“Is this supposed to be toast?” I asked Ryan, holding up the charred bread with a grimace. “Did you make it on the surface of the sun?”
“You’re welcome to make your own, princess,” he drawled insolently.
I stared at his back, regretting that it was now covered in yet another sweater. After our quick but mutually satisfying orgasms, we’d showered—sadly, separately—and started making breakfast with our limited options. Apparently, at some point we’d fallen back into our normal snarky rapport.
“Fine, I will,” I said, shoving Ryan to the side to get to the counter. “Otherwise, I’ll die of hunger.”
He rolled his eyes at me. “I’ve been cooking for myself for over a decade, and I’m still alive,” he argued, biting into his sad excuse for a meal with a grin.
“You can’t seriously consider this cooking. Besides, I know for a fact that you live on takeout and leftovers. My brother talks about it all the time. He once considered hiring you a personal chef.”
I wasn’t kidding either. Jeremy had been highly concerned when he had stopped over one day to find Ryan’s refrigerator empty of everything but beer. Even for a confirmed bachelor he was terrible at taking care of himself. And Ryan was successful enough to afford the help.
“This coming from the woman who managed to mess up pasta last night,” he retorted. “Pasta! It’s just boiling noodles in water. How hard canthatbe?”
“Excuse me? I didnotmess up the spaghetti. It was perfect,” I retorted indignantly. Okay, it definitely hadn’t beenperfect, but it had been just fine. . . I was almost certain. I had eaten the meal, hadn’t I? And Ryan’s plate was empty when he’d returned it.
He smirked at me. “Sure, it was perfect if you like your pasta extra chewy.”
“Maybe I do. Or maybe I just don’t nitpick every little thing to death. You are such a snob,” I huffed.
It was an old argument between us. I tended to be much more laid back about things, but Ryan preferred them ‘just so’. I think he liked the feeling of being in control, but even understanding the reason behind his behavior didn’t make it less annoying.
“Oh, now I’m a snob?” he shot back. “Because I like my food edible? You’re insane.”
I raised my eyebrows at the blackened toast in his hand, and crossed my arms over my chest. Ryan looked down at the charred bread, then back at me. We glared at each other for a moment, and then he started chuckling.
“It’s really not that bad this way, you know.”
“Nice try,” I said, doing my best to hide my smile. “It’s terrible and you know it. Just let me make us something that’s not burnt to a crisp.”
“This is the worst case of the blind leading the blind ever,” he muttered under his breath, but he stepped back and watched me move around the kitchen.
I grabbed what I needed from the fridge, and started making a legitimate breakfast, as Ryan crowded back behind me. When he tried to reach for something, I smacked his hand with the spoon I was holding and shooed him away. If he could take care of the generator and other mechanical/electrical stuff, I could handle the food. As long he stopped complaining about it.
Ryan moved over to the coffee pot, pulled down two mugs from the cupboard, and poured us each a cup of the steaming brew. “You’re kind of bossy, you know that?”
I shrugged as I beat some eggs to a froth in a bowl. “Deal with it.”
He withdrew creamer from the refrigerator—brushing a hand across my ass as he walked past in a way that I couldn’t tell if the touch was intentional, or not. He added a splash of cream to each of our mugs before setting mine on the counter beside the stove, where I was heating up butter in a pan. Then he came up behind me, the warmth of his body too close to mine.
I glanced over my shoulder, finding him peering over mine. “Can I help you?” I asked him, trying to sound annoyed, when I was completely the opposite.
“Nope, just watching thepro,” he teased. “I need to learn to cook, right?”
He closed that last bit of distance between us, until I could smell his aftershave and fabric softener and his groin pressed temptingly against my ass. Even though my body immediately reacted—my nipples stiffening and my pussy tingling—I did my best to ignore his attempts to distract me while I scrambled the eggs in the pan.
But when his hands slid around my waist and pushed into the top of my yoga pants, I dropped the spatula with a huff—which turned into a whimper of need when his fingers dragged through my already damp pussy.
“What are you doing?” I asked breathlessly. “Don’t you want to eat?”
“Oh, I definitely do.” he murmured, nipping at my earlobe while strumming my sensitive clit until my knees began to shake.
I had just a second to turn the burner off before he swung me around and dropped me unceremoniously onto the kitchen table. A hot, wicked smile curved his lips as he pushed my knees apart to make room for him to stand in between.
“I’m going to have to throw those eggs away now, you know,” I said in exasperation.
Ryan didn’t respond. He just pulled my shirt over my head and went to work on the bra I’d been wearing for approximately thirty minutes. I didn’t know why I had even bothered putting one on.