Page 15 of Learning at 40

“You should really stop spying on my yard,” I whisper, my voice raspy and rough.

“I don’t think I could stop if I tried,” he admits, still focusing on my mouth. I lick my lips again. The silence between us grows heavy, like a warm blanket around us. A light breeze whispers through the air. The trees seem to echo my thoughts. Kiss me.

Suddenly, Zack shifts. He slips my hand off his thigh, resting it in the barely-there space between us, and releases it. He lifts the wineglass and finishes the remainder in one long swallow. I roll to my back, not having noticed I’d shifted to my shoulder, mirroring his position of facing me.

“Thanks for the wine.” He holds out the glass like I’m waitstaff sent to do his bidding. Then he surprises me by pressing a kiss to my shoulder.

“Keep your clothes on,” he teasingly warns while a touch of that edgy tone from earlier returns.

“Close your blinds,” I advise, coyly narrowing my eyes at him.

“Not a chance.” He presses off the chaise and stands. Without a glance back from him, I shamelessly check out his ass while he retreats, and my girly parts dance with thoughts of him seeing me naked in other places than my backyard.

6

[Zack]

I’m a man who hardly sleeps. Every minute is money to me when it comes to my attorney practice and the development of Four Points. Money hadn’t always been a concern until I was a teen. Then every dime mattered. So, I’m up until three in the morning or waking at that time to get in a day’s worth of work before a day of play, even when I’m on vacation.

It’s only been twelve minutes since my boys snuck into River’s backyard again, and I had to retrieve them as she wasn’t home. They’ve just finished telling me how they found a loose piece of fencing behind Anna’s garage and slipped through the metal chain link to enter the neighbor’s yard.

“We were searching for Narnia,” Trevor states.

I don’t even know what that means until Mila clarifies. “Those kids went through a wardrobe, not a fence.”

What are we talking about? “Who went through a wardrobe?” I ask. Anna made breakfast for our crew, and we linger around the kitchen island and the small dining table in front of a large bay window near the sitting area. Pancakes on a Monday morning feel like heaven.

“The kids searching for Narnia,” Mila explains. Swiping a hand through my hair, I look at Anna for help. She’s putting away dishes that Mason has washed.

“It’s a book. The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe.” Anna tips a brow at me as if I should know this story. I vaguely remember a movie about such a thing when I was in my twenties.

“How do you know about Narnia?” I ask Trevor.

“Alexa read us the book.”

“Does he mean a nanny or the machine?” Mason asks, tipping up a brow, and sadly, I have no idea. The guilt of my ability as a father is layered thicker and thicker.

“So what’s today’s plan?” I interject, wondering if Anna would like some solitude instead of our crew’s constant chaos. Mason’s been surprisingly quiet while a shadow to Anna’s every movement. He does the dishes. He picks up things. He acts before being asked.

Our friend is a manwhore to the extreme, but his domestic support has been interesting to watch. He was here when Ben needed to be driven to appointments and eventually bathed or positioned. I honestly don’t know how Mason did it.

When I’d met Ben, he was the lawn boy. His father owned the local landscaping company, and Mr. Kulis worked on our yard as well as Anna’s next door. That’s how Anna eventually met Ben, and the rest is history even though it wasn’t that simple. Think princess and servant, and that’s the way I judged him until I had my own fall from grace. Ben was one of the first to accept me when others didn’t know how to react to what happened to my family. When most people shunned us. As Anna was my friend first, Ben became my friend by default until true friendship took over, and I’ve always regretted thinking less of Ben before getting to know him.

He never judged me, and I deserved judgment, especially when it came to River.

I can’t believe I admitted to watching her and swipe a hand down my face to calm thoughts of her touching herself, pleasing herself in that damn person-and-a-half lounger. I haven’t been able to stop thinking about her—again—and when I sat beside her on that same chaise lounge, rubbing arms, holding her hand . . . I am a mess of unfamiliar desire.

“Hot flash?” Mason teases when he sees the sudden dull red flush heating my face.

“Something like that,” I snap, harsher than necessary. “What’s on the agenda again?”

Mason tips his head, but he can’t read me. I’m an enigma to him as I married my one-night stand when I got her pregnant. Even Mason didn’t offer to marry Samantha when he got her pregnant, and they’d been friends with benefits for a year before it happened. I’d made a promise to myself, though. I’d always be present for my children, even if it meant taking a wife I didn’t love. I’d been loyal to her as well.

“Beach day,” Mason comments.

“We don’t want to go to the beach. We want to go to Miss River’s,” Trevor interjects. My boys have been on the floor playing with Legos.

“Miss River?” Anna asks, her head popping up from something she’s reading set on the countertop.