Joke’s on You by Lani Lynn Vale Page 0,38

about Dillan’s welfare that I forgot to worry about my sister’s.

She’d never done well with large crowds—even if they were family—or loud noises. Both of which were well and truly happening at that moment in time.

Dillan saw it, though.

She kicked me under the table when her tap on my arm didn’t work and then jerked her head in Belle’s direction.

Asa was sitting next to her, chatting away.

And Belle, our poor girl, looked like she was about to pull her hair out.

Or worse, lose her shit.

“Asa,” I called out to my son. “Can you come here for a minute?”

Asa snapped his head up, nodded once, and crawled underneath the table toward me.

My father didn’t bat an eye at my son using his legs and knees to get him where he wanted to go, and neither did my mother.

One of my aunts, though?

She yelped when she felt a hand on her knee.

Belle stiffened even further.

“Hey, Belle,” Dillan called. “Do you want to go to the bathroom with me?”

Belle jerked her head in a stiff nod, then was out of her chair and around the table at the drop of a hat.

I patted Dillan’s thigh just as she was getting up to leave.

When I leaned my head back to look at her, she dropped hers down and placed a kiss on my lips. “I’ll be back when I’m back.”

And she was, over thirty minutes later, with my sister in tow.

My sister who had an ice cream cone despite her food sitting in the spot where she’d vacated that hadn’t been touched.

I looked at Dillan to see her licking her lips, obviously having enjoyed her own cone while she was away.

When they both returned to their seats, I picked up my son who I’d sat beside me in Dillan’s absence, but she waved me off.

“I’ll just take mine down there.” She pressed her hand against the back of my neck. “Belle and I were having a discussion about a book anyway.”

I watched her go with my heart in my throat.

Ten years ago when I’d brought my first girlfriend around, she hadn’t understood Belle at all.

She also hadn’t been willing to get to know Belle at all.

She’d been young, yes, but she’d also been old enough to realize that Belle wasn’t stupid. Though, she treated Belle like she was.

Honestly, that’d been the first and the last time that I’d ever brought anyone home to meet Belle. Not because I was embarrassed of her, but because Belle was just that important to me.

And seeing her with Dillan, talking and laughing, despite her earlier panic? That made my heart super fuckin’ full.

“Daddy,” Asa said. “Can we go get ice cream?”

I watched Belle finish off her ice cream and then start on dinner.

“You can have the sopapilla or you can have the ice cream. Which one do you want?” I asked.

He pouted. “I want both.”

I chuckled. “Of course, you do, son. Of course, you do.”

It was only after dropping Asa and Delanie off later that night that I got the chance to talk to my girl.

Delanie waved me off when I would’ve followed Asa inside, and I turned and leaned my hip against the truck as I waited for my girl to arrive beside me.

She didn’t take long in doing so, stopping to run her hand up my side.

I felt my cock get hard instantly.

I’d been thinking about her, and her pussy, since I’d had it the night before.

Only, every time that I’d wanted to have her again, my family would show up and ruin everything.

Needless to say, the moment that her hand came in contact with my skin, all my good intentions about letting her go to bed so she wasn’t tired in the morning flew out the proverbial window.

I caught her up into my arms and dropped my mouth onto hers.

I’d been expecting the taste—sweet like the second ice cream cone she’d gotten on the way out the door.

What I hadn’t expected was for her to practically crawl her way up my body.

I growled and spun her so that she was pressed against the fender of my truck, my body pinning hers in place.

The light that’d lit up the moment that I’d pulled into the drive went out, and suddenly, we were in near complete darkness.

Her kisses were just as frantic as my own, and it took everything I had not to shove my hand down the back of her panties.

I was going to be good.

This was only a kiss.

But then she had to go and