by Lauren Dane
He sighed. “I’ve tried to make allowances for you. You’re Raven, so you get a pass on a lot of shit other people would get called on. I love Elise Sorenson, got that? I love her and I love her kid. She’s strong and smart; she doesn’t rely on me at all. In fact, I beg her to let me do more all the time and she won’t. We get into fights over it because she wants to be self-sufficient. She is exciting. Beautiful, willful and the best mother I know. You’re being fucking petty right now and I don’t like it.”
“Love? Are you fucking kidding me? You can’t love her, Brody. You love puppies and tacos. You love your family. You don’t love a chick like her. As for exciting? Come on! She’s a ballerina. She’s past her pull-by date and she’s loaded down with drama. Is that what attracts you? The drama? Now that Erin is happy and settled, you need to have a chick in your life with issues?”
“I’ve had a chick in my life with issues.” He gave her a pointed look she chose to ignore. “Take a long, hard look at yourself. I’m so beyond tired right now, and I’m hard-pressed to understand what your issue is. We aren’t together. We haven’t been for years now. Long before Elise came into the picture. I love her. I didn’t go into this thing expecting that; we both said we were too busy for it. But it happened anyway and I can’t be anything but happy about that.”
She launched herself at him, her lips landing on his, and for one moment he responded because he always had before. And then, just as quickly, he grabbed her by the waist and set her back from him.
“What the hell was that?” They were standing in his shop; the kiss had happened in full view of everyone.
“You’re still interested. You kissed me back.” She crossed her arms over her chest and looked satisfied. He looked at her, still seeing how pretty she was but feeling none of the spark he once had with her. Instead he felt sorry for her. Worse, wary of her.
“No. For a half second I didn’t shove you off me, that’s different. I wasn’t expecting you to throw yourself at me. I told you, I’m not interested.And I’m not.”
“You’d rather have her than me?” Brody could tell she was truly confused, and that annoyed him even more.
He shoved his hands through his hair, frustrated. “Are you high? Where is all this coming from? Before Elise you didn’t want a relationship, and now what? You want to marry me and bear me children?”
She sneered. “Hell no! I don’t want marriage or kids, and neither do you. Why weigh yourself down with either? You don’t want that. Old people want that.”
“I guess I’m old, because I want marriage and kids and I want them with Elise. It’s a good kind of weight.”
“You don’t. You just think you do because Erin went off and did it. You need to be free. We can have what we had before. Don’t you want that?”
He looked at her, wondering if she’d hit her head. “No. No, I don’t want that. I didn’t want it before Elise either. Raven, I don’t want to hurt your feelings or anything, but we never loved each other. You never wanted anything serious with me. Fuck, you cheated on me when we were in a relationship, or I thought we were, and you never bothered to correct my assumption until I found out you were having sex with other people. So whatever, we broke it off and went very casual and that was fine for a while. But it’s not now, because I’m in a relationship with someone. You have to stop with this stuff or I won’t be able to be friends with you.”
“That’s the first step. She’s going to emasculate you. Make you choose her over your friends.”
“There’s no choice. I love her. My friends should support me in this, they certainly shouldn’t come on to me to try and drive a wedge into my relationship.”
“If you just give us another try, I know we can make it. You looked at me like that once, why not again?”
“I never looked at you like that. I’ve never looked at anyone like that before now. She’s special. Took me nearly forty years to find her, to appreciate love, but I have it now and I’m not going to question it. You and I had a fling and we’re better as friends. Don’t ruin that last part.”
“His friends wouldn’t pull this shit in the open where it’ll get back to Elise.” Adrian strolled up and then turned to Brody. “Hey, asshole, I’ve been sitting at the front watching this whole spectacle unfold along with all these customers and your employees, who happen to know your girlfriend. You don’t think she’s going to hear about this?”
“If she hears, it had better be what happened instead of what anyone’s pervy brain makes up. Now, I have a tattoo to do, and then I’m going to go home so I can have dinner with my girlfriend and her daughter. Because I like to.” He focused back on Raven. “And this better not come up again.”
He motioned for Arvin to send back his next appointment, feeling frustrated and pissed off.
Raven touched his arm, but he stepped back. Her mouth firmed. “You’re making a mistake. People like us aren’t made for monogamy.”
“No. People like you aren’t. And that’s fine, I’m not judging. But I’m also not you. Now, please, go before this turns even more ugly.”
She stomped off, and his client sat down with eyebrows raised. A regular, so at least Brody didn’t have to play get-to-know-you when he just wanted to see Elise, to know how she was. She’d be done with her call by that point but would have had to rush to her studio to teach her afternoon classes. He hadn’t had time for a call and had barely glanced at her text that she was okay and would talk to him tonight about the details.
“She’s going to try to fuck you over,” Adrian said, making himself at home by sitting at Brody’s workstation.
“No, she’s not. It’s over. Why are you here?” He turned back to his client and they spoke about what he wanted. Brody began to set up.
“Fine way to talk to your baby brother. I came in to have you touch something up. I could just go somewhere else where they deal with rock stars and are nice to them.”
“No one in this town would touch my tats, smartass.” He grinned up at his brother and then got to work.
“After that, I need to run out and grab something for Rennie. She’s been out of sorts lately. I know she’s picking up on everyone’s anxiety.” Adrian flipped through a magazine and chatted idly with Brody’s client as he worked.
“You like her, don’t you?” Brody kept his eyes on his work, but Adrian knew he was talking to him.
“Rennie or Elise? I like ’em both. Elise is wonderful. She’s quick and clever and she’s good for you. Aside from being beautiful, she’s nice to be around. Soothing in a way. Rennie? How can you resist her? I’m looking forward to watching her grow up and being the uncle who spoils her.”
“She’s already spoiled,” Brody said with a laugh, and then he looked up and met his brother’s gaze. “I’m looking forward to watching her grow up too.”
She bustled around the house, cleaning up the stuff Rennie had tossed on the couch when they’d come in. It was a way for Elise to keep her mind off her legal issues. She needed to wind down after the day she’d had.
Rennie had had dinner with her grandparents, who’d just dropped her home half an hour before. She’d taken a bath and done her homework and now was finally asleep. Brody was supposed to have come over earlier, but there’d been a disaster at the shop and he had to stay to deal with it.
She tried to push back her agitation. He wasn’t at her beck and call. He had a business to run and she understood that very well. If the pipes had busted at her studio, she’d be there dealing with it herself too, that’s what you did. Anyway, just because she loved him didn’t mean she wasn’t stupidly aware of the rules they’d set out a year before. She was his girlfriend, she knew that, and she knew it meant way more than just sleeping together. It had made her happy, the way they’d been growing closer over the last months, knowing he cared about her that much. And she did know it; he was good to her and Rennie, there for her, and not just for sex.
But she also knew it wasn’t a declaration of love.
&nb
sp; She sat and then got up again. She should just go to bed. Drink a glass of wine, read a book and go to bed. Damn, she needed him. Needed his arms around her to reassure her, and that was so bad. It was like eating cookie dough. You know you shouldn’t, but you can’t help it. Cookie dough was a fine idea, though, she thought, heading for the freezer.
She didn’t want to need him. She hadn’t needed anyone a year ago, and that had suited her just fine. But he’d come into her life, and from the first moment she’d laid eyes on him she’d been fascinated. It had been so much more than sexual from the first, and it had grown until he was rooted in her life.
Bringing the dough, a spoon and the bottle of wine and a glass, she trundled into her bedroom and changed into pajamas before pouring a glass and feasting on cookie dough while watching reality shows.
Her phone rang, waking her up from her dough/wine nap, and she nearly spilled it as she scrambled to grab it and answer.
“Did I wake you?”
She smiled at the sound of his voice as she sat up. “It’s okay. Is everything at the shop taken care of?”
“I’m right outside your front door. If I knocked, would you let me in?”
“On my way.” She hung up the phone and hurried toward the door, but not before a quick check in the mirror showed her to be reasonably non-haggy.
He stood there, as promised, looking tired, but he smiled when she opened the door.
“You’re just what I needed to make this day end on a high note. Much better than it’s been the last several hours.” He hugged her, surrounding her with his scent and heat, pulling the stress and fear from her until all that remained was the warmth of being held by him.
“Come in. Are you hungry?” She locked up and then led him into the house.
“I am. I’m sorry I’m so late. I know you had a rough day, I wanted to be here for you.”
“Sit.” She waved to a chair at the table and he sat with a long sigh. “Want a burrito? I made them for dinner for myself. Rennie went out to pizza with my parents, so there are plenty of leftovers.” She put a beer in front of him and he took her hand, pulling her into his lap.
“Sorry, I needed more of this.”
“I’m not complaining.” She smiled into his neck.
“I missed you today. I wanted so much to be here with you earlier, to have dinner with you and Rennie and hear what happened at court today. Christ, the pipes were a mess. Erin’s going to be pissed. Her kitchen, everything on the bottom shelves got wet. My back wall is fucked, the floor in the bathroom and the employee lounge was a disaster, but we got it cleaned up. The plumber said it looked like there’d been a long, slow leak and it finally just gave. The back wall where the pipes burst is going to have to be re-drywalled.”
She hugged him and then got off his lap, bending and kissing him before going into the kitchen to make him something to eat. “So you stayed to be sure Erin’s place got cleaned up because she had a doctor’s appointment today. You’re a good man, Brody. Erin’s lucky to have you. I’m sorry. It sounds like a horrible mess. Will you have to close the shop?”
She bustled around the kitchen, microwaving the beans, heating the tortillas and putting everything together.
“Tomorrow, a friend of mine who’s a contractor will come out to look at the wall to see what needs to be done, how long it’ll take and how much it costs. Hopefully just tomorrow and the next day. I hate to disappoint clients, but I don’t want to be open with all that dust and water around. So tell me how it went. Rennie’s asleep?”
“Yes, my parents ran her ragged at the pizza place, so she was pretty much out by the time she got out of the bathtub.” She put a plate in front of him and sat. “They’re going to keep the case here in Washington.”
He nodded as he began to eat.
“That’s the first big hurdle. Now they’re looking at their assertions that I’m unfit and my assertions that further contact with the Sorensons is detrimental to Rennie’s mental and emotional state and that they should be allowed no visitation or contact at all unless or until Rennie asks for it. It was all preliminary. This stuff can take a while. But because of the visitations being so upsetting, Bill and Frank both believe the judge will hear things sooner. It’ll all be back and forth between attorneys, and then there’ll be another meeting with the judge where she goes over the findings and hears from experts if she wants to. Apparently this is very narrow, so it won’t be a repeat of the trial I had in New York the first time. I just want it over.”
He put his fork down and took her hand. “It’ll be over soon. You’ll finally be free of them and we can all move forward. I’m glad the first step worked out. Keeping the case away from some crony of your ex-father-in-law’s will be a very good thing. I’m sorry I woke you. I just . . . I just didn’t want to go to sleep without touching you.”
She loved him so much right at that moment, loved him until she thought she might burst from it. And then loved him more. He was what she needed, what she wanted, and if she could just be with him and not spook him off with declarations of love, she could continue to love him. She wanted to tell him she loved him, wanted to tell him so much her heart ached.
After this whole legal mess was finally over, she’d sit down and figure out what to do, but for the time being, there wasn’t a darned thing wrong with loving him and being with him.
“I’m glad you did. I ate cookie dough.”
The confused look on his face morphed into understanding. “You ate cookie dough because you missed me?” He smiled so broadly the dimple usually shadowed by his mustache showed. “Erin used to eat cookie dough. By the log. She was the moodiest teenage girl to ever exist. I’m totally certain of it.”
“Until Rennie. Gah, I cringe to think.” She wished he could spend the night. Wished she could close her eyes with him there next to her and just fall away, knowing when she woke up he’d be there still. But with all the allegations that she was some sort of skank who paraded a group of bikers through her bedroom nightly while Rennie was forced to watch, she had to be careful. Besides, spending the night wasn’t part of the deal between them.
“You look so tired. Why don’t you go home and get some rest.” She caressed his cheek and leaned in to kiss him.
“You look ten kinds of sexy in that tank top and those shorts. Now, if I could wake up to this every day, I’d never want to leave my house.”
Maybe she wasn’t the only one who liked the idea of a sleepover.
“I think I might be able to do something about you being tired and me being sexy.” She stood and put the dish in the sink and his beer bottle in the recycling. “Come on back to my room.”
Once inside, she closed and locked the door. “Get undressed and get on the bed, facedown. I’ll be right with you.” She lit some candles and headed into the bathroom for a few things.
When she returned, she paused in the doorway, content to just look at how beautiful and sexy he was, stretched out across her bed. The sight was ridiculously sexy. He was so big and his shoulders so broad, the tattoo on his back lent him an edge of danger. His body was toned and muscular. Every inch of the man was gorgeous. Having him there, in her bed, in her house on a night like this one made her happy. Content.
She crawled up on the bed, straddling his ass.
“Hey.” He tried to turn around, but she pushed him back into place. “You can’t sit on me totally naked and not let me look or touch. That’s torture.”
She poured almond oil into her hands and then rubbed them together to warm it before she touched the skin of his back. Her reward was a long, deep groan of pleasure from him as she began to work her fingers into his muscles.
“I’m supposed to be here comforting you.”
She laughed softly. “I like to take care of you. It makes me happy. This is you comforting me.”
His breathing slowed, deepened as she worked. This man had done so much for her, had taken care of her, had shown with body and mind that she was beautiful and capab
le. No one had ever made her feel the way he had. It scared her to her toes to imagine him not in her life.
“Damn that feels good. Are you a licensed masseuse too? Since you’re a jack of all trades and all.” His voice was muffled by the pillow.
“Jack of all trades, master of none.” She laughed. “You’d better be good at massages so you can trade them with people when you dance. Man, you’re so tight right here.” She worked into the knot at his right shoulder.
“Between working all day and then dealing with the cleanup from the burst pipes, I guess I’m a mess. Good thing I have you to take care of me.”
Yes, good thing. She bet that selfish bitch Raven didn’t do this for him. Didn’t make him something to eat when he got hungry, didn’t worry about how tired he was. Okay, so maybe she was unfair; Raven did seem to care about him, and Erin too, but it annoyed Elise to see the woman around all the time. She was totally hostile and she touched Brody way more than Elise would have preferred. Which would be zero touches, damn it.
“I’m here for that. Anytime.”
The stress went out of him slowly as he relaxed heavier into her bed.
“It feels so good to be with you here. To be taken care of.”
She scooted down to get to his lower back, ass and upper thighs. “You always do it for everyone else. Someone needs to take care of you for a change. Don’t think I haven’t noticed how you go around making life better for everyone else. You’re a good man.” And I love you.
“Mmm, god that’s nice. And I’m just doing what needs to be done. If I don’t, who will? Who’ll do it right so the people I care about are okay? I can, I trust that.”
Holy cats, was she gone for this man.
“Turn over.”
He did, a lazy smile on his lips. “This is the best part.”
