Perfecting the Odds (16 page)

When he rounded the corner, time froze. He stifled a groan and then completely lost all coherent thought, probably because his blood was now torpedoing toward his dick. Karis bent over the island counter with a piping bag in hand, skillfully swirling fluffy white icing atop cupcakes. A black apron molded to her breasts, cinched her trim waist, and flared at her lush hips. She straightened to assess the rosette and blew a puff of air to move the stray hairs from her face.

Hot. As. Shit
.

“
Lucy, I’m home,” he said quietly so as not to frighten her. She jumped anyway, squirting the icing across the counter.
Fucking kill me now
, he cursed as he his zipper threatened to leave permanent teeth marks.

“
You scared the hell out of me,” she said, palming her chest.

“
You look so….;” he groaned the end of that statement, approaching the counter.

She snorted
a sound of disbelief then grabbed a rag behind her and began wiping the trail of frosting of the counter. That’s when he noticed what was written on her apron.

“You ‘
Hand rub all your meat’,” he asked with a grin before bringing his thumb across her forehead to remove a dusting of flour. “Is there a waiting list for that service?”

“What
did you say?” Her head shot up and caught his gaze on her apron before she belted a laugh. No blush there. Interesting. “My thirtieth birthday gift from Eve. As you can see, it’s meant for guys who grill, but that doesn’t stop Eve. And what’s worse, she literally rolls on the floor laughing whenever I wear it, and I wear it a lot. Pretty messed up, huh?” she asked, wiping up the last of the frosting. She turned to rinse the rag in the sink.

“H
ilarious…and sexy as hell,” he said as he placed his hands on her hips. It took every ounce of restraint not to press his cock against the crease of her ass.

“Hmm,” she
said, eying him curiously from over her shoulder. “You like your women in the kitchen baking?”

“If she likes to bake, I won’t complain
,” he said, crossing his arms and leaning against the island to stare at her heart-shaped ass.

“Well
this woman loves to bake. Want one?” she asked, holding up the most perfect cupcake Michael had ever seen. Wrapped in shiny foil, the swirl of icing sat atop the perfectly round dark chocolate cupcake.

“Wow,
that looks too pretty to eat.”

She
stepped closer, removed the cupcake liner, and held it an inch from his mouth. The rich, sweet scent of dark chocolate and buttercream filled his nose. “Take a bite. Perhaps the flavor is even better than its beauty.” Fuuuuck me.

He opened,
and she slid nearly half of the cake into his mouth. No need to chew. The dark, spicy chocolate cake melted in his mouth. The buttercream, smooth but not too sweet, balanced the cake’s depth of flavor perfectly. “Jesus, Karis, this is almost better than—“

“Sex, yeah, everyone says that. I’m not
convinced,” she teased and winked. “Of course, I’m not a fan of cake…or frosting.”

His brows furrowed.
“You bake heaven and don’t indulge?”

“No, I’m a
committed ice cream fanatic. Thirsty?” she asked as she placed the other half of heaven in his mouth. He nodded. “Water, tea, beer, wine, tea?”

“Beer sounds good,” Michael said. She grabbed two Blue Moons from the refrigerator, popped the tops, and handed him one.

“A toast?” she asked.

He looked up for a second to ponder. “To heavenly cupcakes and learning firsthand how you hand rub meat.”

She laughed loudly. “All right, you
quirky professor. To
those
things.”

Tipping the bottle back, h
e watched as she sipped her beer then reached behind her to untie her apron and lift it over her head. He choked on his mouthful. Her black ribbed tank gripped her braless breasts and curved low to display ample cleavage. Her nipples taunted his gaze, distinct and hard beneath the tank. He guaranteed she could feel the animalistic lust pouring off of him.

She
flushed. “I just have to wrap these up and, uh, freshen up… then we can head out.”

He nodded, unable to form words
.

Twenty minutes later, they were making their way down her driveway to his huge truck. Michael opened her door, stood behind her, and lifted her into her seat. His hands on her hips set a shiver over her.

“
Cold? I have a jacket in the back,” he said.

“No, I’m fin
e. Just a chill,” she responded, feeling her face heat.

He
rounded the truck and pulled himself up into the driver’s seat. Turning the key, he grinned boyishly at its throaty rumble.

“
I’ve never met a professor who drove a truck. So what’s with boys and their trucks,” she asked, leaning out her open window, in awe of how high off the ground they were.

He
sneered as if insulted. “First, profession aside, men drive trucks. Correction,
real
men drive trucks. Second, they are far better than cars in many regards.”

She lifted an eyebrow.

He shifted into gear and started down her driveway. The beastly machine was crazy loud. “Trucks are both functional and entertaining. For instance, I don’t have to rent something to haul furniture, mulch, stuff like that. We’re also over five feet above the ground. It’s fun by road dominance, alone. And then, of course, there’s the obvious.”

“The obvious?”
Her brows drew together.

Michael
grinned. “The truck bed... allows for spontaneous activities.”

Karis
chuckled. “Right, like star gazing and fishing from the tailgate?”

“
Precisely...like I said, ac-tiv-i-ties,” he enunciated and winked.

“I’ve just always heard
a boy,
excuse me
--I mean a man—who owns a large truck is his way of compensating”--she shot a look toward his lap--“for less substantial things.” Teasing Michael and watching him threw back his head with laughter was quickly becoming her favorite hobby, and she couldn’t help herself. But Karis was fully aware of his…size. She had both felt and seen the outline of his impressive manhood a few times already, and quite frankly, the thing terrified the shit out of her.

And fo
r all intents and purposes, she was a virgin. She’d had one true lover her entire life, and although he was not shabby himself by any means, she still feared being with a man who already claimed to have “dated” many women. She was convinced she would totally suck at sex with anyone, especially Michael.

His eyes darkened as he lifted one eyebrow. “Well, I guess you have t
o decide if I’m compensating or...representing.”

She laughed
nervously and elbowed him playfully. “Fair enough, Michael.”

Lord, help me
.

***

By the time they ordered their meals at the local Italian restaurant, they were in full conversation, dishing out normal details for a first date: favorite foods, pasttimes, authors, sports teams. Michael wasn’t surprised by how much they had in common.

Staring at his food,
Michael decided to delve deeper. Eve mentioned her parents’ death, a fact that frankly shocked him, so he hoped his question would allow him into her heart a bit more. It was a gamble, but knowing Karis’s past may help him gain a place it her heart. He stared at her across the table. “So, Karis, what made you fall in love with baking?”

She cocked her head to the side,
appearing quite cognizant of his motives. “Well, is that your passive-aggressive way of prompting my woe-is-me story?” She didn’t pause long enough for a response. “I guess I’ll just come out with it, hmm?” She winked, assuring him that she wasn’t upset by his question. “I was eleven. It was a Monday. Typical. My parents were out on their anniversary dinner date. They went to the same place every year and always came home laughing and all over each other.” She cleared her throat. Michael incited her discomfort and placed his hand over hers. “Even at my age, I realized the sounds of…you know… Anyway, I would head downstairs to the basement if I even sensed it. The anniversary date was a given.” She cleared her throat again as she pushed the linguine around on her plate, Michael’s eyes firmly fixed on her face, his thumb absently stroking over her knuckles. “That night, I remember falling asleep on my bean bag chair, watching an
I Love Lucy
rerun. Normally, once they realized I wasn’t in my room, my parents would check on me, but that night I woke around 3 a.m. to an empty house.” A frigid shudder swept its way from the top of her head to her toes. Karis was sure the emptiness of the house that night birthed her life of inescapable loneliness. “Uh, where was I? …Right, they were never out that late. Ever. I remember walking upstairs and seeing their empty pre-dinner wine glasses on the counter. I decided to call my mom’s aunt, Claire. She didn’t answer, which was odd, considering the time, you know?” He nodded. “I sat on the couch for about ten minutes, trying to figure out what to do next. I was just a kid. Completely scared out of my mind. The phone rang a few minutes later.” Karis winced as the ringing resonated in her head. Michael squeezed her hand, and she forced a smile at his gesture. She met his eyes directly for the part that hurt the most. “A drunk driver. Hit them head on, killing them instantly.” She inhaled deeply, filling her lungs with the part of the memory that haunted her the most. “At least that’s what the doctors at the hospital told me, but I still have the same nightmare: my parents are screaming my name….” Karis swiped away a single tear. ‘
I’ll see your smiling face before the sun rises, pumpkin
,’ Daddy said every night. Damn, it was an onerous story, one she knew delivered any sane man too much to handle. Maybe this date would be it. Then she and he wouldn’t have to deal with her own fucked up issues.

With Robert, s
he assumed he had accepted her because they were stubborn teenagers in love, both without parents or a real family, and the burden of a baby on the way. Perhaps Michael would realize how foolish it would be to get involved with a widow with two children and more hidden baggage in her closet than a politician running for office.

Visibly
pained, he rubbed his thumb across her knuckles. “Anyway, long story short, I was sent to live with my great aunt Claire, who happens to be a brilliant baker. Since I refused to go to therapy, she thought teaching me to bake would channel some of my anger and help me heal.” Karis chuckled. “I think I baked every day for a month and burned more than was salvageable. It really is soothing, though. I relax. Stop thinking.” She exhaled, relieved the story was over but wary because her past was now dished out on the table, leaving her completely vulnerable to him with another screw-up notch in the pattern of their relationship.

“
Is it just you?” Karis hated that his eyes begged for information that would relieve his despair.

“No siblings, but I had my aunt and Eve, of course. Eve is like a sister to me. I don’t know what I would do without her.”

“
When my father died, I had my mother and two sisters, but I still felt alone. But you were...” He dropped his head, and caught a glimpse of what looked too much like emotion she hated most. She furrowed her brow and pressed her lips into a tight line. “Michael,
don’t
. No pity. It’s been a long time. I have two wonderful children, good friends. Plenty of people go through what I have. It’s just the way life is.”

He
raked his hands through his hair, and his eyes shot a flash of irritation toward her. “No, Karis. You’ve been dealt a pretty shitty hand. Don’t reduce it to ‘the way life is’.”

“
Shitty hand or not, it
is
what it is,” she objected, her voice loud enough so that people at surrounding tables began to turn toward the commotion. She cleared her throat and lowered her voice to almost a whisper. “What the hell was I supposed to do? Just sit around and cry all day?
No
... I dealt with it, moved on. I think I turned out pretty damn well. I had a good childhood despite being cut a bit short. My aunt took good care of me; I met Robert; I got pregnant with Robby; we married before he enlisted. I still managed to make money and work my way through college. I began teaching; we had Grace. The end.” She returned to her now cold food, pushing it around, hating to have to look up and see the same pitiful expression.

“
Then Robert died.”

“Thanks for the reminder
,” she chided.

He let out an exasperated sigh. “
Karis, you’re extraordinarily resilient.”

Desperate to change the subject, she pondered her next statement
carefully. She had a tendency to ruin good moments, and she desperately wanted more time with Michael, even if it was just one date. Was it too much to ask for a good meal and little laughter? She could let the little bout of pity go. He hadn’t run scared. So, she chose to wink. “Thank you. You know, Michael… it was quite a decision for me to come on this date. I think I’m doing this whole dating thing wrong.” She smiled and he laughed aloud at her tone change. She sighed with relief. “I mean, I could have sworn you were about to jump me in my kitchen. So what do I have to do?