Free A Trade For Good by Bria Daly Page B

outlet, and
probably her first. Peter's family had been extremely supportive in
every way possible, but they were his family after all, and she
didn’t want to burden his mother who had probably aged ten years in
the few months since her son left.
    Sera asked Jeff about his family, if
he had ever been married, and about his nieces and nephews who he
needed little prompting over to talk about. They were having a
great time, and Sera was surprised at how comfortable she was and
how good it felt to sit back and talk with no
interruptions.
    As if on cue, Sera's phone rang and
made them both jump. It was her mother in law. Poor thing, Emma had
been going for a while now and she wasn't sure if Emma had a fever
or was just overheating from screaming at the top of her
lungs.
    Jeff picked up Sera's purse from the
other seat across from them and left enough money to feed an entire
family on the table. "Let's go." he said without waiting for her to
answer.
    Sera was still on the phone when Jeff
was already standing up and holding his hand out to help her up.
She mouthed a thank you while still listening to her apologetic
mother in law, and got up to leave.

Chapter 10
     
    Jeff led Sera to his car after waving
good byes to the waitress and hostess who were conspiratorially
smiling, and opened the door and helped her in. The waitresses were
probably hoping they were going home together.
    He asked her where her mother in law
lived and realized he was very familiar with the area because of
two houses they had completed a block away this past
month.
    The trip to Marion's house was not
filled with the conversation they had shared at the restaurant over
dinner. In fact, they did very little talking, except for a few
directions from Sera to her mother in law's house as they got
closer. Jeff only spoke when he was asked a question, and Sera
wasn't asking much.
    Jeff's problem was that he had had a
great time with Sera. In fact, he couldn't remember having such a
good time just talking to a woman or being with a woman without
planning on sleeping with her.
    The concept was confusing to him. He
enjoyed talking to his sisters and his mother, as well as the wives
of some of his friends, but he knew this was not the same. He truly
enjoyed Sera's company. He had laughed, had been understanding and
sympathetic, he had been upset for all of what she was going
through. However, he also knew damn well that when he was sitting
there talking and listening to her, absolutely no brotherly
thoughts had crossed his mind.
    The woman was trouble. She
was drop dead gorgeous, she was smart, funny, efficient, mature,
great company, and had he mentioned drop
dead gorgeous?
    Those were the positive attributes. On
the other side of the coin there was the fact that she was married,
had four children, her situation with her husband emotionally and
financially was completely unstable, and she worked for
him.
    There was no way in the world he could
or even wanted to get involved with a woman like this.
    Jeff turned his eyes away from the
road for a moment just to convince himself that he should stay as
far away from this woman as possible. He turned to see her profile
as she looked out of the passenger window even though at this time
of the night there was very little for her to see.
    She had put her hair up with a
makeshift knot somehow, that showed off the smooth white skin of
her neck. The contrast in the color of her skin and the bright red
of her silky sweater top made her even more appealing.
    Who was he kidding? Baggage or no
baggage, this woman was someone he could easily fall for, but
couldn't and shouldn't; he wouldn’t.
    Four kids? Jeff loved kids, but they
had to kind of grow on you. It was almost like working out at the
gym, you start out with a couple of pounds, you don't start off
with the 200 lbs. barbell. You have to work your way up. Besides,
if the relationship didn’t work out, there was much more at stake,
too many people hurt along the way.
    I