“Very.” He caught Clayton’s nose and pinched it lightly. “But I’ll be okay. You have to do this kindergarten thing so you can go to college next week and be an astronaut by Christmas.”

Clayton grinned. “It takes longer than that, Dad.”

“Oh. Well, you still have to get started.” Leaning in, he pressed a quick kiss to Clayton’s brow. His heart squeezed and memories from six years raced through his mind.

Slowly, he pushed to his feet and forced himself to smile. “Do me a favor,” he said. He sounded steady—how about that? As Clayton flashed him a curious smile, he ruffled the boy’s hair. “Now I know you want to know everything under the sun, but don’t come home and be smarter than me already. Wait until tomorrow before you do that.”

Clayton laughed and turned back to Neeci. “It will take a lot longer than that, Dad. I don’t know if I’ll ever be that smart.”

He managed to make it out the door.

And that was when he saw that Ressa was loitering there . . . as if she’d been waiting for him.

Half-blind, he kept on walking. He needed to breathe. For just a minute.

*   *   *

Trey left the school like a man possessed and he didn’t even seem aware that she’d followed him, not until he heard the sound of her heels clicking on the pavement.

Slowly, he turned and looked at her.

“Rough day?” she asked softly.

He jerked his head away, one shoulder rising and falling in a shrug. “Always heard the first day is harder on the parent than the kid.”

“If that’s the truth, I kinda feel like giving both of you a cookie and a teddy bear.”

Frowning, he swung his gaze back to her.

Because he seemed to need the company, she moved in closer and leaned against the truck next to him. Not close enough to feel his heat, but close enough to wish she could.

“You know, you are the last person I thought I’d see here,” she said quietly.

He slid her a look from the corner of his eye, and she didn’t think it was her imagination that the shadows seemed to lessen from his gaze. A faint smile kicked up the corner of his mouth and then he tipped his head back to the sky. “I have to say the same.”

Common sense told Trey to get his ass in the truck and leave.

She didn’t want anything from him. That had been made almost painfully clear.

We had a nice night, but that’s probably all it’s ever going to be.

A nice night? Yeah. He equated a nice night to one that didn’t involve a temper tantrum or him forgetting that he had something in the oven or that he’d left a load of clothes in the washer for two days. If he got through a day without some sort of minor disaster and could relax at the end and maybe not have a headache? That was a nice night.

What they’d had, for him at least, had shot up past nice into the realm of blow the top of my head off. Or maybe his cock. He couldn’t go more than a few nights without dreaming about her, although after years of what had felt like an almost sexless existence, he wasn’t entirely bothered by the dreams.

He was just bothered by the fact that a night that had all but shaken his world had just been . . . nice.

He was still craving a whole lot of everything from her and she wanted nothing from him.

Just his luck.

*   *   *

Ressa bit her lip as she pushed off the truck, moving to stand in front of him. She had to fight the urge to smooth that misery from his brow, hold him until it all eased away.

“So why do you want to give me a cookie and a teddy bear?” he asked, his gruff voice cutting through the fog of thoughts tangling in her head.

“Hmm.” Unable to keep her hands to herself, she let herself lift one up, intending to brush his hair back. But he caught her wrist, held her hand there, trapped in mid-air.

Their gazes locked.

She forced a smile.

“I’m past the age where a teddy bear will help, Ressa.” His thumb stroked over her wrist and then slowly, he let go of her hand.

She let it fall to her side, stung by that blunt rejection, although she supposed she shouldn’t be. She was the one who’d pushed him away. “I can’t help it. You look like you need it,” she said, smiling to cover the emptiness she felt.

“We’ll save it for Clayton.” He glanced toward the school. “He needs it more than I do.”

“Yeah. I guess he does.” Sighing, she followed his gaze, her heart aching for the boy they’d left inside. “Guess maybe the teddy bear idea is a little much for you.”

She looked back at him, watched as a faint smile crooked his lips. “Yeah. Well, I never say no to cookies. But I don’t need somebody to hold my hand over the fact that my son is starting school. I just need to . . . deal.”

Starting school? “This isn’t just about him starting school, is it?”

Through his lashes, he studied her. “Why are you asking?”

“I . . .” Frowning, she looked away.

“That weekend we had is over, Ressa. You made it clear that was all you wanted, so what does it matter if I need a cookie or whatever?”

It stung. And if she wouldn’t have hated herself for taking the easy way out, she would have just told him to forget it.

But as she stood there struggling for some sort of answer, he took a step toward her. His mouth grazed her ear, sending a shiver through her. “I still wake up smelling you on my skin. A cookie, a teddy bear, a friendly chat isn’t what I want from you. Since you already decided you didn’t want anything more than beyond what we had in that hotel room, I’d just as soon not try to do . . . whatever it is you’re doing.”

He went to cut around her.

Insanity struck.

There was no other explanation, but logic had nothing to do with what she did next. She caught his arm in her hand. “Almost every night, I find myself dreaming about you. It’s not a matter of not wanting more.”

Under her hand, the muscles in his arm went tense.

He was watching her. She didn’t want to meet his eyes, but she couldn’t avoid it forever. Mouth dry, she slowly lifted her gaze to his and found that blue green gaze cutting into her, stripping her bare, and all she wanted to do was erase the past five weeks. No. Not the past five weeks—there was another period of her life she’d love to undo, but that just wasn’t possible.

“It’s just that this is too complicated,” she said.

“Complicated.” He shifted around.

Ressa found herself caged between him and the truck. His arms bracketed her shoulders and his mouth was only a whisper away now.

“Sometimes we make things out to be more complicated than they really are,” Trey said, and his voice was imminently reasonable. So reasonable and logical, it caught her off guard when he slid his knee between her thighs. She wore a full-cut skirt, but the material was thin, very little barrier, and she gasped at the feel of him rubbing against her inner thighs. “Let’s simplify. I want you. I want to know more about you and I want to spend time with you. Either you want the same or you don’t.”

As he brushed his mouth against her cheek, he murmured, “Which is it?”

“I want that, but . . .”

He kissed her.

Ressa moaned, grabbing his waist to steady herself, but he ended the kiss too quickly and moved away, watching her with hooded hungry eyes.

“Then we either try this out or don’t.” He stood four feet away now, hands hanging loose at his sides. His gaze focused on her mouth and Ressa shuddered at the hunger she saw there.

We don’t.

Logic whispered inside her head. She knew better. “I’m something of a mess, Trey,” she said, managing to keep her voice level. “I’m raising a child who isn’t mine. There are complications involved with that. There are other things in my life that are just as complicated, if not worse. I don’t think I’m the ideal woman for a man like you to get involved with.”