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didn’t know how to answer Jack. So I didn’t.
    He patted my shoulder. “Thanks, Sean.”
    I walked away feeling as if I’d just been warned, but I just wasn’t sure what the warning was about.
    ***
    The gym was a little busier tonight than it’d been recently. Delaney was already there, working on the heavy bag when I came in. Like the night before, I watched from the doorway for a moment. She had good form. Her arms were up where they should have been, her punches landing accurately. She was clearly learning what I’d been teaching her.
    She was wearing those yoga pants again, a white t-shirt hanging low over her ass. This one wasn’t transparent, but there was something about the loose way in which it fit that still made my balls tighten. Or maybe it was just seeing her, just knowing what was under there, the memory of touching her that made my thoughts go places they shouldn’t. I never should have kissed her; I never should have allowed myself to touch or be touched.
    Jack would kill me if he knew. And I should respect that; I should respect his wishes.
    But how do you ignore this sort of instant attraction?
    I dropped my bag on a bench and crossed to where she was working up a fine sweat, her forehead shining in the dim light. She had her blond hair pulled back into a ponytail again. It was pulled tight across her head with the tail itself dancing with every move she made. I slid my hands over her arms, sliding them down to her wrists, not to correct her, but because I couldn’t resist the touch. She stopped moving, tension flashing through her body but then disappearing as she leaned back into me.
    We stood that way for a long moment, then she twisted away.
    “I’m really not in the mood for this today,” she said softly, cutting through my chest with each syllable.
    “Okay.”
    “I, um…” Her eyes came up slowly to meet mine. “Would you go to dinner with me? Would you let me buy you dinner?”
    My eyebrows rose. “Yeah?”
    “I’m hungry. And I feel like I owe you something…”
    “You don’t owe me anything.”
    “Then maybe I’d just like to get to know you a little.”
    I should have liked that idea, but this little thought in the back of my head was like an alarm going off.
    You don’t want to know me. I’m not a good man.
    But the idea of spending more time with her, just staring at her across a dinner table, was too much to resist.
    I inclined my head. “Okay.”
    She smiled brightly. “Great. Then…” She hesitated, glancing down at herself. “I guess we should go somewhere casual.”
    “There’s a little place down the street I know. I think you’d like it.”
    “Yeah?”
    I gestured for her to lead the way. She smiled, happy to be leaving with me. Again, that thought flashed through my mind: You don’t want to know me. I’ll just let you down.
    I grabbed my bag, and we walked side by side. There was a heavy silence between us for a block or two, but then we both started to talk at the same time.
    “How do you—?”
    “I’m sure you—”
    She laughed, pausing in her step to look up at me. “Sorry,” she said softly. “I was just wondering how you know this neighborhood so well.”
    “My father grew up around here. He used to bring us down here, show us around. Even trained us at the gym.”
    “Us?”
    “I have a couple of brothers.”
    She nodded, beginning to walk again. “I always wanted siblings, but my mom said she’d done it once. She wasn’t interested in doing it again.”
    “She got perfection in you.”
    She nodded, a wry smile twisting her lips. “That’s what she said, but I think she just didn’t want to go through the whole pregnancy thing again. Too uncomfortable.”
    I thought about Stacy, her body swollen with Killian’s child. It looked painful, but she was always smiling, always so excited when the baby moved. She clearly didn’t mind being pregnant.
    “Does that frighten you away from the idea of doing it yourself?”
    “Everyone