the grass. “You look like a corpse,” she said with a snicker. “Come on. Loosen up, Pretty Boy.” She undid his shoelaces and pulled his shoes and socks off, tossing them casually aside. “Better?” All he did was shrug; now his bare feet were going to get muddy in addition to his shoes. He kept that all to himself and instead threw an arm over his face to keep the sun off his eyes.
Her small delicate hands massaging his feet startled him, and when her thumb dug into his arch he couldn’t help letting out a moan of pleasure. “Good, right?” she asked, and all he could do was nod. She began to hum something. It was a familiar song, though he couldn’t figure out what it was.
“You have a pretty voice.” And it was true. Whatever it was that had started off as a hum was now a little melodic song that was barely a whisper.
“Thanks.”
“What is it?”
“The jingle from the insurance commercial that’s always playing on the radio. It’s stuck in my head for some reason.”
He sat up a little to see if she was teasing him, but she just kept singing and then he realized it was indeed the annoying jingle from the radio. He laid back down and laughed. JL’s good humor was refreshing, and he found that her soothing voice and gentle hands made him feel peaceful. The birds chirped overhead, and he heard a few splashes coming from the water. He realized that the heat wasn’t really that stifling at this early hour; once he made the effort to embrace it, it actually felt nice. He closed his eyes and succumbed to the feel of her small dainty hands kneading the soles of his feet.
—
A loud rustling sound woke Enzo with a jolt. “What the—” He shot upright and saw trees and grass before his eyes landed on Jamie Lynn, who was sitting with her feet in the water, mud splattered all the way up to her calves and her hand in a bag of cheese puffs, her cheeks full as she chewed. He glanced around and saw her fishnet stockings hanging from a branch. She looked completely at peace. He’d never met anyone as sure of herself and as comfortable in her own skin as Jamie Lynn. “I fell asleep,” he said, feeling ridiculous for stating the obvious.
She turned her face to look at him. “Yep.” She extended the bag of cheese puffs to him.
He shook his head. Who ate cheese puffs so early in the morning? “Why didn’t you wake me?” He ran his fingers through his hair. He hadn’t had a nap since…he didn’t remember the last time he’d had a nap. “I’m a terrible date.”
She tilted the bag up to her mouth and finished off the contents before standing up. “Why would you say that?”
“I fell asleep twenty minutes into our date.”
“Good. You needed to relax.” She plopped down next to him and offered him a warm soda from a bag, but he declined. She shrugged and gulped it down before opening a pack of Oreos, which he also declined. “I’ve never met someone who ate as much as you do.”
“Not true,” she said with her mouth full. “Travis.”
“You’re right.” He swiped a crumb from the corner of her mouth and smiled. “Travis does eat a lot. What’s with you guys? You’ve got a super metabolism gene or something?”
“Not sure. I love to eat, so I’m glad I can.” She took out some baby wipes from one of the bags and cleaned the dried mud off her legs.
“I’m sorry I missed you getting naked in order to take off those stockings.”
She laughed and winked flirtatiously at him. “I guess I should’ve thought it through a little more when I dressed this morning. I hadn’t planned to come to the park, and then once I was here I wanted to feel the water.”
“It’s all right. I get it.”
She settled in a little closer to him, but her eyes were still on the water in front of her. “So, I’d like to know more about this wife situation.”
“There is no wife situation. My father and Marianna’s father are business partners in one of the many corporations my father owns. Marrying Marianna was always something I was supposed to do. Go to Wharton for grad school like he did, return to Brazil, get married and have a handful of babies, and then help run my father’s empire with Marianna by my side. Her