He reached into the sack and pulled out a pair of gaudy orange and purple race socks. He pulled them apart and handed one to Birdie. “One for you.” And then he put the mate on Toni’s lap. “And one for you.” He retrieved a second pair of socks—baby blue and lime green—and divvied them up between the sisters.
“New socks!” Birdie yelled as if she’d just gotten her own rainbow-farting pony. “Oh, thank you, Logan!”
He grunted in surprise when he got the Birdie tackle-hug treatment and only hesitated a second before hugging her back. “You’re most welcome.”
Toni suddenly wanted to jump his bones again.
Birdie sat back and yanked off her shoes, tugging off her old socks and replacing them with the new. Touched by Logan’s thoughtfulness, Toni had to use one of her new socks to dab away a stray tear before she followed Birdie’s lead and changed into them. They wriggled their matching mismatched socks at him and he laughed, that charming smile of his turning heads again—Toni’s head.
Yep. Bones. Jumped. Now.
Toni was ecstatic to find Mom waiting in the hotel lobby with Susan. Not because she actually wanted to see either of them, but because she needed to hand off her sister so she could get her hands on her man as soon as possible.
“Thanks for visiting.” She gave her mom the quickest of hugs. “Be a good girl for mama.” She kissed Birdie on the cheek. “Later,” she said to Susan and started to back away.
“I don’t want to go on the plane,” Birdie wailed.
“You don’t?” Logan asked.
Birdie shook her head vigorously. “No. I hate them.”
“I love planes,” Logan said.
Birdie looked up at him adoringly. “You do?”
“Yeah. They go even faster and higher than dirt bikes. You can fly through the sky like Superman.” He demonstrated his flying skills—extending his arms and making zoom noises.
Birdie pursed her lips together, obviously struggling with a huge dilemma: fear of flying versus impressing her new friend. The new friend won. The two of them zoomed around the group several times. Susan looked rather annoyed by their childishness, but Mom was smiling. She squeezed Logan’s arm when the two pretend airplanes came to a stop. “Thank you,” she said to him.
He grinned. “No problem.”
“Hello, Logan,” Susan butted in, her tone dripping with something nasty. Disdain?
Logan turned his head to look at her and scowled. “Do I know you?”
“I don’t know,” she said, with a sly smile. “Do you?”
“This is Susan,” Toni said, not really wanting to introduce them. She wanted to get away, get him alone, and get busy.
“It was good to meet you all,” Logan said when he apparently understood Toni’s persistent tug on his elbow as it’s time to go. He gave Susan one last look, patted Birdie on the head, and turned to follow Toni.
“There’s something familiar about that Susan woman,” he said as they stepped onto the elevator.
“Please don’t tell me you’ve slept with her,” Toni pleaded. There wasn’t enough bleach in the world to clean that skank off his dick.
“No. I recognize every woman I’ve ever slept with. I might not remember their names . . .” He turned his head toward her. “What was your name again?”
She slugged him in the ribs.
“No.” He shook his head, still scowling. “I know I never slept with her, but I think I’ve seen her somewhere.”
“She used to be a journalist,” Toni said. “Maybe she interviewed you.” Please let that be all there was between them.
He released a sigh and nodded. “Yeah, that must be it.” He turned toward her and smiled. “So why were you in such a hurry to ditch your adorable little sister?”
“Well,” she said, “there was this hot guy doing all sorts of dangerous stunts on a dirt bike and I thought to myself, damn, I need to get me some of that.” She turned toward him and slid a hand down his belly, stopping just short of touching what she really wanted. “And after he got me excited with his daring, acrobatic feats, I found him surrounded by all sorts of women, which made me wonder if I even stood a chance with him.”
“You do,” he murmured before directing her hand several inches lower.
“And then he bought a little girl some socks which made her incredibly happy.”
“He sounds pretty lame. I ain’t gonna lie.”
She smiled at him, her heart throbbing with the love trying to burst from her chest.