Ginny carried her plate and juice over to the table. “You can be very frustrating sometimes, Gavin.”
“Same.”
Choosing a clean pair of jeans, a T-shirt, and a pair of grey boxer briefs from the now empty duffle bag, he rose from the table. “I’m going to take a quick shower. If someone knocks on the door, come and get me.”
Ginny gave him a mocking salute. “Yes, sir.”
Pausing, he speared his hand through her hair to tilt her head backward. “Remind me to spank you when we go to bed.”
“Dream on, wild man.” Taking the last bite of her sandwich, she lightly waved her hand off as if brushing what he said away.
“Are you sure you’ve only been spanked once in your life?”
“Twice … after last night,” she contradicted him.
The few taps he had given her wouldn’t be considered a true spanking in any universe, other than the one in Ginny’s mind.
Bending down, he pressed a hard kiss to her lips, but Ginny wasn’t in a kissing mood and attempted to pull her mouth away. Forestalling her, he used his tongue to part her lips, delving inside to give her something else to think about besides her upcoming spanking.
He gave her a gloating smile when he broke off the kiss. “I’ll be back in ten.”
“Take your time.”
“Tired of me already?” he quipped.
“I could never get tired of you.”
The sincerity in her comment had him clutching her hair in his fist, straining her neck back farther. He had been told that by too many women to count, but it was the first time he fucking believed it.
“Gavin?” Ginny wrapped her fingers around his wrist but didn’t try to pull out of his grasp.
“Ginny, don’t ever try to play me.”
“I won’t.”
“I’m not happy you didn’t confide in me about being Evangeline and T.A.’s sister. I’m giving you the benefit of the doubt when I swore never to do that shit again. You have no idea what I’m capable of. If I find out you’re blowing wind up my ass—”
“I’m not. I swear on my father’s grave I would never lie about my feelings for you. Ever. At different times, I might not have been able to tell you the full truth about some things, but never, at any point, have I lied to you about how I feel about you.”
Satisfied, he released her hair and started to let his hand drop, but Ginny retained her hold on his wrist.
“You like me more than a little, don’t you?”
He wasn’t ready to discuss his feelings with her, despite the moment of clarity he had when flying out of Treepoint. He had put his ring on a woman’s finger before, called a woman his, but he had never felt as vulnerable as he did with Ginny. Reaper no longer had a heart to place in a woman’s hands again, and the vulnerability she arose in him was akin to Achilles wearing boots had he been forewarned about his death. Taylor hadn’t exactly betrayed him. She might not have waited for him, but he didn’t believe she hadn’t fucked around on him while they had been together. Even if she had, he didn’t think it would have been a deal breaker from marrying her. Sexual faithfulness had never been at the top of his priority list when he decided to get married. Rider and he had been the ones to come up with the club’s rules deciding on how women earned votes to become members. They’d been full of youthful arrogance and fresh out of the service, wanting a smorgasbord of pussy rather than having a monogamous relationship.
Reaper jerked his wrist free. “I’m going to get that shower.”
“Go ahead. I’ll take mine when you’re finished.” Her back was ramrod straight when she got up to carry her dishes to the sink. “Oh … Gavin, just so you know, and you can’t say this is coming out of the blue … my love for you will never be shaken. However, you can only shake a tree so long before it stops giving fruit.”
Reaper turned on his heel. “What in the fuck does that mean?”
A hurt look crossed her face. “To me, it’s self-explanatory. You can figure it out for yourself since you don’t want to answer my question,” she snapped.
“Then, since it doesn’t make any sense to me, and probably never will—as I will never be able to figure out the way your minds works—I’ll just wait until you decide to explain it to me.”
“Then I hope that day never comes, because if it does, it won’t matter to me anymore.”
Inwardly cursing to himself as he went into the bedroom, he strode to the closet instead of the bathroom. Going inside and shutting the door, he dropped the contents in his hands to the floor, then knelt and blindly began skillfully dismantling the duffle bag. He’d expected his things would be searched, and he hadn’t been disappointed. Several items had been removed, but he was hoping the fuckers hadn’t figured out the hidden features that Razer incorporated in the bag.