Free His Lover's Little Secret by Andrea Laurence

blueberries.”
    “Nope.” Gavin smiled. “I haven’t had breakfast.” He let Jared return to his blocks. “I’ll be right back, big guy.”
    He followed her into the kitchen, leaning against the entryway. The kitchen was too small for both of them to be in there and get anything done. She tried to ignore his physical presence and how much of the room he took up without even entering, but she failed. The sight of him in those tight jeans was more than she could take. Her body instantly reacted to his nearness, her mouth going dry and her nipples pebbling against the thin fabric of her T-shirt.
    She spun to face the stove before he could notice and decided to focus on pancakes, not the sexy man lurking nearby. Eyeing the batter, she decided she needed a larger batch to feed a man of his size. “So what brings you here this morning?”
    Gavin watched her fold in another handful of dried blueberries. “I wanted to make up for yesterday.”
    Sabine tried not to react. She was happy that he was making the effort, but failing Jared and then making a grand gesture to appease his conscience was a dangerous cycle. She’d rather he just be present the first time. “How’s that?”
    “I saw in the paper that the Big Apple Circus is here. I got tickets for this afternoon.”
    Just as she’d thought. She had no problems with going to the circus, but he didn’t ask her. He didn’t call to see if that was something they might want to do. What if Jared was petrified of clowns? Or if they had other plans today? Gavin just bought the tickets and assumed that everything would go the way he’d planned.
    But— he was trying, she reminded herself. “Jared would probably enjoy that. What time do we need to leave for the show?”
    “Well,” Gavin said, “that’s only part of the surprise. We aren’t leaving. You’re staying.”
    Sabine looked up from the griddle. “What do you mean?”
    “I just got tickets for Jared and me. I thought you might enjoy an afternoon to yourself. I even brought you some painting supplies.”
    That explained the stuff he brought in with him. She’d been so thrown off by his unannounced arrival that she hadn’t questioned it yet. She supposed that she should be excited and grateful, but instead, her stomach ached with worry. Gavin was taking her son someplace without her. She didn’t really like the sound of that. He didn’t know anything about children. What if Jared got sick? Or scared? Did Gavin even know that Jared wasn’t fully potty trained yet? Just the idea of him changing dirty Pull-Ups started a rumble of nervous laughter in her chest that she fought down.
    “I don’t think that’s a good idea,” she managed to say.
    Gavin’s dark brow drew together in consternation. “Why not? You said you wanted me to be there. To be involved.”
    “It’s been less than a week, Gavin. You’ve spent a couple hours with him, sure, but are you ready to take care of him on your own for a day?” Sabine turned back to the stove and flipped over the pancakes. She grabbed one of Jared’s superhero plates and slid a couple tiny pancakes onto it beside the slices of banana she’d already cut up.
    “You don’t think I can handle it?”
    She sighed heavily. Ignoring him, she poured some blueberry syrup into the small bowl built into the dish and grabbed a sippy cup with milk from the refrigerator. She brushed past him to go into the living room. Jared had a tiny plastic table and chair where he could eat. She set down his breakfast and called him over. Once he was settled, she turned back to look at Gavin. He was still standing in the doorway to the kitchen looking handsome and irritated all at once.
    “I don’t know,” she admitted. “I don’t know if you can handle it or not. That’s the problem. We don’t really know one another that well.”
    Gavin crossed his arms over his chest and leaned against the door frame. His biceps bulged against the constraints of the shirt, drawing her