This house was different from the one they’d shared with Sarah. It was more of a home. It had that lived-in feel. A happy feel. Jeez, now he was just being ridiculous.
“She’s getting dressed,” Sloan said, striding into the room.
Wasn’t that a shame?
He stopped himself from saying the words out loud. Just. He and Sloan had come to some sort of truce, and he had no desire to ruin it by expressing his admiration for Kinley’s curves. His cock, already hard, throbbed with need as his memory stirred. It might be the only time he ever got to see her naked. Unless he joined Club Decadence. But he wasn’t sure he was that much of a masochist to put himself through that. To see her, to watch them together, to know they would never be his.
He might have tried to convince Sloan that his interest in Kinley had been a brief thing, but he wasn’t fooling himself. He could fall in love with her. Was halfway there. And Sloan loved her. It was perfect. Except for one thing, of course. He wasn’t a part of it.
“I might have scared her a little. I scared myself,” Sloan admitted. He pulled two beers from the fridge. James didn’t remind him he didn’t drink beer. He found himself needing it, because Sloan hadn’t been the only one frightened.
“I guess we overreacted. If this has been going on for a month, there were probably plenty of times for him to strike.” Sloan grimaced, looking sick.
“Plenty of times for who to strike? What’s going on?”
James swung around at Kinley’s voice. Damn, he was off his game if he hadn’t heard her step into the room. He looked over at Sloan, this was his woman. His sub.
“Your stalker,” Sloan stated bluntly.
James winced, watching as Kinley grew pale.
“You might have eased into that a bit more slowly, big guy,” he said quietly, wishing he had the right to go to her, to hug her, to tell her it was all going to be all right.
Sloan seemed to realize his blunder and strode over to her, drawing her against him and holding her tightly. But Kinley proved once more how strong she was. It only took her a few seconds before she pulled back, hands on her hips to stare first at Sloan then him.
“All right, one of you start talking. Now.”
Kinley sat on the sofa and watched as both men looked at each other. She was glad they seemed to be getting along, and neither of them had new bruises. But she wanted to know what the hell was going on. What stalker?
“I don’t have a stalker,” she muttered.
“We think you might,” James said, almost apologetically. But then his face hardened, and she shivered slightly at the cold look. “And when I find him, he’s dead.”
She wasn’t certain he’d meant to say that out loud. Sloan sent him a sharp look then sat on the coffee table in front of where she sat. He reached out and took her hand in his.
“Kinley, James didn’t send those flowers.”
James snorted. “As if I’d do something so amateurish. Those notes were ridiculous.”
“But if James didn’t send them who did?”
Sloan just watched her. She looked from him to James, who stood a few feet behind him.
“That’s just it, darlin’, we don’t know.”
“Until you do know, you should treat him as a threat,” James added. “She shouldn’t go anywhere alone.”
Her head buzzed as she struggled to keep up. “Wait, so someone has been sending me flowers anonymously? Why?”
Both men looked serious and tense.
“We don’t know why,” Sloan said gently.
“From the sound of those notes, he’s a secret admirer.”
“I have a secret admirer? That’s ridiculous.”
“You are beautiful, sexy, and kind,” James said impatiently. “What’s so ridiculous about it?”