“Why not?” I laugh. “It was amazing. Is there anything Nana can’t make?”
“No,” he agrees. “But you could’ve had . . .” He shakes his head again, harder this time. “You’ve been cleaning my fucking office and you’re practically royalty.”
“Oh, I am not,” I huff. “That’s tabloid bullshit.”
“I’m a little shocked, okay?” he laughs. “This does explain a lot.”
“Like what?”
“Like you just paying for MaryAnn and Dave’s cars like it was nothing,” he says slowly. “You could’ve just bought them new ones.”
“I couldn’t because Graham would ask way too many questions,” I laugh. “But, yes, now you see why I didn’t want you calling the police on me over Daisy. It could’ve been a big deal.”
He nods, standing up. Wiping his palms down his jeans, he takes a deep, labored breath.
“This doesn’t change anything,” I tell him, panic starting to seep in my tone. “I just wanted to be honest.”
“I’m glad you did. Honesty is the best policy, huh?”
Even though he’s the one who said it, I have concerns that maybe he doesn’t necessarily prescribe to that theory. There’s a niggle in my stomach that worries me.
“I always go for honesty,” I say. “So you can say goodnight or we can watch a movie. But I’m not discussing the Landry thing anymore.”
“Good. Because I don’t want to discuss it either. Let’s go get some root beer and come back and watch a movie. That is, if you want to cuddle.”
“Are you any good at cuddling?”
His eyes darken. “I’ll let you be the judge of that.”
“WELL,” HE SAYS, STRETCHING his arms overhead. My body just moves along with his because I have no intention of getting up. He smells too good. Feels too sturdy against my cheek. Makes all the butterflies swarm like it’s the first day of spring in my belly. “Am I a good cuddler or what?”
“The best.”
“I was afraid I forgot how,” he yawns, scooping me up into his arms again.
“How long has it been since you cuddled someone?”
He moves us side to side in a breezy kind of way, like we’re on a hammock somewhere warm with no cares in the world. “I don’t know.”
“Last week? Month? Six months?” I prod. “Not that I care, just curious.”
“I’ve been with women in the last six months. But no cuddling.”
Burying my face in his shirt, I smile against his torso. He chuckles, his chest rumbling. “You like that?”
“Of course I like that,” I giggle. “Can I ask you a question?”
“Sure.”
“Why me?” I ask, pulling away.
He furrows a brow. “Why you what?”
“Why are you cuddling with me? If it’s not your thing.”
“I didn’t say it wasn’t my thing,” he says, tilting his chin to the ceiling. “I just said I hadn’t done it.”
“So . . . why me?”
I think he’s going to blow me off. If I poke too hard, he changes the subject or turns it around on me. This time, however, he seems to consider my question. “I don’t really know. Whatever I say will make me sound like a pussy.”
“I think you’re a pussy anyway, so . . .”
He grins, cinching my waist and moving me so I’m straddling him. We face each other. “There was something about you from the night I met you. You were a little mouthy and I was a little mad, but there was this thing in your eyes that I couldn’t stop thinking about.”
“So it wasn’t my ass? Peck said it was my ass.”
Laughing, he digs his fingers deeper into my hips. “Your ass is perfect, but that’s the thing—that’s not what I was thinking about that night or the night after or the night after that. It was that thing. Like there was more to you than some drunk girl smashing my headlight out.”
“Maybe there is, maybe there isn’t,” I tease.
“Oh, there is. I’ve seen it now. You’re kind,” he whispers, pressing a kiss to my sternum. “And thoughtful,” he says, laying a series of kisses from my collarbone up to my ear. “And so fucking sexy.”
The last words come out as a growl, making me tremble in his hands. He nips at my lobe, his breath hot against the sensitive flesh at the back of my neck.
“Are you trying to keep me from asking you more questions?” I breathe, melting into him.
“I’m trying to make you forget about whoever cuddled you last.”
“Done.” Moving my head to the side, allowing him all the access he wants, I rock back and forth as his cock grows beneath me. I can feel it moving, lengthening, the urgency of his kisses growing more frantic as he lets himself unwind. His tongue draws a line to my mouth, his eyes flashing open as our mouths meet in a slow, delicious union.
He kisses me with the ease of a man who knows what he’s doing and with the hunger of a man who needs more. His hands roam my body—squeezing my ass, skirting up my shirt and pinching my nipples until they harden between his fingers, cupping my cheeks as he holds me still and kisses me like a cool drink of water on a hot day.