It had been hard as hell to let Aurora out of my bed this morning. She looked so damn perfect twisted up in my sheets, but she looked even better without them. I groaned and tried to think about anything boring to stem my growing erection. I didn’t need to spend the day trying to work with a hard-on.
When I felt at least partially in control, I exited my car and headed for my office. Chad had opened and was already behind the front desk, working at his computer. He mumbled, “Hello,” and handed me a mug of coffee as I walked by. “First appointment will be here in twenty.”
I shook my head in amusement before I took a sip of the steaming brew. Chad was a funny kid. He was the best assistant I’d ever had, but he was from a small town in Arizona and was on the shyer side. He buried himself in work and didn’t say much, which had made me hesitate when I first hired him, but I’d followed my gut instinct. He proved his worth the first time he was confronted with a high-pressure situation, i.e. an extremely angry couple who’d come in for our services. He’d managed to defuse the situation and get everyone acting civilized before they even stepped into my office. The kid had a knack for calming those around him, which was what made his reaction to Aurora all the funnier. If I hadn’t been so distracted by her, I might have recognized the humor in it before now.
After getting settled at my desk, I woke up my computer and returned to a website I’d been perusing the day before. I’d found what I was looking for; I just needed to make the purchase and have the order put on rush. If I hadn’t been so determined to have it be perfect for my woman, I could have had it that much sooner. But it needed it to be as special and unique as Aurora.
A few minutes later, shouting in the front office caught my attention. Chad rushed through my door with a harried expression and snapped, “There’s a shouting guy in your waiting room, Mr. Scott. I tried to talk—”
He’d barely gotten the words out when a man stormed into my office. Chad grumbled and glared at him, then threw up his hands and marched out, muttering under his breath about manners.
I leaned back in my chair and crossed my arms over my chest, staring down the behemoth of a man fuming in front of me. “Knox Dawson, I presume?”
Surprise flickered in his blue eyes for a moment before they shuttered, and he went back to a deadly expression.
“Aurora showed me a picture of the two of you on her phone,” I explained despite the fact that he hadn’t asked. What had actually happened was that I noticed the picture of her wrapped up in another man’s arms on her lock screen last night and demanded to know who the asshole holding my woman was so that I could kill him. In my defense, the siblings looked nothing like each other except for the blue eyes he shared with my girl. Luckily, it had only taken another orgasm to get her to forgive me.
“I’m going to need you to give me an explanation as to why you’d be dropping my sister off at work the morning after her car was left in the parking garage all night.” Knox seethed after another few moments of silence. He stepped forward and bent over my desk, leaning on clenched fists. It was a tactic that probably scared the living shit out of most people. I could see where Aurora learned it from, and it almost made me smile. “And if it’s anything other than you saw her walking to work and gave her a ride,” he continued, “I’m going to rearrange that face of yours in the unlikely event that someone ever digs up your body from where I’ve buried it.”
I slowly stood from my chair before bending over to mirror his position. He had a couple of inches and probably twenty pounds on me, so my show of confidence caused another flicker of surprise and begrudging respect.
“I’m not going to lie to you, Knox. So you need to ask yourself if you really want me to answer that question.”
Knox’s eyes narrowed, and his gaze bored into mine until he finally blew out a breath and stood. “Fuck,” he grunted. He put his hands behind his head and walked in circle as he exhaled a calming breath. “What is it with my sisters finding the only fuckers on the planet who aren’t afraid of me?”
He sounded genuinely forlorn, and I had to suppress a laugh. When he faced me again, I shook my head and gave him a pointed look. “You and I both know that’s not what you want for them. Or you wouldn’t make the effort to try to scare us off.”