Creed had proved that morning he was a true badass.

He was good with kids.

Not a surprise, he had them, he had experience, he would be. It didn’t mean I liked watching it.

I didn’t let on and behaved as usual.

The kids ate donuts, drank milk and they did this while Creed and I looked after them and Charlene got ready for work. Then Creed helped Adam while I dealt with Leslie and Theo. Creed and Adam were done first, Charlene was out of the bathroom so they went down there to look at the faucet. Charlene got done getting ready and found me.

This brought us to now.

“Can I help you fix it?” Adam cried loudly and excitedly, jumping up and down twice.

“Need a part, pal,” Creed’s deep, smooth voice with the rough edge sounded down the hall. “But I’ll get it, come back tonight and you can help me then.”

Great.

“I can help!” Adam shouted, jumped again and Creed’s smile got bigger, brighter, sexier and, f**k me, sweeter.

I pulled away from the door and turned to Charlene who was examining me.

“You give him that bite mark?” she asked quietly.

“Um… yes,” I answered.

“The bruise on his cheekbone?” she went on.

“Things got outta hand,” I whispered.

“How out of hand?” she whispered back.

“He pissed me off. I attacked him. Got a bite and punch in. He defended himself. Things got heated in a different way. He gave me an orgasm after introducing me to bewilderingly good head and rough, hard sex, during which he carried me partway across a room still inside me and shortly after, I returned the favor. With the orgasm, I mean, I didn’t carry him across a room.”

Her eyes went huge and she muttered, “Holy crap.”

I would use different words but I still agreed with an, “Unh-hunh.”

Her face changed, her eyes going warm and worried before she said quietly, “I know it’s him, Sylvie.”

Unlike Knight, I’d told Charlene his name.

She kept talking. “Knew it was him yesterday when he came over and introduced himself. I played it cool though I have no clue how since I was,” she leaned in and hissed, “freaking out. Are you okay?”

I nodded and moved further into the kitchen, murmuring, “I’m cool.”

“Sylvie –”

I turned to her. “He has to matter for it to matter and, babe, he quit mattering a long time ago.”

This was the conclusion I’d come to the night before. I was off my game because I was letting him get to me, like he meant something when he didn’t, not anymore.

So I had to let that go and when I did that, I would get a partner who knew what he was doing. I would work with him to make Knight’s troubles go away. In the meantime, I could jump a hot guy whenever I felt like it.

This was not a bad deal.

The rest was done and had been a long time.

I just had to get over the shock of it and I’d done that over bourbon and pool with a bunch of g*y guys and drag queens which was the best way to go about that. Or one of them.

“Sylvie, when you told me –” Charlene started.

I stepped close to her. “When I told you it was my birthday. That was our day. That was the day. And I was drunk. Being over it doesn’t mean being over it. Shit like that,” I shrugged, “you never get over. But you can deal. I’m gonna deal. He lives in Arizona, has kids and a life down there and he’s a f**king great lay. You know me. I don’t get involved but I do have fun. So I won’t get involved but I will have fun.”

“The guys you pick up, honey, they aren’t Tucker Creed.”

I shrugged again. “They aren’t anyone. Neither is he. A memory come back to life, who’ll eventually become another memory. Might as well make it a good one this time.”

She bit her lip looking doubtful before she let it go to whisper, “Be careful.”

I grinned. “Careful’s my middle name.”

She rolled her eyes at my blatant lie then shook her head and, doing so, caught sight of the microwave.

“Crap!” she snapped. “Right!” she called loudly to the house at large. “Car! School! We gotta go!”

She moved into the dining room where Theo was chewing on something, diapered ass to the floor. I moved there, straight to Leslie who was sitting on a booster seat at the dining room table, coloring. Creed and Adam appeared in the kitchen as we were heading out.

We got the kids in the car and I was still being a goof with Leslie when I heard Creed ask Charlene, “Sylvie got a set of keys to your house?”

I gave Leslie one last smile and touched her nose with my finger before pulling out of her car door as Charlene answered, “Yeah.”

“I’ll change the windows out today. Tonight, I’ll deal with the faucet and look at your car,” he told her. “Good for you?”

“Definitely, Tucker, thank you,” she replied and her gratitude was genuine. Dan was gone but even when he was around Dan was a lazy-ass motherfucker. Creed, for Charlene, was a godsend.

I slammed the car door, moved to Adam’s window and pressed my hand to it before I bent and pressed my mouth to it and blew my lips wide making him and Leslie giggle.

After doing this, I moved around the hood of her car to the other side where Creed was standing as Charlene went on. “And thanks for the donuts.”

I watched Creed jerk up his chin.

“Later, babe,” I called as I walked by him.

“Later, honey,” Charlene called back. I lifted a hand and kept going as I heard her say, “Bye, Tucker. Thanks again.”

“No problem,” he muttered and I knew he was following me.

I stopped at my front door, Creed at my side, and I waved as they drove away.

Badasses, apparently, didn’t wave because Creed didn’t but when I turned to look up at him I saw that they watched cars drive away while smiling.

“Your agenda for the day?” I asked and he looked down at me.

“First up, drugstore,” his smooth, rough voice answered, giving me a quiver.

“Excellent,” I muttered. “Next?”

“Got a lead yesterday. Following it. You?”

“A lead?” I prompted and he shook his head.

“Let me see if it pans out, Sylvie.”

Oh shit. Oh no. Oh shit.

That could mean bad things if he had a lead on one of the guys.

I buried that and nodded. “Okay, me. Nair.”

“He doesn’t get out of bed before noon,” Creed shared.