Bennett (On the Line 2)

“You wouldn’t even give me the time of day if it weren’t for the baby. You threw my fucking number away, remember?”

I balked at his mention of the morning after we met. “And what did you want from me, exactly, Bennett? Besides more sex?”

“Just more.” He parked in front of the courthouse and gave me a dark look. “The same thing I’ve been trying to get out of you for three months now. But you’re too damned resolved not to turn into your mother. I’m never breaking through.”

“Okay,” I said in my calmest tone, “I’m going back into work now. I think we should talk some more later when you’re not so angry.”

He just stared out the windshield, his jaw set tensely. I got out of the car, still confused about where all this had come from. Wasn’t I the one who had irrational emotional outbursts?

Apparently today was his turn.

Bennett

I’d been a douche to Charlotte. I realized it about a minute after she got out of the car. Of all the days to unleash my pent-up insecurities on her, I’d chosen the one she’d said was one of the happiest of her life.

It had been looking like one of the happiest of mine for a while. When I’d seen our son on that sonogram monitor, my feelings had come into clear focus for the first time. Being next to her in that moment had made me realize I wanted her by my side permanently.

I loved her for her, but the fact she was the mother of my son added an intensity to my feelings that was almost unbearable. Her swelling belly was the most beautiful sight in the world to me. The three of us were already a family in my mind.

Moving past my guilt over Kelly enough to fall in love with Charlotte had been hard. Admitting it hadn’t been easy, either. And then she’d rejected me.

She didn’t love me and she didn’t want to marry me. My drive home was spent in pensive thought about it.

I’d never had trouble attracting women. Kelly had been the first and only one besides Charlotte that I wanted more than a casual thing with. Her death had crushed me for a long time. With Charlotte, I’d started to finally heal. I’d let go of the guilt over how happy I was with her.

But for what? To be Charlotte’s on-call fuck buddy and baby daddy? I wanted much more than that from her.

I passed the turn onto my street and headed to the ice rink instead. No one was there, so I laced up my skates and took a bucket of pucks and a net out and shot for practice.

There was no giving up on this. With every puck that slid home into the net, I realized I’d just have to be patient. Her mother had set such a shitty example that Charlotte had gravitated to the other extreme. Her rejection of me wasn’t actually personal. She had a wall up against all men.

But after five years of certainty that I’d never love a woman again, there was no wall I wouldn’t scale to get inside the fortress Charlotte had set up around her heart. It was like my goal of getting called up to Chicago—I’d just have to work harder.

Charlotte

James and Brian couldn’t keep their eyes off each other. I could see where James’s transformation from annoying asshole to decent guy had come from.

Brian was a soft-spoken, dark-haired man with a great smile. He’d complimented the spaghetti I cooked several times, refilled my water glass and shown genuine interest in my answers to every question he asked me. He was truly a nice person from everything I could see.

And James soaked up his attention, returning every smile and kindness. When Brian commented about liking James from the moment he saw him, he’d blushed a bright shade of red and grinned happily.

They seemed to be in love, which I couldn’t even fathom after less than two weeks of knowing each other. It had to be that they were both completely s

mitten, which wasn’t the same thing as love.

I was smitten with Bennett. All he had to do was look at me and I felt heat and longing for him. I adored his sweet, easygoing personality. He was the first man I’d been with who didn’t make me feel like a moody bitch for my occasional bouts of temper.

And when he held me, the whole world disappeared. When I sank into his strong embrace, I felt a blissful sense of being protected in every way.

Not that I needed it. I could take care of myself. But still, I liked the way it felt to be with a man I knew would protect me not just physically, but emotionally. Even yesterday, when he’d gotten so upset, he’d just been hurt. I understood why, too. I’d texted him asking him to come over after his game tonight so we could talk.

“Any baby names picked out yet?” Brian asked me.

“Not yet.”

“James Holloway has a nice ring to it,” James said with a wink.

I smiled. “Well, I do know his last name will be Morse.”