Sheila rushed in first, letting the door shut in his face. He hid the smile. God love her. His sister was in her take-no-prisoners mode. By the time he stepped inside the office, the apartment manager had a set of keys in her hand, and his sister pushed past him to hold the door open again, motioning for them to follow.
Cody trailed behind, checking out the clubhouse and workout room. Those were important to him. He listened as the manager talked about the swimming pool on the fourteenth floor as well as some of the perks, like valet parking if the lot was full and Starbucks coffee served every morning on the way out. They took the elevator up, and Sheila stayed all business. For Cody, the decision was a no-brainer. He was in. He’d just have to be more conservative with his money to make the budget work. He’d wanted the place since reading the description on the website. This place was the exact opposite of the farm and threw him almost downtown on one of the busiest and best streets in the city.
“The one bedrooms are small, but the units come with granite countertops in both the kitchen and bathroom,” the manager said as she opened the front door to the unit. Cody entered the apartment, taking in the hardwood floors and the fresh coat of paint on the walls.
“Very nice.” He’d always wanted a place in town but hadn’t been sure he could afford it. This was a big step. Cody was in the process of second-guessing his finances when he spotted the large windows that ran along the back wall. He smiled. If he’d had any doubts, that breathtaking view of the Austin skyline sealed the deal. This was home.
“Oh my God,” Sheila exclaimed loudly. “Cody! Oh my God. You’ve got to have this place. I can picture leather sofas, oversized rugs, and that cool black kitchen table from Pier 1.”
Cody smiled and shook his head as he glanced across the room at the manager as his sister headed for the bedroom. “So much for acting like you don’t want it. Can’t wait to see her shrewd negotiating skills.”
“Get in here! Look at this room. You can see the whole view of downtown.” Sheila squealed excitedly, beckoning them both to follow her.
“It looks like we won’t be seeing those shrewd negotiation skills after all.” He winked as he passed the manager, causing her to giggle.
“We can have the papers written up in about fifteen minutes.”
“Good”—Cody laughed—“because as you’ve heard, my sister’s already started decorating for me.”
The Big Reveal
With his cell phone glued to his ear, Mitch paced back and forth under the welcome shade of the old oak trees in the front yard of Cody’s parents’ house. Nervousness and excitement churned in his belly with every ring that went unanswered. He had slipped outside so as not to wake Cody from his much-needed nap, but Mitch had news to share, and he wasn’t quite certain how it would be received. This was a first for him.
“Hey, man,” Mitch said when Colt answered on the fourth ring.
“Why do you sound like that?” Colt asked, suspicion heavy in his voice on the other end of the line.
“Sound like what? Never mind, I’m not answering that. You asked a dumb question. What’re you doing?” Mitch asked, burning a steady path in the green grass at his feet. This was new territory for him, and he didn’t know the correct protocol, but he damn sure wanted to shout his news from the rooftops.
“I’m watching Jace’s tight ass flip across the mat. He’s proving to the gym that he’s still got it. I paid one of his kid’s twenty bucks to taunt him into doing all those flippy things. I fucking love watching him do all those twisty tricks. He’s so damn hot. And so damn good,” Colt boasted, and Mitch stared unseeing at one of the trucks parked in the driveway, not caring in the least what Colt prattled on about.
“Okay, well, I won’t keep you from your fun.” Mitch rolled his eyes and shook his head. He took a deep breath to calm his nerves. No reason to beat around the bush, so he tossed it out there like a grenade. “I wanted you to know I met someone and he’s become important to me.”
“So that means you’re gonna quit fawning all over my husband every time you see him?” Colt shot back without missing a beat, seemingly unfazed by Mitch’s declaration.
That settled his nerves like nothing else could have and set everything back to right in his world. Colt had become a brother to Mitch ever since his dad had taken Colt into the family fold. Mitch saw his job as little brother to always tease and torture his siblings. So Mitch cocked his brow and stopped dead in his tracks. It took minimal effort to add all his normal snark back in the tone of his voice as he said, “You know what? I think I need to introduce those two. Then I’ll entice sweet little Jace into an earth-moving and unforgettable threesome. And you’re not invited. Just me, Cody, and Jace, doing all kinds of depraved and carnally wicked things to each other. We can see firsthand exactly how bendy your man is.” Mitch waited…then laughed at the long silence greeting him. No way would Cody ever go for that, and Mitch wouldn’t either, but he sure loved to bust Colt’s ass.
“Fuck you. That’s not funny. I’m selling your stupid baseball cap on eBay tonight, Knox. Hope you’re the highest bidder.” Colt huffed. Then there was a muffled voice on the other end of the line to which Colt replied, “Mitch met someone.”
Seconds later, Jace was on the phone, sounding a little out of breath but happy. “Congratulations! You need to bring him by the house so we can meet him and y’all can stay as long as you like.”
“I think you‘ve met him already. That night we all went out. You know, the hot blond I was talking to outside the club in Dallas,” Mitch reminded him.
“Oh yeah, I remember. He’s a cutie, Mitch. Good catch,” Jace said. Mitch straightened his shoulders as a big grin spread across his face at Jace’s compliment.
“Thanks. I won’t keep you. I gotta get back inside. I just wanted you both to know I found someone, and I want you and Colt to officially meet him.” Relief washed over him. Now, he’d covered all his bases, telling everyone who needed to know.
“Good luck, man. And congratulations. Bring him by soon,” Jace exclaimed loudly.
Mitch hung up the phone about the time the screen door of the old farm house squeaked opened. Cody stood in the doorway, looking all sexy and sleep-rumpled. Mitch’s heart fluttered at the sight of his handsome guy. He had finally met the man of his dreams, someone he wanted to share his life with, that special someone he could see himself growing old with.
Mitch slid his phone in the pocket of his jeans and jogged across the yard, taking the steps up to the wraparound porch two at a time. “Hey, babe, how was your nap?” Mitch asked as he leaned in and kissed Cody sweetly on the lips, before guiding him back inside. “How about you tell me all about it over a big piece of your mom’s famous southern pecan pie?”
Cody’s Mom’s Chocolate Cake & Icing
Ingredients
2 1/2 cups flour
1/2 cup cocoa
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon cinnamon
2 teaspoons baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 cups sugar
1 cup vegetable oil
2 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 cup buttermilk
1 cup hot strong coffee
For Icing:
3/4 cup cocoa
4 cups confectioner sugar
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 cup real butter (1 stick)
1 teaspoon vanilla
1/2 cup evaporated milk (use extra milk if need to thin)
Directions for cake
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease and flour 2 or 3 layer pans or a 9x13 inch pan.
Mix and blend all dry ingredients, except sugar.
In a separate bowl, cream together sugar, oil, eggs, vanilla, and buttermilk until blended. Then gradually add the dry ingredients a little at a time until mixed thoroughly.
Add the hot coffee by pouring a slow stream against the inside of the bowl while mixing. Batter will be runny.
Pour into pre
pared pan(s). Bake approximately 20 -25 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in center comes out clean.
Directions for icing
Mix the cocoa and sugar.
Cream the butter. Gradually add the cocoa mixture to the creamed butter, alternately, with the 1/2 cup of milk until blended. Add the vanilla.
Carefully add very small amounts of milk at a time until desired consistency is reached. Cream well in between each addition of milk.
Ice cake and Enjoy!
Home Sweet Home
Cody stepped through the front door of his apartment and smiled at the darkened silence that greeted him. After almost two full weeks at his parents house, this place seemed like heaven. He tossed his truck keys on the kitchen counter near the door.
“I need to get you a key,” Cody said, reaching over to flip the switch, letting light fill the small entryway. Mitch came through the door a few steps behind him.
“You were supposed to wait for me,” Mitch said, going into marshal mode, critically assessing the apartment before giving Cody a quick glare and moving farther inside.
“It’s fine. No one knows we were coming here today,” Cody said, shutting and locking the door before trailing behind Mitch as he entered the bedroom, his pistol now drawn and aimed toward the floor. “I love the silence. I missed this place.”
“Cody, you promised to follow the rules. Now, I gotta tell your dad you didn’t do what you said,” Mitch said, opening the closet door, looking inside. Cody ignored him completely. He walked over to his dresser and opened the top drawer. He rifled through his things, then tossed the lube and condoms on top of the dresser, before digging deeper, lifting the secret compartment hidden below the contents.
“Here,” Cody said, raising his head to see Mitch staring back at him in the dresser’s mirror.
“What’s that?” Mitch asked, walking toward him while holstering his weapon.
“A key to the place. Aren’t you moving in?” Cody asked, facing Mitch. He wasn’t entirely certain how to interpret Mitch’s odd look.
“If you want me to,” Mitch said quietly, stopping about a foot from Cody. He didn’t take the key that Cody extended. Instead, he continued to search Cody’s face until their eyes connected and held. “Don’t you think it’s a little fast?”
“I thought you wanted this,” Cody replied, pulling the key into his closed fist and dropping his arm by his side. With lightning speed, Cody’s emotions raced through confusion, doubt, uncertainty, then worry. What had he misread? Cody went to take a step backward, his ass bumping the dresser in his retreat. Mitch reached out a hand, grabbing his wrist, keeping him right there.
“I thought you wanted more time,” Mitch said, using his fingers to forcibly open Cody’s palm to remove the key. Cody watched Mitch’s every move, staying quiet, feeling very much like the man who had first met Mitch, trying so hard to figure him out.
Mitch tucked the key inside his jeans pocket before tenderly drawing Cody closer. “Don’t look like that. I want to be here with you. There’s no place else I’d rather be. I just don’t want to push you. You’ve been through too much.”
“I’m fine—” Cody started, but Mitch silenced him with two fingers to his lips.
“Thank you for the key,” he said and lowered his mouth to Cody’s, vanquishing his worries with a single press of those sexy lips.
The Holidays 2014
An unexpected blizzard blanketed most of New York, and based on what everyone in the Knox family was saying, the snow drifts were unprecedented. Cody had never seen anything like this before. Extreme excitement didn’t describe the emotion well enough. In Austin, Texas, they were lucky to get a dusting, and when the weatherman called for winter precipitation, that usually meant a good thick layer of ice rather than anything resembling a winter wonderland.
The Knox family members had celebrated Christmas early this morning. The children giggled with delight to find Santa had left everything he was supposed to leave, but the happiness spilling over in the Knox household had nothing on the allure of the freshly fallen Christmas snow Cody wanted to get out and play in. Mitch finally obliged. Much like southern fried chicken, the white stuff wasn’t the draw to Mitch that it was to Cody.
Cody dressed quickly and rushed outside a little faster than his lagging boyfriend, which only gave Cody time to prepare to strike. He’d planned an epic snowball fight. One he wanted to win and he was determined to get the jump on Mitch. Cody quickly found the biggest drift closest to the largest tree. Two very important factors in dodging return fire.
He packed several balls and hid, waiting for Mitch to appear. His plan was to launch one right after another at Mitch the second he walked out the door. Man, he was stoked! Unable to control his excitement, his body vibrated with intensity. He probably wouldn’t ever get an opportunity like this one again.
It took more than a few minutes, but Cody was patient. He’d spent hours in the deer stand with his dad as a boy, doing nothing more than waiting on a possible target. Just as Mitch opened the back door, Cody took aim, and at the last-minute change the trajectory and hurled the snowball above Mitch’s head, aiming for the roof. Mitch wasn’t alone.
He held a snow-suit-bundled mini-Mitch in his arms. It took Cody a while to learn the little boy’s name—Matt Ryland Knox—because he’d always been referred to as mini-Mitch, even had Mitch’s middle name. The three-year-old had been attached to Mitch since they’d arrived a couple of days earlier. Genetics were a funny thing—the kid was a dead ringer for his uncle. The two had never met in person before but were bonded on a level Cody had never witnessed before. Mitch had brought his little clone out to play with them in the snow. The moment was so moving to watch. His big, strong badass Mitch laughed and talked so patiently with this very little boy.
Mitch stayed on the porch and waved at Cody where he stood out in the snow several feet away. Cody looked down at all the snowballs he’d created and sighed. They’d be wasted. He couldn’t fight Mitch to an epic snowball death while he held the boy. Out of nowhere a zinger hit him square in the chest. When he turned his head, another caught him in the face.
“When you’re the youngest, you learn to be sneaky,” Mitch yelled across the yard.
Mitch let another one fly to the delightful laugh of mini-Mitch who now stood only a few feet away. Cody dove, dodging for cover as a huge ball of ice exploded against the tree beside him. Luckily that one hadn’t hit its mark. The ice ball might have missed him, but he landed in a snowdrift that covered his entire body. He heard Mitch more than saw him trekking toward him, coming after him, the crunch of snow under feet. Cody tried to roll or bust any sort of move, but his inexperience with the heavy, wet snow slowed him down enough so Mitch could tackle him right there.
“I’m already down. You didn’t have to jump on me.” Cody huffed as his body took the full brunt of Mitch’s weight. Funny, during sex and sleep, he loved Mitch on him. Now? Not so much. “You don’t play fair.”
“Just now figuring that out?” And a scoop of snow Mitch held hidden in his hand landed in Cody’s face. “If I played fair, you wouldn’t be mine, Mr. Turner.”
Cody spat and sputtered, trying to blow the snow off his face while Mitch held his position, and Cody’s hand stayed pinned underneath Mitch’s big body. Finally, Mitch helped brush the snow out of his eyes and lips, and he leaned closer, smiling warmly as he whispered, “I love you.”
Warm lips found Cody’s. He didn’t participate in the kiss but did laugh when he felt the slightest weight added to what already lay on top of him. Matt had tackled them both.
“Hey, little man! Your uncle’s heavy enough,” Cody shouted from the bottom of the pile.
Matt squealed with delight and reared back readying himself to jump on top of them again. Mitch, clearly more an expert at maneuvering in the snow than Cody, turned at the last second, catching his nephew in his arms. Mitch growled and rolled on top of the little guy, not crushing him with his weight, but pinning hi
m down. Mitch’s nephew reached over, grabbed a handful of snow, and shoved it in Mitch’s face before he even knew what happened.
“Dear God, he is a mini you.” Cody laughed, sitting up, brushing the snow away.
“I’m gonna get you,” Mitch teased the boy.
Cody could have sworn the overly excited giggle from Matt came with resounding a-okay.
After the Proposal
Mitch pulled the thick material of his jacket tighter across his body, hunkering down in the warm wool lining just as an icy gust of wind blasted off the chilly water and rushed across the front porch of his parents’ lake house. A few feet away, his nieces and nephews played in the deep snow, oblivious to the chill in the air. Of course, kids rarely noticed how cold it was outside when it meant building a snowman. Mitch, on the other hand, had grown accustomed to the warm Texas heat, making this frigid weather a million times colder than he ever remembered it being growing up.
“He’s adorable. Mom says he favors you the most.”
Mitch smiled at the comparison. Although, he wasn’t sure adorable was a word he’d use to describe himself, but he couldn’t deny the resemblance his nephew shared. More than anything, Mitch was excited to spend time with his family as he sat there on the front porch step with his sister, Candace, surveying the perfect winter scene of their parents’ large tree-lined property.
“Yeah, but I didn’t realize exactly how much until I got here. Mom mentioned it on the phone a time or two, but you know Mom.” Mitch let his words hang in the air. The distant laughter from his nieces and nephews filled the brief silence. “I have to confess, it kind of threw me when I walked in and actually saw him,” Mitch said, watching with pride while a pint-sized clone of himself played rambunctiously in the snow. Even though mini-Mitch was too little to get in on most of the action, that hadn’t stopped him. The kid had wormed his way right into the middle of the group, chucking snowballs like a little pro.
Nice Guys Collection With Added Bonus Material Page 70
