Her body went hot and tight at the memory of his kiss. The feel of his lips moving over hers and the taste of his mouth. She’d never dated. Never had a boyfriend. Had just barely begun to have an interest in boys when her life had all but stopped.
Lizzy joined them and handed her a glass of lemonade. “Please tell me we’re not the only family with grown men who run around in the backyard like boys.”
“No.” Hannah smiled, grateful for the distraction. “Everything’s a competition to men. Who can burp the loudest. Who can fit the most cookies into their mouth.”
Lizzy nodded in agreement. “So true. That’s right, you have brothers.”
“Yes. Four.”
“Oh, girl. We could swap childhood nightmares. Getting zipped up in sleeping bags, feet stuck into a spinning ceiling fan.”
It hadn’t exactly been that kind of childhood, but she smiled anyway. Conversation dropped off as the game got under way.
The men talked trash. The women cheered and laughed while they chased toddlers. Stephen’s mom sat nearby with a referee’s whistle and she wasn’t afraid to blow it. She scolded them for being too rough, using their full names like they were little boys instead of full-grown men. Hannah would have loved to see her own mother scold her bossy brothers. And, as Abby had explained, no matter what, the game would end in a tie. She smiled at the rightness of that. Of a mother’s sense of love and fairness.
When Stephen took off his shirt, it was like all the air had been sucked from the backyard. Nothing could have made her look away from the rippling muscle, or the sheen of sweat that covered his back and shoulders. All the brothers were good, the teams evenly matched, but Stephen was by far the best, his athleticism, speed, and strength evident in every move. She wanted to run her hands and mouth over every inch of him, and she had nothing else to do but stand there getting hot and bothered. To wonder what the light dusting of black hair on his chest would feel like under her fingers. And the line of it that disappeared into the waist of his jeans, leading her eyes right to what she wondered about most.
“Look at that,” Matt yelled after Stephen made a stunning catch. “He can still play.”
Yes. He could. And looked incredibly good doing it. And when he handed the football off to one of the little boys, then scooped him up and made a run for the goal, her heart melted.
The game ended, high fives were given all around. Husbands kissed their wives, kids begged for food, and Stephen walked to where she waited at the swing set. He didn’t stop until he’d closed every bit of space between them. Until his wide body shielded her from the rest of his family. Neither spoke for several long hot seconds. Tiny beads of sweat ran along his temple and down his stubbled jaw.
Strong and solid. Hot and sweaty, liquid brown eyes heavy with desire. For her. So close she could feel the heat rolling off his skin, could breathe in his sexy man smell.
He raised his hands to the wooden beam above her head, boxing her in. “You threw my game off.”
She swallowed against her dry throat. “I did?”
“Definitely. It took everything I had not to come over here, screw the game.”
And it took everything she had not to slick her palms over his abs, his chest, and around his shoulders.
“I could feel your eyes on me. I can’t think straight when you look at me like that.”
She didn’t know exactly how she’d been looking at him, but she knew what she’d been thinking. Good Lord. Had everyone seen it? And now he was looking at her like he’d won the grand prize and she was it. She had the thought that maybe she should run, that she wasn’t ready for this. For him. But she laid a shaky hand against his side, felt him suck in a breath between his teeth.
“I need a shower.”
“I don’t care.”
Stephen cursed under his breath. “I’ll take you home.” He took her hand in his and grabbed his shirt off the back of a chair, barely giving his family a backward glance.
Chapter 19
Stephen pulled her behind him out the gate, and she’d waved a hasty goodbye to Abby with what she imagined was a ridiculous smile on her face. They went around to his motorcycle parked at the curb and he fastened his helmet on her head. He slipped on his shirt, and cranked the motor. “Hold on.”
She did, because what else does a girl do when a man tells her to get on the back of his motorcycle? She hugged him tight enough that her breasts pressed against his muscled back. The motor vibrated between her legs and the ridges of his abs flexed under her hands. Exhilarating. Arousing. Hot.
But mostly it was being with Stephen. Just the two of them, the warmth of the sun, and the whipping wind as they flew down the highway. Wild and free. Like being on a horse, only a million times better because she wasn’t alone.