Price of a Kiss (Forbidden Men 1)

No, not really. But I nodded and stepped into the room, smoothing down my shirt as I went, so I hopefully wouldn’t look like a total dork. But when my gaze latched onto a pair of familiar gray eyes, I experienced a mad case of word vomit. “I’m fine. Sorry about that. I’m just the queen of clumsy.” And a total dork.

“Reese,” Dawn said again, this time with amusement in her eyes. “This is my son, Mason. He works most evenings at the Country Club, so you may or may not see him coming and going whenever you’re here. Mason, this is Reese Randall.”

Mason gaped at me with the most horrified expression I think I’ve ever seen. A second later, he shook his head and cleared his throat before glancing away and distractedly mumbling, “Hey.”

“H-hi,” I croaked.

But what the hell? Hotness was Dawn Arnosta’s son? That couldn’t be. They didn’t have the same last name.

Even though I knew this was all a big, awful coincidence, I felt tricked.

With him decked out in his work uniform—a pale blue polo shirt with an oval logo for the Waterford County Country Club over his left pec and Khaki pants to match—I was suddenly reminded of what Eva had said about him being a gigolo.

Holy crap, she hadn’t been lying about the Country Club thing; what if she hadn’t been lying about—

My eyes grew round. And his narrowed as he stared back, his lips tightening as if he could read my mind.

“…Mason just started taking classes at the community college this semester too,” Dawn was telling me. “Maybe you two will see each other there.”

“Yeah,” I murmured, half out of it as I smiled tightly at the mother before turning back to the son. “I…I think I might’ve seen you around campus already.”

“You dumped a bag full of books on my feet before my calculus class on Monday,” he reminded me dryly.

“Right,” I agreed slowly before trilling out a guilty little laugh. “That was you, wasn’t it? Yeah, sorry about that…again.”

His stare was borderline hostile, telling me I didn’t impress him in the least. But it still held a powerful punch.

Whenever he’d glanced at Eva on that first day of classes, it was as if he’d stared straight through her. With me, it was the complete opposite.

He saw me. He just didn’t approve of what he saw, for some unknown reason.

“Oh, so you two have already met, then.” Dawn seemed pleased to learn this. “That’s great.”

I sent her a horrified glance to let her know she was crazy. Mason and I had certainly never “met” before. But she was too busy pointing to something he was blocking with his body like some kind of protective papa bear.

“I guess that leaves one introduction. Reese, this is Sarah.” Taking Mason’s elbow, Dawn manually dragged his resisting body aside to reveal the little girl sitting in a wheelchair behind him.

Yeah, I said wheelchair. Sarah, the twelve-year-old I was supposed to babysit, sat in a wheelchair.

This, I had not expected.

Trying not to show my shock, I clasped my hands together and gave the girl such a huge smile it stretched my lips to unbelievable proportions. “Hi, Sarah. I’m so happy to meet you,” I said aloud when internally, I screamed, Oh, my God. Oh, my God. Why didn’t Dawn mention this in the phone interview?

In response, Sarah flailed her head and arms, limbs and neck spasms floundering her out of control as her torso went limp and floppy. A low, garbled sound, like a sick cow on drugs, moaned its way from her throat.

I’m not to

o sure, but I think she said, “Hello.”

I freaked.

How the hell was I supposed to watch a special needs child in a wheelchair? I wasn’t trained for this. Artie, the autistic boy I’d watched once or twice two years ago, had had such a mild case that sometimes I’d forgotten he was different at all. But there would be no forgetting it with Sarah. I didn’t know the first thing about…well, whatever it was she had.

“Sarah, this is Reese.” Dawn crouched next to her and set her hand gently on the girl’s shoulder. “She’s going to stay with you in the evenings now that Ashley’s gone.”

I smiled encouragingly at Sarah, hoping she understood I was a good guy, hoping she understood anything.

Sarah moaned out another inarticulate sound that didn’t give my hope a lot of room to breathe.