“I’m aware,” he interrupted. “But you’re not my mother.” He set his coffee cup on the arm of the chair and turned toward me, making the space between us more intimate. “My relationship with Jared is important to me. I’m closer to him than I am to any of my brothers, and that’s not something I want to lose, but…fuck, Darcy. I haven’t been able to talk myself out of wanting you since I was nineteen years old. And after last night and this morning… I don’t know how you can expect me to.”

“Tommy, I—”

“Nope. It’ll be impossible at this point.” He shook his head and coughed out a laugh filled with complete disbelief. “Now that I’ve had a hint of your taste and heard your soft, growly, kitten moans? There’s absolutely no fucking way that I’m going to be able to stop wanting to hear those sounds or wanting to be inside of you so—”

“Are you sure I look okay?” a familiar voice said just beyond the giant elephant ear leaves that hid us from view.

“Baby, you look perfect. Gorgeous. What are you so worried about, anyway?” Jared said. Brandi and Jared were coming up the back walkway.

“We should probably drop this subject for now. Or permanently,” I said, then practically jumped to my feet. “Everyone will be here soon, and we can’t… We shouldn’t—”

Tommy tipped his head and gave me a pained look. “Darcy,” he whispered.

And damn it, I should have never given him permission to use my given name because hearing it whispered from his lips made denying this dark, needy thing growing between us even harder to ignore.

He reached for me and grabbed my wrist in a loose hold, stroking the pad of his thumb over my pulse point. “Can we please continue this conversation later?”

“What would be the point in that?” I asked, trying not to be swayed by his gentle, reverent touch. “We can’t have each other, so what’s the point of talking like this?”

He let me go and sank back into the chair. “You’re right,” he murmured.

The look on his face damn near crushed me. “Tommy—”

“Hey, ma! And Tommy…what’s going on?” Jared asked, glancing between the two of us as he climbed the stairs with Brandi trailing behind him. “Everything okay?”

“Of course!” I said, pulling him into a quick hug and a kiss. “Just sharing a cup of coffee and some conversation.”

“I was apologizing for letting things get out of control last night,” Tommy volunteered.

Jared cringed. “Yeah, sorry about that, ma. We didn’t cause too much damage, did we? I really don’t remember much.”