Barely a hint of her through her sleep pants and underwear, but I nearly came right there.
It’d been so long. So fuckin’ long, and I was losing my grip, sanity just slipping out of my reach.
I kept rocking my cock covered by my jeans against her clit, loving the way she moaned and whimpered my name, the girl struggling to stay quiet so her moans weren’t carried on the wind.
Shit.
It was so sexy, the girl in the spotlight of the breaking day.
I wanted to tear every scrap of clothes from our bodies and sink all the way in.
Disappear in that tight heat of her body.
I bit down on her collarbone as I thrust against her like some teenaged kid who’d never gotten his dick wet.
But that was what it felt like.
Like I was coming up on something great.
Something bigger than I understood.
Every muscle in Rynna went tight, and she sucked a sharp breath into her lungs before she started quaking all around me.
She did her best to stifle a deep moan while she came right there against my truck.
Her knees went weak while I continued to work myself against her hot body, wondering just how far I was going to let this madness go.
It only took the weak cry floating from Frankie’s room for me to find that answer.
For me to come tumbling back down to reality.
To the truth of who I was. To my responsibilities.
I edged back, fighting the dread that spiked like barbs at the base of my throat.
“Shit.” I shook my head, trying to orient myself. To rip myself from her body. I stepped back, my body still raging, barely able to look at her after the shit I’d just pulled.
Rynna reached for me with a trembling hand. “Rex . . .”
How was it possible that I saw understanding flash through her expression?
“I’m so fucking sorry, Rynna. God, I don’t know what the fuck I’m doing.”
Rynna resituated her clothing, stepping back out onto the walkway, all lit up in the new day laying siege to the summer sky. For a moment, she just stared back at me. That energy flickered in the air. The softest smile rimmed her mouth. “You don’t have to be.”
Then she turned and crossed the street while I stood there like a fool, staring at the spot she’d just left vacant.
I guessed maybe that was what I’d always been.
A fool.
Shaking myself off, I rushed back up the steps and inside.
“Daddy.” The tiny cry filtered down the hall, and I reined in all the emotions and locked them there where they belonged.
Because just like I’d told Kale, I only needed one girl in my life.
And right then?
My girl needed me.
The doorbell rang. The words to the book I’d been reading Frankie trailed off. Instantly, my breaths turned shallow, my heart skyrocketing with a boom.
God. I really had lost it, my mind and body still reeling from whatever the fuck it was I’d thought I was doing earlier this morning when I’d had Rynna up against my truck.
I’d resisted for years.
And it was the girl next door who’d become irresistible.
Guilt welled in the deepest parts of me. In those sacred places I’d just desecrated.
I shifted where I was propped up on the headboard of Frankie’s bed with the book lifted out in front of us. My daughter was sprawled halfway across my chest, her head twisted to the side so she could see the pictures.
I’d basically been there all day, alternating between reading her stories, checking her temperature, and watching her sleep.
“Who’s that?” she whispered. Those brown eyes lit with a flash of excitement, promising me whatever sickness she’d been suffering from had finally begun to run its course.
“Not sure. You expecting a party or something?” I teased, tapping my index finger against her button nose, trying to pretend like the mere idea of Rynna standing on the other side of the door didn’t have me in knots.
She scrunched that nose with the cutest grin. “People aren’t suppose to gets a party just for feelin’ better, silly.”
“No?” I feigned ignorance.
“No way! Only prize people gets for feelin’ better is having to go backs to work.”
Laughter shot from my mouth in the same second affection stabbed me in the chest, so deep I thought it might cut me in two. But that was the thing about loving Frankie Leigh.
I loved her so much it physically hurt.
I ruffled a playful hand through her hair. “Sounds to me like you’ve been spending too much time with your grammy.”
Shock had her mouth dropping open. “There’s no such thing as too much Grammy times, Daddy. Don’t you knows that?”
I laughed again, almost deciding to ignore the door, but then Frankie hopped off the bed. She wrapped both her tiny hands around one of my wrists, yanking with all her might. Of course, the only nudge she gave was the one that shot through my heart. “Come on, Daddy. There’s someone ats the door. We gots to see who it is.”
“Okay, okay,” I said, relenting, hating the way my nerves buzzed through my body when I did. The way those defenses wanted to go up.
All the while, I was wishing there was a way I could throw rescue ropes over the side.
That I could climb out of the bullshit mess I’d made of my life and jump into one where taking a girl like Rynna Dayne would be okay.
With Frankie’s hand wrapped around my index finger, I stumbled along behind her. The kid was far too chipper as she bee-lined for the door. Maybe I had overreacted.
She popped up on her toes to peer out the side window and out on to the porch. She huffed when she dropped back onto her heels. “I finks we were too late. Nobody’s there.” I set a hand on her shoulder, guiding her behind me, that kick of protectiveness always at the ready to take hold. I twisted the lock so I could open the door and peer outside.
She was right.
No one was there.
But someone had been.
To my right, someone had left a tray on the short wooden table between the two rocking chairs. I’d made them what seemed a million years ago, back when I’d been nothing but a fool. We’d just been moving into this place, and I’d been thinking maybe I’d finally outrun that shadow.
The scar that forever eclipsed the true joy of my life.
I should’ve known better.
A large lidded bowl rested on the tray, and a tented card was propped to the side of it.
Squealing, Frankie flew out from behind me. “Oh, look it, Daddy. It gots my name on it. It is a present for me.”
My gaze darted across the street. The old house sat silent and unmoving, just the branches of the big trees that fronted her yard waving their welcome.
Emotion slammed me. Unstoppable. Too much. Overwhelming.
Pushing out a sigh, I forced myself to walk all the way out.
My senses were punched again when I reached down and grabbed the handles of the tray. Only this time, it was the amazing aroma that lifted from the bowl, striking me like comfort and warmth.
Comfort and warmth that was intended for my daughter.
Thoughtful in a way I couldn’t allow the woman to be.
My sweet girl trotted along beside me while I carried the offering inside and set in on the small dining table.
“What’s it, Daddy?”
She peered up at me with that trusting grin, her fingers threaded together where she leaned against her elbows on the table to get a better look. She looked like she was already issuing up a prayer for the food she’d been given.
“Careful,” I warned, lifting the lid.
It was a chicken pot pie. The kind Corinne Dayne had been famous for.
Homemade.
Handmade.
The aroma of it so overpowering, my mouth watered.
My damned hand was shaking when I reached down and snatched the note. Frankie’s name was written across the front in the prettiest handwriting I’d ever seen.
I lifted the flap to find what was written inside.
Dear Frankie Leigh,
Remember when I told you I had some of the recipes to my grandma’s pies? I have a special secret just for you—I have the recipe for the pot pie she used to make me whenever I felt sick, too. It was always my favorite, and sometimes, I didn’t even mind getting sick, because I knew she would make it and soon everything would be better. I remember being a little girl, just like you, eating this same pie at our kitchen table right across the street. With every bite I took, I knew that my grandma had to love me more than the whole wide world.