Hot Damn(14)
“No. No, that’s fine.” I wave her inside and watch as the little boy—Christopher—grins up at me, one hand in his mouth. He’s drooling around it, totally unselfconscious.
“You gotta kitty?” he asks.
“I do. It’s a bad kitty.”
He frowns. “Bad kitty.”
“Yep.”
We move toward the living room. “You can’t play with the kitty, Christopher. I explained that in the car. You need to sit and be good, okay?”
“Okay. Be good.”
She sets him on the couch and gives him an iPad. It’s got a big, thick case on it, one of those made to hold up to manhandling by little kids. “You can play the owl game, okay?”
He nods enthusiastically. The owl game must be fun.
While she pokes at the iPad, I can’t drag my eyes off her. Her reddish hair is drawn back, but some of it falls down nearly to her shoulder, drifting over the cloth of her T-shirt. Her jeans hug her ass and her thighs, accentuating the curves and valleys. I catch my breath a little every time I see her, almost like I’ve forgotten what she looks like. The reminder is a punch right in the hormones. If there was ever a woman who deserved the title of MILF, it’s Maddy.
Finished setting up the game, she pops a set of headphones over the kid’s ears and plants a kiss on the top of his red beanie. Then she turns back toward me, and I ask the first question that pops into my head. “So. Where’s his dad? You two still together?”
Her expression, which softened when she was talking to her son, hardens up again. She glances back to be sure the kid is focused on the iPad before she says in a carefully modulated voice, “He’s…out of the picture. Doesn’t want anything to do with us.”
I can’t understand why a guy would walk out on a woman like this. And leaving your kid in the lurch? I’m not nuts about kids, but abandoning your family is just wrong.
She’s sorting through the toys in her bag, choosing some of them and setting them aside. “So what made you decide to do this…cat therapy thing instead of a normal job? You’ve got the gig at the vet’s office—isn’t that enough?”
“It pays the bills, but I’m trying to do better. Get to my dream job.” There’s a hesitation, as if she’s afraid to tell me anything else. Then she says, “I want to go to vet school.”
“What’s stopping you?”
“Money, mostly.” She stares down at the bag of treats in her hand, her fingers shifting back and forth as if she’s trying to decide how much to say. Finally she looks up at me. “My parents cut me off when I got pregnant. Said if I wanted to be grown up so fast, I could take care of it on my own. But Troy… Christopher’s father left right after he was born, and now I’m stuck taking care of him by myself.”
“That’s bullshit. How can your parents just toss you over like that?”
Her gaze flicks up to me again. “They’re conservative. They weren’t raised to think being a single mom is just another valid choice. More like it’s a big, huge mistake.”
“It doesn’t matter what they think—you’re their daughter.” My voice has risen because I’m genuinely pissed on her behalf, but I make an effort to pull it back down so it doesn’t upset the kid. “Blood is blood. You take care of your own—you don’t just toss them to the curb.”
She turns away, sorting through the bag again. “Never mind. I shouldn’t have said anything. Let’s just get to the session.”
Cat toys in her hands, she shifts back toward me, but then stops. “On second thought, let’s get those scratches taken care of before we start.”
“What, these?” I twist my head back to look at the scratches. I can barely see them out of the corner of my eye. They curl just over the top of my shoulder, the bulk of them going down my back. “It’s fine. I’ve had way worse, trust me.”
She rolls her eyes a little. “Yes, I know you’re a big macho fireman who challenges death on a regular basis, but cat scratches can get infected really easily. Haven’t you heard of cat scratch disease?”
“You mean the song?” I smile so she knows I’m not that dumb.
Maddy rolls her eyes. “If you get a bad case, you feel like you’ve got the flu. It’s a bacteria they can carry.” She starts to look impatient, like she’s tired of educating me. “Just trust me. Sit down, and I’ll doctor them.”
I take a seat on the couch, where I tossed a blanket over the cushions yesterday to cover the torn-up upholstery. She perches next to me and sorts through her bag, coming out with some alcohol pads and a tube of antibiotic ointment. I give her the side-eye.
She rips open an alcohol pad and strokes it down the length of the scratches. It stings, as expected, and I wince. Not expected, though, is the way my dick perks up at her fingers touching me.
I risk a peek as she opens the gold-colored tube of ointment. Her fingers are neat and precise as they unscrew the lid. The way she seems completely confident in what she’s doing is a bit of a turn-on. More than a bit. A lot. I shift a little in my seat, hoping she doesn’t notice the growing bulge at my crotch.
I try to will it back down, but then she starts applying the ointment and it pops right back up again. She’s soft and careful, making sure the ointment gets into the wounds but not pressing so hard that it hurts.
“Let me know if I’m hurting you,” she says quietly, and, God, that’s so sexy.
“Nope.” My mouth shoots off before I can think about what I’m saying. “I wish I had more scratches.”
She draws back. “Stop it.”
“Stop what?” I turn a little so I can almost look at her. Her face is going pink. Leaning toward her, I smirk and add in a melodramatic tone, “I like the way you touch me.”
Angrily she screws the cap back on the ointment and throws it back in the bag. “I don’t appreciate you mocking me like that.”
“What?” Again, I have no idea what she’s talking about. Does she not know she’s hot as fuck on a stick? “I’m not mocking you, sweetheart. I’m straight-up serious. In fact, if this weren’t a professional cat therapy meeting, I’d let you try those hands out in some other places.”
Her face has gone beet red, the color going all the way down her neck and probably onto her chest. I wonder if her tits are blushing. I’d like to find out. She’s obviously uncomfortable, though, so I scoot back a little to give her some room.
Staring into the bag of cat toys, she says, “I guess it’s a good thing you’re a public servant, then.”
“Why?”
“Because if you’re fire chief, people elect you, right? So you’re held to a higher standard. You have to behave yourself.”
I bark out a laugh. “Yeah, ’cause I wouldn’t want to be involved in the very first sex scandal involving an elected official.”
Her mouth tightens. “Let’s just focus on what I’m here for, okay?”
I probably should, but I don’t want to. “What’s the deal? Am I not your type? Do you not like the big strapping hero type?”
“I just…” She’s obviously not going to finish that sentence, so I press on.
“You had Wolverine on your T-shirt yesterday, and today it’s Iron Man. So you like big strapping heroes, just not me? Is that it?” I’m mostly teasing, but I’m also a little serious. Most women find me fuck-worthy, whether in or out of uniform. Not that I’ve had much chance to explore that part of my life lately, with the cat ruining everything I ever loved.
“I don’t have time for this,” she shoots back. Her voice is firm, but she still won’t make eye contact, and I can tell the conversation has upset her. “I have a kid to take care of. I have a job. I need to focus on being a mom.”
“And moms can’t get laid sometimes?”
At this, she shoots a glance back at the kid, but he’s focused on his game, headphones firmly in place. I wonder how long he’ll stay occupied. Long enough for me to make some progress with his mom? Probably not.
She drags some Band-Aids out of her bag and slaps them onto my shoulders, not nearly as gentle as she was before. “This is not what I came here to talk about.”
Pushing to her feet, she makes it clear she’s done with that part of the conversation. Briskly she brushes her hands together. “Where’s Thor?”
I shove a hand through my hair, frustrated. I don’t really want to stand up at the moment, but it looks like I’m going to have to. “How should I know where the little shithead is hanging out?”
Maddy glances back toward her kid again, her mouth tightening. I guess I’m not supposed to swear when he’s around. He’s still got those headphones on, though, and is really focused on whatever the “owl game” is. His tongue is sticking out of the corner of his mouth, and his forehead is beetled in concentration. It’s kind of adorable.
“I came here to work with him, so I assumed you’d know where he is.”
“I’ve been letting him run around more, like you said. So he’s probably hiding somewhere.”