Free The Trouble With J.J. by Tami Hoag

started to giggle.
    “I think we’ve had too much wine.”
    “Naw.” He smiled, relieved. He rested hisforehead against hers. “Not quite. I’m sober enough to know that if I got you to drink a little more, I could call a blitz and rush your pass defense.”
    “What would happen then?” she asked, her voice a husky purr she didn’t even recognize.
    “Sack.”
    “Sack the quarterback? But you’re the quarterback.”
    “Yeah,” he said, grinning lazily. “In this game sacking the quarterback takes on a whole new meaning.”
    “I see,” she said with a low chuckle. A pleasantly languid sensation of anticipation ambled over her. “So are you going to ply me with liquor?”
    “Nope.”
    A mixture of disappointment and embarrassment flushed Genna’s cheeks as Jared helped her up from the floor. He probably thought she was desperate and wanted him to get her drunk and make love to her on the ceramic tile. Her aching body told her he wasn’t far from wrong.
    Jared brushed her hair out of her eyes and gave her a tender smile. “When we make love I want us both sober. Makes for a better memory and a lot less guilt.”
    “Well,” she said, pretending to be in a huff, her nose in the air. “You’re not my type anyway.”
    He chuckled and tweaked her cheek. “Sure, Gen, just like you’re not my type.”
    “I’m not,” she said reasonably.
    “We’ll see.”
    The sound of a car pulling up to the curb came through the screen door.
    “That’s probably Amy with Alyssa,” Jared said, checking the thin gold watch on his wrist. “I’d better go.”
    Genna wanted to say something to him about what had happened between them, but her brain was jumbled with words that wouldn’t sort into any kind of order. What was one supposed to say to a man after a romantic interlude on the kitchen floor?
    Jared smiled down at her knowing she was confused. She’d come right out and said she didn’t like him, didn’t want him, then turned to Play-Doh in his arms. He gave her a wink. “See ya at school tomorrow, Teach.”
    Genna leaned against the doorjamb as she watched him cross her yard and his and scoop his daughter up into his arms when he reached the front sidewalk. There was a hell of a lot more to that man than punk hair and a Jack Nicholson grin.She had to admit he was fun to be with. Unsettling, but fun. And he kissed like a thief. He’d stolen every ounce of strength and willpower from her so she had to prop herself up in the doorway, or melt into a puddle on the kitchen floor.
    What did it all mean?
    Life was meant for living, Genna .
    Have a summer fling .
    That seemed to be what he was thinking too. Modern adults did that sort of thing all the time, she reminded herself. He didn’t have to be Mr. Right for her to have fun with him. She could have a relationship with a man without thinking how his name would look engraved on a wedding invitation, couldn’t she?
    “He’s still not for you, Genna,” her mouth said, but her brain wasn’t convinced so easily anymore.

FIVE
    “B EFORE I COME in I want to make one thing perfectly clear,” Amy announced through Genna’s screen door. “You are not sending any food home with me. I’ve gained five pounds since J.J. moved in. I don’t see why your anxieties should go to my hips.”
    “I don’t have any anxieties,” Genna insisted as she dribbled icing on a pound cake.
    “Oh, really?” Amy let herself in. She poured a cup of coffee and sat down at the dining room table. “What are you trying to do, then, put Torino’s Bakery out of business single-handedly?”
    “I don’t know what you mean.”
    “I mean,” Amy droned on, “no one in the neighborhood has had to turn on their oven since you came back from vacation. And let me ask you this, why haven’t you gained any weight? What are you, a space alien?”
    “I’m ignoring you, Amy.”
    “I’m calling the Enquirer . ‘My Neighbor Is a Space Alien.’” Her hand blocked out the imaginary