Wicked Sexy (Wicked Games Series Book 2)
Page 32
I take a bite of the bacon—it’s chewy and meaty, perfectly cooked—and moan in happiness.
Connor rounds the island, sweeps my hair off my shoulder, and kisses me on the temple. “Eat up, sweetheart. You’re too thin.”
I stuff the rest of the bacon in my mouth. Between chews, I say, “That’s probably the most romantic thing a man could ever say to a woman.”
Connor leans one elbow on the island and cups my face in his hand. His look changes from teasing to contemplative. He strokes his thumb over my cheek.
Feeling uneasy, I swallow. “Why are you looking at me like that?”
It’s a moment before he answers. Streaming through the windows, the sun worships him, glinting mink and gold in his dark hair, bronzing his skin, sculpting his impressive abdominal muscles in highlights and shadow.
“Juanita sent me a text a few minutes ago.”
I drop the bacon and sit up ramrod straight. “Is she okay?”
I’ve seen her several times since returning to New York. The first was at her house a week after we returned from Alaska. Her mother didn’t want to let me in, but her siblings convinced her to. Juanita was in far better spirits than I would’ve been in her shoes. With her pet rat, Elvis, perched on her head, she told me how she’d been on her way back from my house the night she threw the switch, when she’d been nabbed on the street by a group of men in combat gear. A van had pulled up alongside her, they’d swarmed out, and that was all she remembered until she woke up in the caves. I’d hugged her and told her I loved her. She’d laughed and told me to suck a bag of dicks.
Then she showed me the scar on her back—sixty stiches, raw and red—and I broke down and cried.
She rolled her eyes and told me not to be such a pussy.
“She’s fine,” Connor reassures me in a soothing voice, caressing my cheek. “She’s great, actually. She just wanted to find out what time she should come over for our barbeque tomorrow.”
My body sags in relief. I wonder if this is what it feels like to have kids, this constant, sick feeling of worry.
“Oh. Thank God. So why do you look so weird?”
“Do I?”
“Very.”
He smiles. “So I’m obese, cruel, and weird-looking. You poor thing. How do you put up with me?”
“Bacon,” I say seriously. “You make excellent bacon. It’s your one saving grace.”
“Aside from Zeus,” he answers in the same serious tone.
I nod. “Exactly. Now explain your face, please.”
He tugs on a lock of my hair. “Maybe I was just thinking about how much I like the color red.”
I shake my head. “Nice try.”
He looks at the ceiling, pretending to think. “Maybe I was contemplating what I should make you for dessert.”
“Dessert after breakfast? You know you’re a really bad liar, right?”
His eyes meet mine, and his smile fades. His voice drops an octave when he says, “Maybe I was wondering when you were going to put your townhouse on the market.”
“Oh. That.”
When I look down at my plate of food, Connor puts his knuckle under my chin and forces me to meet his eyes. “Yes. That.”
“Um. I can’t yet.”
His brows shoot up. “Why not? You expecting to move back in?”
“No. I mean, I hope not.”
His eyes get wide. I can’t tell if the look he’s giving me is anger or astonishment.
“You hope not?”
Feeling a little defensive, I say, “Well, we haven’t exactly talked about the future—”
“I’m in love with you,” he says abruptly. “You are my future.”
That takes my breath away. We’ve never said ‘I love you’ to each other. Even after the day in the hospital, it’s always just been ‘I loathe you.’ Our little inside joke.
I whisper, “So…then…you’re just one of those guys who doesn’t need the piece of paper?”
Connor looks at me like I’m speaking a foreign language that he doesn’t understand. “What. The. Hell. Are you talking about?”
All of a sudden, my face is flaming. I’m embarrassed and uncomfortable and wish we weren’t having this conversation. But we are, so I might as well get it over with. I blow out a breath, square my shoulders, and look him in the eye.
“I’m talking about marriage.”
Connor’s face transforms. He straightens, takes my face in his hands, and breathes, “Yes.”
I blink. “That wasn’t a question.”
“Yes it was. You just asked me to marry you.”
Is he fucking with me? “Uh…”
“And I said yes.” He flutters his lashes. “Where’s my ring?”
He is fucking with me! I punch him in the shoulder. “You dick!”
Without missing a beat, he says, “Because I already have yours.”
I freeze. I’m pretty sure my heart stops beating, but I can’t tell because I’ve lost all sensation in my body. “You…what?”
Connor gently kisses me. He nuzzles my jaw and then whispers in my ear, “I had this big romantic production planned out—candlelight dinner, horse-drawn carriage ride in Central Park, down on bended knee, the whole thing—but since you beat me to the punch, I’ll just give you the ring and we’ll call it even.”
A little squeaky noise comes out of me.
He chuckles and kisses me again, drawing my tongue into his mouth, gently biting my lower lip. My heartbeat is all over the place. I place my hands on his chest, and they’re shaking.
When he pulls away, he’s breathing hard. His eyes drift open, and in them all I see is love.
I say breathlessly, “So where is it?”
He brushes my hair off my face. “Where’s mine?”
He’s teasing, but I’m in no mood for delays, so I improvise. I tear a strip of bacon in half, take his left hand, and wrap the piece of bacon around his ring finger, tucking the ends under so it stays in place. It’s a big, crumbly, greasy mess. He stares at it, looks at me, and then looks back at his hand.
I ask, “What do you think?”
“I think I can’t wait to tell our kids that you proposed to me with a bacon ring.”
“I didn’t pro—kids?”
He glances up at me with a glint in his eye and a smile playing around the edges of his mouth. “Four.”
My mouth falls open. “Four? You want four kids?”
He pulls me in against his strong chest, leaving a smear of bacon grease on my arm, and wraps his arms around me. He rests his chin on the top of my head. “You’re right. We should have eight. Start our own little army.”
I say loudly into his chest, “I am not having eight children!”
He sighs. “Fine. If you really want twelve, we’ll have twelve. But I think we should definitely consider a nanny at that point.”
I fake a growl. “You’re extremely lucky that I love you, jarhead, because if I didn’t, you’d be missing a few important body parts right about now.”
He stills. Slowly he pulls away, looking down at me with shining eyes. He whispers, “Say that again.”
I know exactly what he wants to hear, but he isn’t giving me my ring, and so I’m not giving him what he wants either. I ask innocently, “You’d be missing a few important body parts?”
He shakes his head. He’s so still, I think he might be holding his breath.
“Um…you’re extremely lucky?”
He shakes his head again, pulls me closer so our noses are almost touching.
“Honey, you’re getting grease all over my silk robe.”
“Say it,” he demands, and his eyes are so full of need, I melt.
Staring deep into his eyes, I murmur, “I love you. With my whole heart. And I will until the day I die.”
He groans and then gives me a kiss I’ll remember for the rest of my life, in no small part because he’s gripping my head with his left hand and now my ear is full of bacon.
“But I’m
still going to keep the townhouse,” I say when we finally draw a breath. He does his bristling cat impression, all glaring eyes and hackles raised, hissing through his teeth. “Why?”
“Because the loft doesn’t have the right wiring for the quantum computer I’m going to build.”
He blinks. “Quantum…”
“Computer. Yes. What, you think I didn’t upload the source code from Søren’s system to the cloud before you showed up to rescue me?” I make a tsk of disapproval. “Honey. You should know me better than that!”
He’s looking at me in total astonishment, which makes me feel pretty damn good. I love being able to surprise him, even though he knows me so well.
He protests, “The CIA said his whole system was corrupted. They examined it for weeks. They couldn’t get it to work—”
I bark out a scornful laugh. “You think I’d let the government have it? You know what they’d do with that kind of technology! No way, José! They can try to build their own. But if and when they do, they’ll have a little white cartoon kitty cat watching their every move.”
He looks like he’s trying to wrap his head around the idea and not having much luck. “So…that’s what you’re going to do with it? Watch over the government?”
I lift a shoulder. “That’s just a side gig. Its primary function will be saving the world.”
After a long, silent interval, Connor begins to laugh. It’s quiet at first, a low chuckle, but quickly builds to roar, until finally he’s laughing so hard he’s gasping.
“I always knew you were a superhero,” he says, shaking with laughter and drawing me close.
I wrap my arms around his neck and beam at him. “Can I please have my ring now?”
And the man that I love responds, “Princess, you can have anything you want,” and kisses me once more.
Acknowledgments
Huge thanks to Jim Tierney of Digital Anarchy and Greg Strause of Hydraulx for sharing their knowledge of computer theory, systems architecture and design, and all things automating algorithmic processes that scale. You guys are geniuses.
Big thanks to Marie Force for her support and enthusiasm, and giving me such great suggestions to make the Wicked Games series better! I love working with you! And to Linda “Eagle Eye” Inmanson, thank you for catching all my goofs and correcting the various ways I butcher the English language. You rock.
As always, I have to thank Geissinger’s Gang for their support and encouragement. Facebook wouldn’t be the same without you.
Thanks to Jay for being patient and accommodating when I’m in my writing cave, and for having my back, no matter what. I’m lucky to be on your team. Marrying you was the best decision I’ve ever made.
Finally, thank you to all my loyal readers who have followed me on my publishing journey since my first novel came out four years ago. Without you, this whole writing business is just me amusing myself at a keyboard. I appreciate you more than you know.
And to any new readers, welcome! I’m excited to share the wild and crazy inner workings of my imagination with you. I sincerely hope we will be together for many, many years to come.
About the Author
J.T. Geissinger is an award-winning author of smart, sexy romance. Her eleven published novels all include a high level of sensuality, intense emotional connections, and plot twists galore.
She is the recipient of the Prism Award for Best First Book and the Golden Quill Award for Best Paranormal/Urban Fantasy, and was a finalist for the prestigious RITA® Award from the Romance Writers of America. Her work has also finaled in the Booksellers’ Best, National Readers’ Choice, and Daphne du Maurier Awards.
She lives in Los Angeles with her husband, on whom all of her heroes are based.
She loves to interact with readers, so please join her private Facebook reader’s group, Geissinger’s Gang, to find out more information about works in progress, have access to exclusive excerpts and contests, and a chance to get advance reader copies of her new releases.
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