One Hot Momma (12 page)

“What do you mean?” He really hadn’t thought about it. He thought of her kids as his own.

“I mean do you want them to be yours, your bloodline,
your
genetics.
Half of your DNA?”

“You mean now?” He hedged.

“
Rafe
.”
She sighed as she said his name.

“I don’t know. I mean this is a tricky question for me.
Either way I answer is going to be the wrong way, and
besides, I asked you first.”

“I answered.”

“No, you didn’t.” He took a step back from her. “You started to, but then you changed it around. You never said yes,
Rafe
, I want to have children of my own, or no,
Rafe
, I don’t. So which is it?”

“I don’t know.” She shrugged then put her hands on her arms and rubbed them.

“I don’t know either.” He went back to the truck and got his jacket. As he helped her put it on, he thought up more things he should know about a woman he was going to marry. “How many men have you had sex with?”

She blanched then headed for the truck.

“What?” He followed after her. “It’s a fair question.”

“What’s fair about it? You know I wasn’t a virgin so that means there was at least one other man before you. Do you really want to know how many? What does that number prove to you? That I was a slut before we met or that I have always been frigid?” Now she was mad. He had seen her irritated before, but he had definitely taken what was a great night and turned it into a disaster. He should have listened to Jan and stayed away from the lake tonight. “How many women have you slept with,
Rafe
?”

He stopped dead in his tracks. His mind started to register the number, adding up all of the women in his life since he was sixteen seemed to take more brainpower than he had to spare at the moment. “That can’t be right.”

“What can’t be right?” she asked and whirled around to face him. Her face was pink, her nose red, and her lips trembled.

“It’s… I asked you first,” he said and hoped she would stick to her guns and not tell him.

“Three.” She threw up her hands.
“You happy now?
Three and then you, so four.
Ha!”

“Well, that is a very reasonable number.” He hoped she would let it drop. No way did he want to tell her now. She was right; it didn’t matter. He didn’t know why his ego wanted to know.

“And you? I’m dying to know now. Where do I rank in the list?” Her fierce blue eyes locked him in place.

“Times ten.”
He wished he could take it back, take back the questions and the answers and go back to holding her and dancing.

“Ten?” she said as if it were a lot.

“Times ten, you said three.
Three times ten.”
He looked away from her shocked and appalled expression.

Layla
turned away from him and climbed in the truck. He shut the door and got in on the driver’s side. She turned the heat on and the radio down.

“You rank number one though,” he said as he put the truck in reverse. “I mean it,
Layla
. You are the only woman I have ever been flesh to flesh with, the only one I have tasted, and the only one who has ever really tasted me.”

He couldn’t tell if she coughed or laughed at him.

“Heath made us go to the clinic and watch all of the STD videos. He would do terrible things like put a picture of a penis all distorted on mine and Jack’s dressers and a note with a box of condoms saying double up or die. Hell, the first time I had sex I wore three condoms and kept most of my clothes on.” He laughed at the memory. “Thirty is a big number. I never really thought about it before.”

“So I get to look at half of the women in this area and know they have had sex with you. Great.” She sniffed and he checked to make sure she wasn’t crying. Her nose was still red, and she was hunting through her purse for what he now knew was a tissue.

“No.
Not at all.
Both girls I had sex with in high school have married and moved away. The rest were scattered around the country. I was a rodeo cowboy when I was younger. I made good money riding Broncos, better money riding bulls. The more I came home, the more time I spent with Jan. The more time I spent with Jan the less I wanted to let women let me take advantage of them. I was full of hormones as a young man, what can I say. But as I got older and Jan got older, I would think about Jan as a teenager, a young woman, and I knew I had to be better than I was being. I couldn’t let her see both me and Jack as wild boys. I mean Heath was always working. Jack did date locally, and I was all she really had as a male role model since my dad and granddad died. I like to think she made a good decision in choosing Buck because she didn’t make bad decisions in high school. I’m pretty sure she walked down the aisle a virgin, at least she better have.” He waited to hear her reply. His hands gripped the steering wheel, and his gut clenched. “Really if you look at the last four years, there has only been two.”
Silence.
“Are you still mad at me?”

“No.” She sniffed again. “I thought I was going to marry the first guy I had sex with.”

Her statement felt like a kick in the gut. “What happened?”

“My sister married him instead.”
Layla
shrugged.

Rafe
pulled off the road and slammed on the brakes. “What?”

Her nose was still red. Her eyes looked heavy, sleepy. “I never told that to anyone before. It happened once, one time. I was head over heels in love with him. Then he came to pick me up for a date and Lola left with him. He didn’t even realize she wasn’t me until they got to dinner. Of course, she turned on the charm, and that was the end of it. It was like a sick joke that their children became mine, I mean my twin sister. Those children would look the same no matter which one of us gave birth. At first, it was a hard reminder. Of course, I dealt with it. That is why I always said I was divorced. I mean if anyone saw pictures of them, they would think it was me not Lola anyways.”

She sat in silence still thinking. He sat there staring at her. “The other two were just college flings. I was spreading my wings so to speak, testing my boundaries. I’m only telling you because you should know that I have always been careful, too. I wouldn’t go down on a guy unless he had a condom on. I guess in a lot of ways you are my first, too. Does gender count for anything?” She sniffed and then blew her nose. “Ugh. My head is killing me.”

“Gender?”

“The third
time there were
three of us.” She coughed, put her head to the window and her fingers to her temples.

“Let’s just get you home.” He reached across the seat and offered her his
casted
hand. She placed her hand in his for a moment, but then had to cough and sniff again. His head was starting to hurt, too. It hurt with processing the fact that
Layla
had been a part of a threesome and one of the partners was a woman. Of all the things, he never saw that one coming.

* * *

“
Rafe
, where’s mommy?” Brice asked as he stretched and walked into the living room.

“Still asleep.”
Rafe
smiled at the little man. “I can make you breakfast, and mommy can rest.”

“She’s not in there,” Savannah said as she walked in behind Brice. “Her blanket and pillow is gone, too.”

Rafe
stood quickly and fought the panic rising inside him. She wouldn’t leave them. Certainly if she would leave him, she wouldn’t leave the children, so where was she and what had happened?
“
Layla
!”

He walked and called her name through the house. As he passed the hall bathroom, he heard his name. He opened the door and found her on the floor, under the blanket with her head on the pillow.
“
Layla
?”

“I’m sick.” She sniffed and closed her eyes. “I got tired of running back and forth. I’m exhausted.”

“Mommy?”
Savannah started toward the bathroom.

“Stay back, sweetie.”
Layla
held up her hand and Savannah stopped. “I have a cold, and I don’t want you to get sick. I love you, Savannah, but mommy is really not feeling good right now, and I don’t want you to catch it if it’s the flu, okay?”

“Okay.” She nodded. “Ms. Chester told us about the flu. We squirt our hands with bacteria all the time in class.”

Rafe
and
Layla
both shared a smile at Savannah’s understanding of antibacterial gel.
Layla’s
smile faded quickly. “Close the door.”

Rafe
stepped inside the bathroom and shut the door, so Savannah couldn’t see.
Layla
looked
so
weak as she tried to get up enough to vomit in the commode.

“Leave,
Rafe
, please,” she pleaded but he didn’t listen to her.

He held her hair back as she heaved. Nothing was in there, so he knew it must have been painful. Her tears confirmed it as she lay back down on the bathroom floor.

“You need a doctor.” He covered her back up with the blanket. “I’ll be back.”

She tried in vain to protest.

“Is mommy okay?” Brice asked.

Rafe
squatted down to look the boy eye-to-eye. “No, cowboy, mommy has the flu. She has a very sad tummy right now, and she is afraid you and your sister will get sick too if you get too close, and that would make her very sad if you got sick because of her. So as much as we all want to make mommy feel better, we have to give her some space until the doctor gets here and can get her better, okay?”

“Okay.” He nodded then hugged
Rafe
tightly. “I’m glad we’re here.”

The boy’s words sunk in. If they were still in the apartment and
Layla
was sick, they wouldn’t have another grown-up around to take care of things. They would have had to call him, but if he was gone with the rodeo… his jaw clenched and he decided one way or the other he would not leave them to face these things alone ever again whether it worked out with
Layla
or not.

* * *

“That hurts,”
Layla
said as the doctor gave her a shot in the ass. Heath and Chance had come over and picked up the kids, so they didn’t have to sit at home and be worried and bored all day.
Rafe
had carried her, against her will, and his arm’s protest to his bedroom. The bathroom in his bedroom was closer than the hall bathroom near hers.

“The shot should help ease the nausea,” the doctor said and then looked at
Rafe
who was holding his
casted
arm and in obvious discomfort. “Let’s take a look at that arm next week. I’m afraid to take the cast off. You don’t seem intent on letting it heal.”

“I’m working on it.” The doctor shook his head and walked out. He turned his attention to
Layla
, sprawled out in his bed, her left butt cheek exposed with a band-aid on it. A bucket next to the bed just in case she needed it. “Can I get you anything?”

“No.” She pouted.

He sat beside her on the bed, so he could rub her back with his left hand. “You’ve gained weight since you’ve been here.”

“I’m sure I gave up a few pounds last night.” She groaned. “Way to tell me I’m getting fat,
Rafe
, when I’m sick and puking my guts out.”

“You are far from fat. I was just noticing that you look a lot healthier. Well, not at this moment, but in general. You look healthy and happy here,” he whispered as he continued to make gentle strokes up and down her back. He gathered the blonde hair with a hint of red in it and twisted it before laying it aside. “If things don’t… I mean if we don’t… I don’t mind things the way they are. I’d like all of you to stay here, even after I get my cast off. I mean I still have months of rehabilitation to go through.”

“I’ll stay as long as you need me to.” She sighed as her eyes closed.

He let out a breath. It was a step in the right direction. She at least saw the value of staying with him. He could settle in to the idea of living as roommates for a while. Obviously, he didn’t want to share a bedroom without being married, especially when he had Savannah to think of. Brice too for that matter, he definitely didn’t want that boy to grow up to become a heartbreaker.

* * *

Rafe
slept in
Layla’s
bed that night. It was a whole new torture for him to be wrapped in her sweet scent all night long. He caught himself more than once reaching for his cock. He would get up then, go check on her in his bedroom, and then return to a restless sleep. He wanted so badly to crawl in bed beside her and snuggle up to her. He wanted to stroke her hair and place his nose in her neck. He wondered if this was how she had been feeling all that time. He wondered if her nose was clear enough that she was affected by being in his bed.

Morning came entirely too early, and the children came down the stairs and were ready for the day to begin. They started by bundling up and heading down to the barn. It was good for them to start learning a few things about the ranch. It also allowed
Layla
more time to rest. By the end of the night, they were exhausted and so was he.