Read Online Changed by His Son's Smile by Robin Gianna - Free Book Online
Authors: Robin Gianna
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kiss, with barely one second of resistance. Her cheeks burned with embarrassment. Especially because his kiss certainly hadn’t been full of tenderness. It had been full of anger and possessiveness, no doubt because Drew had mentioned Matt and a competitive man like Chase wouldn’t just shrug at something like that.
No, she had a feeling that had just added more fuel to the hot fire already burning within Chase about the two of them getting married.
Matt was the first man she’d dated since Chase, since leaving Honduras to go back to the States to work and start a new life there with Drew. Having a man in her life hadn’t been on her to-do list. But Matt had seemed so easygoing, so harmless, really, that she’d finally given in to going out with him a few times the month before she’d left for Benin. He’d been happy to include Drew in several excursions and had been pleasant to spend time with.
Kissing him had been pleasant, too. Pleasant, but not knee-weakening. Not breathtaking. Not so mesmerizing that she’d forget everything except how his mouth tasted and her heart pounded and how much she wanted to get naked and intimate the way she had when Chase had kissed her. So all-consuming that she’d lost all thought about anything but the way he’d made her feel.
And that was bad. In so many ways. More than bad that she hadn’t spared one thought about Drew seeing them devouring one another and rubbing their bodies together. Her face burned all over again at the thought, even though Drew was too young to think much of it, even if he’d noticed.
It was bad because she had to keep her focus. She had to resist the intense, overpowering attraction she’d felt for Chase since practically the first moment she’d met him and which clearly hadn’t gone away with time and distance.
As she’d told him before, great sex wasn’t a reason to get married. Neither was a feeling of obligation on Chase’s part. Or a need to control their lives. If she ever did marry, she wanted it to be because her husband loved her more than anything. Wanted to be with her more than anything. Believed she was every bit as important to him as his work.
And that obviously just wasn’t true with Chase.
Love had nothing to do with him wanting marriage, and she shoved away the deep stab of pain that knowledge caused. His reasoning that she and Drew should stay in the States while he lived his life the way he always had, or close to it, just wasn’t enough. Not for her and not for Drew.
Working with underprivileged people around the world was important to her, especially after she’d seen all the need in Honduras. She had her career plan all worked out, where she’d be employed in the U.S. for two years, spend nine months abroad, then head back to the States for two more years. And giving Drew exposure to other cultures couldn’t be anything but good for him.
Not to mention that, if Chase was still going to live all over the world, it made no sense to get married and pretend they were a family the years they lived in the U.S. Didn’t he see that Drew would always know he wasn’t as important to his dad as his job? But if they weren’t married, Drew would accept that his parents were no longer together, and would understand why his dad lived somewhere else.
She believed Chase when he said he wanted to be part of Drew’s life. It would probably work out okay if he saw Drew several times a year for a few weeks each time. After all, they lived in a global world now. With phone calls and video chats online, being close to one another shouldn’t be too hard.
What a tangled mess. But she was here to do a job, not think endlessly about the problems. She stared at the scribbled index cards, and wondered why some of the previous doctors and nurses had even bothered to record the unreadable notes.
“Dani, are you in here?”
“Yes.” She absolutely wouldn’t ask Chase where he’d gone. For all she knew, he’d been seeing a woman.
No, she had a feeling that had just added more fuel to the hot fire already burning within Chase about the two of them getting married.
Matt was the first man she’d dated since Chase, since leaving Honduras to go back to the States to work and start a new life there with Drew. Having a man in her life hadn’t been on her to-do list. But Matt had seemed so easygoing, so harmless, really, that she’d finally given in to going out with him a few times the month before she’d left for Benin. He’d been happy to include Drew in several excursions and had been pleasant to spend time with.
Kissing him had been pleasant, too. Pleasant, but not knee-weakening. Not breathtaking. Not so mesmerizing that she’d forget everything except how his mouth tasted and her heart pounded and how much she wanted to get naked and intimate the way she had when Chase had kissed her. So all-consuming that she’d lost all thought about anything but the way he’d made her feel.
And that was bad. In so many ways. More than bad that she hadn’t spared one thought about Drew seeing them devouring one another and rubbing their bodies together. Her face burned all over again at the thought, even though Drew was too young to think much of it, even if he’d noticed.
It was bad because she had to keep her focus. She had to resist the intense, overpowering attraction she’d felt for Chase since practically the first moment she’d met him and which clearly hadn’t gone away with time and distance.
As she’d told him before, great sex wasn’t a reason to get married. Neither was a feeling of obligation on Chase’s part. Or a need to control their lives. If she ever did marry, she wanted it to be because her husband loved her more than anything. Wanted to be with her more than anything. Believed she was every bit as important to him as his work.
And that obviously just wasn’t true with Chase.
Love had nothing to do with him wanting marriage, and she shoved away the deep stab of pain that knowledge caused. His reasoning that she and Drew should stay in the States while he lived his life the way he always had, or close to it, just wasn’t enough. Not for her and not for Drew.
Working with underprivileged people around the world was important to her, especially after she’d seen all the need in Honduras. She had her career plan all worked out, where she’d be employed in the U.S. for two years, spend nine months abroad, then head back to the States for two more years. And giving Drew exposure to other cultures couldn’t be anything but good for him.
Not to mention that, if Chase was still going to live all over the world, it made no sense to get married and pretend they were a family the years they lived in the U.S. Didn’t he see that Drew would always know he wasn’t as important to his dad as his job? But if they weren’t married, Drew would accept that his parents were no longer together, and would understand why his dad lived somewhere else.
She believed Chase when he said he wanted to be part of Drew’s life. It would probably work out okay if he saw Drew several times a year for a few weeks each time. After all, they lived in a global world now. With phone calls and video chats online, being close to one another shouldn’t be too hard.
What a tangled mess. But she was here to do a job, not think endlessly about the problems. She stared at the scribbled index cards, and wondered why some of the previous doctors and nurses had even bothered to record the unreadable notes.
“Dani, are you in here?”
“Yes.” She absolutely wouldn’t ask Chase where he’d gone. For all she knew, he’d been seeing a woman.
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