Once and Again - By Lauren Dane Page 0,4

had the right amount of smoke, always the hint of a smile. That sound that’d been, and most likely still was, a magnet to underpants all across Georgia. He moved that way too, took his time to look around. Always late but he was so charming he got away with it.

A cruel twist of fate that he’d turned out so well. It was small of her, but she’d wished him a potbelly and male pattern baldness a few times. And here he was looking mighty fine. She hadn’t had sex or even a boyfriend in about a year. He caught her at an already weak moment, and no matter how many lectures she’d given herself in the hallway outside, it did matter that she’d loved him once. It mattered that he’d walked away from it and never appeared to even care.

Still, mmm, that thick head of hair looked soft. She knew what it felt like against the skin of her inner thighs, in her hands as she sat behind him in his big old bathtub and washed it. Caramel. It was the color of burnt sugar, and it matched the well-defined beard and mustache he had now. His shoulders were still powerful as the muscles showed against his shirt when he turned to grab something out of his top drawer.

He kept talking like she wasn’t imagining him naked. “He’s pretty far gone. But here are some extra-credit assignments. I want all four of them done and I want quality work. I won’t be doing him any favors if I let him slide.”

Did she ask for that? Good gracious. But, he was in charge and her brother had messed up so it was time to suck it up and deal. She nodded, taking the papers and reading them over. “All right. He’ll do them.”

“I know things have been hard since…”

No. Not there and not with him. “He always was a crappy father. Chris can’t let our father hurt him any more than he already has. It’s not going to bring him back if Chris has to take summer classes or fail tenth grade. I’m not here to make excuses for him. He knows he’s been slacking and he knows I aim to make him stop.”

He paused, licking his lips before he spoke again and little tingles spread out from all her best places. “Your momma’s okay with this?”

“I know she’s been a problem.” Which had been such a lovely thing when she’d lived far enough away, not to be drawn into her mother’s passive aggressive ways of getting attention. The drinking only made it worse. “Which is why I have the guardianship. She’s been too lenient to try to make up for our father leaving. Chris knows how to work her and get what he wants. But I’m not her.”

Thank God. If she had been, maybe Lily never would have had the nerve to box up Nathan’s stuff and leave it on his doorstep along with a check to cover his half of the security deposit on the apartment they’d rented together. It wasn’t the way he’d kissed Alison. Her cousin Alison. Lily knew her cousin had been throwing herself at Nathan in the time he and Lily had been taking some space from one another. It was, the way he’d made her feel when he never bothered to try to talk to her about it.

Gah! Enough. Back to Chris and the situation with her mother.

It wasn’t that Pamela didn’t care about her children. It was that she often found it best to get attention by letting Nancy show up and complain and criticize while Lily tried to ignore it. That way drama swirled all around and their mother got to be part of it without being a target.

As their mother never did a thing to stop it, Lily had learned over her life that the best way to deal with her sister was not to let her ruffle feathers. Lily just pretended Nancy wasn’t standing there carping about something she was far too lazy to have done herself.

The only balancing act would be to keep their mother from getting drawn into it for entertainment. The last thing Lily wanted to do was mother her own darned parent, but it appeared to be what was needed. Because it was Chris who mattered right then. Not Nathan Murphy looking all handsome and smoking hot or anyone else. Lily knew she was the only one in Chris’s life who could make a difference,