Once and Again - By Lauren Dane Page 0,2

upside the head. “Whatever it takes, monkey-boy, whatever it takes. I’ll see you after school. Right out here.” She pointed to the parent pick-up lane.

“Until my car gets back from the shop, Mom’s letting me use hers. No need to pick me up.”

This one she and her mother had only reached agreement on the day before when they’d gotten word Chris had cut fourth period again. One of the many reasons her mother had agreed to let Lily be in charge was her own seeming inability to give Chris hard consequences. Though Lily was beginning to think a big part of that had to do with the pills, but she hoped that would end soon too. In either case, there was a new sheriff in town and this was going to end one way or another. Starting with the removal of privileges like a car—a car Lily didn’t think he’d done anything to earn to start with.

“Boy, did you hit your head? Who drove you in? I did. How is it you’ll get Mom’s car? Pay attention. Anyway, only boys who go to school and pass get cars their mothers pay for. Until you get your grades back above failing, you’re not driving anything.”

His eyes widened and his mouth hardened. He looked an awful lot like his oldest sister right about then, and that scared her enough to stay hard and on task with him.

“That’s my car. You can’t do that.”

“Chris, you’re missing the point. I can. I will. You’ve pushed Mom around long enough. Go to class or I’ll escort you there myself.” She kept it quiet, but made sure to keep eye contact with him.

“Fine.”

She shrugged and stepped back. “See you at two fifty.” Before he said another word, she moved past him and toward the administration offices.

“Lily Travis for Principal Bunton, please.” She held on to her folder with all the letters, notifications, emails and other things the school had sent over the last semester.

Living with her mother and raising a nearly sixteen-year-old boy with a ferocious sense of entitlement. Just what she thought her life would be like at twenty-eight.

Nathan Murphy had been grading a test when the knock on his door startled him. A warning that he wasn’t seeing any students just then died on his lips when he looked up and saw…her standing there.

Long, shiny black hair, perfect bangs framed large brown eyes outlined with black liner. The deep-red lipstick on her lips should have looked overdone against her pale skin, but it was the entire package that worked. She was as sexy as she appeared wholesome. Speechless, he took her in from the tips of the ballet flats she wore, up legs as long as a summer day, up the nip at her waist where the red and white gingham blouse had been belted. Bangle bracelets at her wrists. She was an ad for the updated, way sexier 1950s. It was all American but in that pinup sort of way. Vintage sexy and he really wanted some more.

And he’d seen her naked more times than he could remember. Which was a lie. He remembered every single time he’d been with Lily Travis naked.

“Um.” He cleared his throat and loosened his tie. “Lily?” She’d not been this va-va-voom when they’d been in school. This was a woman who had a point of view. She’d grown up. This woman appeared to fully own the depth of her sexuality in a way she’d only begun to realize when they’d been together before. This personal style suited her very well.

She straightened and took a deep breath. The buttons at her cleavage did their work—barely—as her breasts thrust forward, stretching the material. His cock must have felt sympathy and that was why it stretched the material at his lap.

He searched for his words as he took her in. “Lily?”

She stepped into his classroom, and he couldn’t seem to think of anything else to say as he watched the woman he’d once loved walk toward his desk. She still moved as if music played in her head.

His sister Beth was close to Lily so he knew she had been around more to deal with her little brother. But it hadn’t prepared him for the punch to the gut at the sight of her.

“Mr. Murphy.” She nodded once, all business. “I’m here about Chris. Do you have a few moments?”

“Chris?” He wondered if she wore stockings with garter belts and corsets. And then of course he had to imagine her