Total pages in book: 135
Estimated words: 131916 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 660(@200wpm)___ 528(@250wpm)___ 440(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 131916 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 660(@200wpm)___ 528(@250wpm)___ 440(@300wpm)
“Um, heck yes, you have all the smart ideas like your dad.” She shifted to look at me with a mischievous grin on her mouth. “You know, like bringing you here.”
THIRTY
RIVER
I pushed open the garage door to some kind of mayhem going down in my house.
Though it wasn’t summoned by the wicked or iniquitous.
Nah.
There was no question this mess was compliments of my baby sister. Should have known better than to have left her to her own devices.
Taylor Swift was blaring from the built-in speakers, and a riot of laughter carried above it.
Raven’s.
Nolan’s.
I was pretty sure there was a spot of it from Charleigh, too. That sultry sound rolling through the air and aiming right for me.
It speared me straight in the chest when I rounded the corner of the opening to the kitchen and found the three of them in the middle of it, dancing around like fuckin’ loons.
Nolan was on the ground, shouting, “Watch me!” as he spun on his butt, the kid’s signature move, while my sister twirled with a glass of red wine lifted over her head, singing, “Go, Nolan, go, Nolan, go!”
And fuck me…Charleigh was laughing and giggling and being adorable as shit as she was engaged in this awkward dance, trying to keep time yet totally off beat.
Still wearing those pink scrubs that shouldn’t be sexy but never failed to send a bolt of electricity straight to my guts.
My sister grabbed Charleigh’s hand, attempting to spin her, though the two of them got all tangled up as Charleigh tried to dip low enough to duck under my sister’s arm.
Cracking up, Raven stumbled to the side like she’d already downed a whole bottle of wine, and Charleigh was giggling all over the place as she got taken with her.
Her smile radiant and wide.
My heart squeezed, as fucking unruly as my dick that jumped at the sight.
Nolan was the first to notice me, and he popped up off the floor and threw his hands over his head. “Hey, yo, Daddy-O!! You got here already? We’re having a dance party, so you’d better get your booty over here.”
With Nolan’s welcome, Raven whirled my direction, her expression contorted in suspicion and delight. “That’s right, get your cutie patootie over here and join us!”
She shimmied her hips, sloshing a bit of wine over her glass and onto the floor.
I grunted at her from where I loitered at the entryway.
She knew that shit wasn’t about to happen. I didn’t dance.
Charleigh had slowed to what was mostly a stop, and those cinnamon-flecked eyes widened a fraction, the caramel molten. They couldn’t seem to sit still, and they took a little joyride, roving over my body like she’d forgotten my shape in the short time I’d been gone.
“Oh, come on, River,” Raven whined like she thought her little pouty face was actually going to convince me to start dancing around in my kitchen.
I grunted again as I set the bags from the Chinese takeout place onto the counter.
“Whelp, even if he doesn’t wanna dance with us, Auntie, he at least brought food, and we gotta have food if we’re gonna have a party.” There was my kid. Always sticking up for me.
“Guess he has to be good for something.” Raven said it with all her sass, still shimmying her hips around, while Charleigh kind of just swayed back and forth, like she might be trapped in that spot.
Raven groaned and reached over to her phone she’d left on the counter and turned off the music. “Oh, fine, I see the dance party is officially over since the two of you are just standing there drooling over each other.”
“You droolin’, Dad?” Nolan peeped, oblivious to what Raven was implying. “You must really be hungry.”
I couldn’t pry my attention from the woman who remained rooted, skin flushed from dancing and wine, lips still swollen from my kiss.
Yeah. I was fuckin’ famished.
“Oh, he’s hungry, all right.” Raven laid it on thick, her gaze keen as she strutted across the floor where she started to pull plates out of the cabinet.
I didn’t even give my baby sister the benefit of an eyeroll.
“Well, I’m definitely hungry,” Nolan hollered, skipping over to the bags of food. Holding onto the edge of the counter, he tried to jump high enough to see what was inside. “What’d you get me?”
Finally forcing myself to suck down the insane reaction the girl had over me, I turned to start unloading the white take-out containers. “Your favorite, of course.”
“Orange chicken?” He might as well have won a million bucks with the way he shrieked it.
“Yup.”
He threw himself at my leg, fully wrapping himself around it with his arms and legs, hanging off me like I was a jungle gym. He tipped his head back, looking at Charleigh upside down. “Told you I got the best dad in the whole wide world, Miss Charleigh. Except that he won’t get me a puppy, but you got me one, so now I got everything I even need.”