pocket as the delivery driver resorted to pounding on the door with his fist.
Millie took pity on him and nodded. “Go ahead.”
Frazzled and more than a little cranky, he groped through the fabric of his shorts for the mute button as he rushed for the door. The delivery man was two steps down the front walk and spewing a string of obscenities into his own cell by the time Ty flew out the door calling, “Sorry, man. Sorry.”
He gave the frizzy-haired Dungeons and Dragons–type a conciliatory pat on the arm as he caught up to him. The kid ended his call without another word, his jaw falling slack as he tilted his head farther back to look him in the eye.
“No problem,” he mumbled.
Flipping open his wallet, Ty extracted two twenties and extended them. “Here. Keep the change.”
“Oh. Well, cool. Thanks.” He almost tore the Velcro flap off the thermal bag in his haste to exchange his burden for a hefty tip. “Have a good night,” he called as he headed for the beater parked in the drive.
Ty nodded to the kid’s back and muttered, “Yeah, could go either way,” under his breath as he returned to the house.
He found Millie perched on one of the tall bar stools lined up at the island. Ty gave his head a shake, then nodded toward the farmhouse table in what Mari liked to call the breakfast nook. “Let’s go to the table. You can lay it all out for me.”
He tucked a roll of paper towels under his arm and carried everything over to the table. Millie hadn’t budged from the stool. Raising a challenging eyebrow, he gestured to the refrigerator. “Help yourself to whatever you want. I’m gonna grab a shirt.”
He was halfway down the hall when he heard her call out, “Don’t bother on my account,” in a soft singsong.
Smiling, he ducked his head as he dodged into his bedroom. Afraid she might change her mind and bolt, he didn’t waste time indulging his vanity. He yanked a clean T-shirt from his drawer and pulled the comforting cotton over his head as he walked back toward the kitchen.
She sat at the table, rolling an unopened bottle of water between her hands. He paused, taking the opportunity to drink her in. Her brow was furrowed. Faint lines radiated from the corners of her eyes. Her hair blazed like a bonfire, but her skin was so fair he could see the shadowy blue lines of her veins at her temple. As if sensing his stare, she set the bottle on the table abruptly and wiped all traces of pensiveness from her expression.
“I probably should have called first.” She twisted her lips into an apologetic smile, but her eyes didn’t light. “Talk about making assumptions, huh?”
“No problem. I don’t have the hang-ups about it some people do.”
Ty grabbed a bottle of water for himself, then joined her at the table. Straddling a chair, he flipped back the lid on the box, and the heady aroma of spicy sauce and melted cheese came rushing out. He took a deep hit, then beamed as he reached for the roll of towels and tore one free. Being a gentleman and all, he offered the rectangle to Millie, but she shook her head, her nose wrinkling as she stared into the box.
“Is that chicken?” she asked.
“Fra diavolo sauce, three cheeses, pepperoncini, spicy chicken, peppers, and onions.” He raised his eyebrows and fixed her with a pointed look. “I wasn’t expecting company.”
She blinked and took a cautious sniff. “I guess not. Trying to hold people off for the next week or so, or practicing to become a dragon?”
“It’s good. You should try a slice.”
She snorted at his earnest encouragement. “Not without a truckload of antacids on hand.” She nudged the box toward him with her index finger. “What’s the white stuff?”
Ty smiled as he lifted a slice from the box. “A drizzle of ranch dressing to offset the spiciness.” He toasted her with the pizza. “Mind if I…?”
“No, go right ahead.” She laughed, shaking her head in what looked like amused wonder as he took a big bite.
The five-alarm flavors burst into fire on his tongue, but the taste explosion was nothing compared to the slow burn of curiosity snaking through him. “So…” He chewed around the word but waited until he swallowed to follow up. “How many condoms do I have?”
A peachy blush rose up her throat and stained her cheeks, but Millie didn’t look away. “Yes. How many?”
He surveyed the slice in his hand as if he might have the exact figure stashed under a bit of pepperoncini. “Why?”
“Because I think we need a way to measure what would be a reasonable amount of time for this…relationship to carry on. I figured we could gauge it in condoms.”
He gaped at her, amazed she actually managed to vocalize the last bit with an air of assurance that suggested her scheme was completely reasonable. But what truly rankled him was her insistence on taking the end of their relationship as a foregone conclusion.
“Why aren’t we a long-term thing?”
“What?”
“You said earlier we weren’t a long-term thing and we wouldn’t want our relationship to get all messy and emotional.” Ty forced himself to take another bite even though his appetite had taken a swift nosedive. He knew the fire burning in his chest and gut had nothing to do with the combination of toppings he’d ordered and everything to do with her, but he’d be damned if he let her think he couldn’t take the heat. “Why not?”
Her eyes widened, and she gave her head one of those little shakes meant to make him feel like he was the crazy one, but he wasn’t buying in.
“How come you get to walk in here and tell me the relationship I’m in isn’t long-term?” He used the half-eaten slice of pizza to point to his chest. “I’m in this too. I get a say.” He fixed her with an unwavering stare. “And I say it sounds like you’re the one making plans and assumptions.”
Those vibrant eyes narrowed. “Don’t try to spin me.”
“Stop trying to run the clock out.”
Millie sniffed, plucked a loose pepperoncini from the box, and popped the spicy tidbit into her mouth. He watched as she chewed the tiny morsel. Of course he watched. She knew he would. But being aware he’d stepped into quicksand wouldn’t give him any leverage when he had to pull himself out. Ty stared at her lips, recalling exactly how soft and pliant they could be, imagining them parting, picturing them as they closed around his dick.
Tearing his gaze away was almost physically painful, but he did what he had to do. “Six,” he answered tersely.
Millie nodded. “I knew we’d gone through a few. I wasn’t sure how many you had to start.”
“Buying anything more than one box seemed like tempting fate, but you know I can get more.”
“I was hoping we could go by the honor system.”
He shook his head. “I have no issue with playing dirty.”
“Ty, please.”
Appetite completely gone, Ty tossed the uneaten pizza into the box. “I don’t get this. What is your issue with seeing where things go?”
“Seeing where things go?” She repeated his words back to him as if he’d asked the most ridiculous question in the world. “My issue is it’s messy.” She tore a section of towel from the roll and wiped the tips of her fingers with meticulous care. “I deal with messes all day long. The last thing I want is a mess when I go home. That’s why I pay for a cleaning service, a guy who mows my lawn, and have a standing appointment to get my color done every four weeks.” She waved a hand toward her hair. “I like order in my world. I like to know what’s going to happen when.”
He shoved his chair back with enough force to make the legs squeal against the tile. Millie flinched a little but recovered quickly, of course. By the time he came to his feet, her face was a mask of polite interest.
“So basically, you want to schedule a fuck with me every Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday, but you don’t want any kind of real intimacy.” He crumpled the towel he’d been using as a napkin and threw the wad into the open pizza box. “You gonna pay me?”
Her eyes widened, and he caught her soft intake of breath. Good. He’d shocked her. Pissed and tired of being jerked around, he crossed his arms over his chest.
“I assume you pay to get your toilets scrubbed and your roots dyed.” He paused and pursed his lips as if giving the matter real thought. “I think a hundred a night seems fair enough, since I’m gonna get my kicks too. For that, you get oral, textbook sex, and, of course, as much finger-banging as you want—”
“Ty.” Millie rose from her chair and placed a conciliatory hand on his arm, but he wasn’t buying.
His phone began to vibrate in his pocket. He ignored the call but didn’t bother to silence the alert. Instead, he shook her hand from his arm and flashed an insincere smile. “Unlimited orgasms. Tell you what, I’ll even throw in an option for anal for free.” He shrugged. “You can kick me out whenever you want, but I want cash, no checks accepted. I’d have to ask for two forms of ID, and we don’t want to get too personal.”
“Stop,” she snapped.
He couldn’t. He clenched his fists at his sides and tried to take a calming breath. It was no good. He had no capacity for holding back on anything else. “I’ve licked you, Millie. I’ve licked and kissed and sucked every inch of you. I’ve been inside you. My dick, my tongue, my fingers… I’ve felt you come and come inside you. There aren’t enough condoms in the world to keep this from getting messy.”
“Then we need to end this now,” she said in a rush.
“Too late. I’m in love with you.”
The admission surprised him as much as it did her. Not because he hadn’t known, but because he figured it was way too early in the game to let her see his clutch play. But he had told her, and now the truth was out there, and he didn’t want to take the declaration back.
“No.”
The gleam in her eyes was the only thing that helped him believe her denial was an automatic response rather than a rejection. Millie Jensen wore the lean and hungry look of a woman who’d given up trusting in love but hadn’t quite let go of believing in it.
He let one shoulder rise and drop as if the bomb he’d dropped wasn’t atomic. Nothing to do but own his feelings for her now. “I love you, Mil. Started falling the day we met and have been ever since.”
When she didn’t take off for the door, he reached for her. His hands closed around the lean muscle of her upper arms, and he drew her closer. But not too close. He wanted her to have all the space she needed to absorb what he was telling her.
“The night you showed up at my door…” He looked up at the ceiling, trying to find exactly the right words to say. “God, I was happy to see you. So happy I should be ashamed, but I’m not. I felt like…” He hesitated to put his true feelings on the line, lest she misconstrue his meaning, but he was in this far already. No point in pulling up short of the goal. “Like I deserved you. I’d done my time. I tried, honestly tried, to make my marriage work, even though I knew there was no hope. It would have imploded one way or another. I didn’t want to be the bad guy.” He pressed his hand to his chest. “I was the one who asked her to marry me. I made the mistake. I was the one who was old enough to know better.”
Something in his speech seemed to plod her out of her shock. “But you married her anyway.”
“Mari was pregnant when we got married.”
“Oh.”
The word came out of her so soft and small he almost didn’t hear her. “She miscarried the week after we got back from Las Vegas.”
“Oh.”
“By that time…” He shrugged. “But I wanted a baby. I figured we’d try again, but Mari…”
“Right.”
Millie took a breath so deep it rattled through her. Then her whole body convulsed, and she wrenched herself from his grip. He thought she was bolting and started after her, but the second she hit the hall, she took a sharp right and headed toward the bedrooms rather than the door.
“Millie?”
She didn’t answer. Instead, she clamped one hand to her mouth and the other to her stomach, curling into herself as she race-walked toward the guest bath. Seconds later, he heard the lid hit the back of the tank, and the unmistakable sound of retching carried down the hall. Concerned, Ty rushed to the doorway. He arrived in time to see her groping for the toilet paper holder, tears streaming from her eyes as she wiped her mouth with the back of her hand.
Eager to be of some real assistance, he yanked the hand towel from the ring by the sink and pressed the soft cloth into her hand. “I’ll grab some water.”
He rushed to the kitchen to retrieve the bottle she’d never opened, but when he heard her vomiting again, he slowed his steps. As much as he wanted to be helpful, he knew no one liked an audience in these situations. Hanging back in the hall, he listened, his heart in his throat as she sniffled and blew her nose. He heard the flush and counted to three before swinging into the doorway.
“Here.” His knees popped as he squatted beside her, extending the bottle out to her.
She uncapped the water and took a sip without meeting his eyes. She drained half before lowering the bottle, but her gaze remained locked on the tile floor.
Needing to look into her eyes, he hooked his forefinger beneath her chin and gently tipped her face up. When she met his eyes at last, he forced a shaky smile. “Better?”
“Can’t hold my scotch,” she said solemnly.
Matching her somber tone, he nodded. “We all have that trouble at some point.”
Unable to restrain himself any longer, he wiped the mascara trails from her damp cheeks with the pad of his thumb. He’d never thought someone could still look beautiful when they cried, but Millie was proving to be the exception in so many areas of his life.
Her skin was the rich, velvety white of fresh cream. A rosy blush tinged her cheeks, and the tips of her ears were so pink they glowed. The contrast between the ripe, natural beauty of her face and the over-the-top shock of her hair suited her to perfection. Her eyes shone bright with banked tears, but the sheen only highlighted the sharp inquisitiveness in her all-seeing stare. This was the woman he’d started falling for years before he ought to.
“Was it the stuff about Mari that upset you or me saying I love you?” he asked quietly.
“Might have been the pizza,” she challenged.
Ty dipped his head, then gave it a slow shake. “Nope, can’t blame the food. You didn’t eat any.”
“Apparently, scotch doesn’t mix well with strawberry daiquiri.”
“What does?”
She sighed and scooted away enough to rest her back against the wall. Her eyes slid shut, and she let her head loll to the side, but still she answered. “Sunny days and warm sand.”
“Well, the sun has been out, but we’re pretty landlocked. Unless you count Lake Mason,” he added. “There’s a swimming beach.” He ran his hand through her tousled hair. “I’d take you.”
Though her eyes were already closed, she squeezed them tighter. “Please don’t.”
“Don’t what? Take you to the beach?”
“Touch me,” she whispered. “This will be so much harder if you touch me.”
He cupped her cheek in his palm. The pad of his ring finger traced the stubborn line of her jaw. “I don’t intend to make it easy for you to dump me, Millie.”
“You’re a good man, Ty. A nice man who always tries to do the right thing.” Her eyelashes fluttered, and she opened her eyes, blinking a couple of times to bring him into focus. “But I can’t give you what you want.”
“So you say, but I believe in you.”
“No, I literally can’t.” She knocked his hand away with a jerky wave of her arm. Before he could react, she scrambled to her feet using the wall as leverage. “You said you liked being married. Well, I didn’t.” Her hands clenched at her sides. “I’m not trying to be a jerk or to mess you around. I really like my life. I’m selfish. I don’t want to have to share my space or let someone make decisions for me.”
She stepped sideways, sliding along the wall, making it clear she wanted to get out of the room without any part of her touching any part of him. Ty stood up but otherwise didn’t move from his spot.
“I like sleeping all over the bed if I want. Sometimes I eat a bowl of cereal for dinner. Standing at the sink,” she added. As if her questionable meal choices might be a deal breaker. “I’m a crappy housekeeper.” He must have looked surprised by the revelation, because she rushed on, eager to convince him. “Seriously, I can live with my own filth for a long time.” She wrinkled her nose as she groped for the doorway. “I can’t tell you how long some of the salad dressings have been in my fridge. Do I throw them out?” She gave her head an adamant shake. “No, I toss a new bottle in with the old. They keep each other company.”
“I’m not looking for a maid, Millie.”
She waved him off. “I’m not anyone’s idea of a domestic partner.”
“I didn’t ask you to be mine.”
Millie threw her arms up as she backed into the hall. “You said you were in love with me.”
“I am.” He took a single step toward her, and she reeled back, holding her palms out to ward him off. He halted, but the panic in her eyes gave him all the confirmation he needed. She was as scared as he was. “I think you might fall for me too if you give yourself a chance. Maybe that’s why you’re freaking out.”
As expected, she planted her feet, squared her shoulders, and rose to the challenge. “I’m not freaking out.”
“You keep putting me off, then calling me back. You refuse to see me, then show up at my door.” He closed the distance between them but was careful not to touch her. “You keep saying no, but you keep doing things that say yes. You want to say yes. I know you do.” He lowered his head until he could feel the hot, moist puffs of her breath on his lips. His voice broke when he spoke. “I can almost taste your yes, Millie.”
“No.” She whispered the denial, but there was no heat behind it.
“I have to tell you, when you say it like that, it sounds more like a ‘yes, please.’ But I know what no means.” He took a half step back but no more.
A breathless laugh escaped her, but Millie only lifted her chin a millimeter more and said nothing.
“I wish you could see the expression on your face, Millie. Your eyes tell me everything.”
“Do they?” She wet her lips. “And what do you think they’re saying?”
“Please don’t give up on me, Ty,” he said in a low, taunting voice. “Please keep chasing me. Please kiss me. Fuck me. Love me.” Her breath hitched on the last one. “And I want to.” He took her hand and pressed her palm to the front of his shorts. He was hard as a rock and ready to roll here and now. Up against the wall. All she had to do was say the word. “All you have to do is tell me what you want, Millie. Say anything, and I’ll give you everything.”
“Ty, I can’t give you a baby,” she blurted, throwing her hands up in frustration.
He opened his mouth, but whatever he was about to say was chased clear out of his head by a jarring blast from his cell phone.
“Goddamn it!” he growled, pushing away from the wall and yanking the offending instrument from his pocket with every intention of smashing the phone into a thousand pieces. He almost did when he saw his ex-wife’s smiling face beaming out from the screen.
Millie saw the photo too and took the opportunity to put some space between them. Sidling a couple of steps down the hall, she gestured to the phone. “She’s been calling and calling. Why don’t you find out what she wants?”
Steaming with anger and pent-up frustration, he leveled a finger at her. “Stay.”
She flipped an entirely different finger back at him, but she didn’t make a break for the door.
Keeping a wary eye on her, he swiped his thumb across the display to accept the call and snapped a gruff, “What?”
“Ty?”
He rolled his eyes, the sound of Mari’s voice screeching down his spine like fingernails on a chalkboard. “Yeah. What? What do you want, Mari?”
“I want to talk to you. I need to talk to you.”
“There’s nothing more to say.”
“But it’s important,” she insisted. “Can we meet somewhere?”
He blinked, confused by the request. The last he’d heard, his ex was shacked up in Los Angeles with her boy toy. “Meet? How? Aren’t you in California?”
“I’m here. In town, I mean.”
Millie took a step back, her eyes narrowing enough to let him know she’d heard Mari’s answer and was wary too. Annoyed by both the intrusion and the stricken look on Millie’s face, he hit the button to send the call to speaker. He had nothing to hide, and he’d be damned if he’d let the stubborn woman standing outside of arm’s reach slip away because she imagined something might be going on between him and his ex.
“Sorry if you came all this way to talk to me, but I really don’t have anything more to say. You got what you wanted, Mari. Now I’m trying to move on with my life.”
“But this isn’t what I wanted,” she wailed. Impatient and unwilling to be drawn into whatever melodrama Mari had created for herself, his thumb hovered over the button to disconnect. He was about to say goodbye when she hissed, “You’re the one who wanted a baby.”
“A baby?” The question popped out of his mouth, but he stared at the glossy screen as if the image might tell him he’d misunderstood what she’d said. His head jerked up, and he spotted Millie standing at almost military attention.
“I’m pregnant,” Mari snapped.
Her announcement startled him so much the phone spurted from his hand and clattered to the floor, but they both still heard her last words clear as a bell. “And the baby is yours.”