Nex

by Cheryl Douglas

  “Maybe it would help distract you from the pain if I did this?”

  He set my other foot in his lap and began giving me the most incredible—make that the only—foot massage of my life. I’d never had the extra money to spend on incidentals like pedicures, and Scott had never seemed to care about the state of my feet after a long day of work.

  “You don’t have to do that,” I said, trying to withdraw my foot from his hands.

  “Doesn’t feel good?” he asked, his full lips drawn up as though he knew exactly how good it felt.

  “It feels amazing,” I said as my cheeks grew warm. “But you don’t have to do that.”

  “Maybe I want to.”

  In that case, who was I to argue? I leaned back against the cushion, letting him work his magic. Wow. This man had amazing hands and knew just how to use them.

  “Is that helping?”

  “You have no idea.” If I wasn’t careful, I’d be so relaxed I’d fall asleep.

  “There’s nothing wrong with letting someone pamper you every now and then, Jac. It doesn’t make you weak or dependent. When you cook those amazing meals for me, that’s how you make me feel. Spoiled.”

  I loved that I was able to do that for him. Sharing my passion with him, seeing how much he appreciated it made me wish I could do that for him every day. “Cooking for you is my pleasure.”

  “You know, you’ve got me to thinking I should start eating better.”

  Judging by his incredible physique, I would have thought he was strict about his food choices. “Well, you have a housekeeper who shops for you, right? Shouldn’t be too hard.”

  He laughed. “It is if you can’t cook. Could you recommend someone who might be able to help me with that?”

  I felt a stab of jealousy when I thought of some pretty young thing making herself at home in his kitchen, preparing all of his meals, especially when I was hundreds of miles away. “Um, I’m not sure. Your housekeeper couldn’t help you with that?” I’d never met his housekeeper, but he once told me she was a sweet, motherly type who occasionally treated him to chocolate chip cookies. A safe bet, as far as I was concerned.

  “I’m afraid not. She has a few clients, including my brother’s family. We all keep her pretty busy.”

  “Oh.” I bit my lip, trying to think of a reasonable solution. “I love cooking for you, but with exams and everything—”

  “Hey,” he said, leaning in to kiss me before resuming the foot massage. “I wasn’t throwing hints.”

  “I know.”

  “I have an idea,” he said, setting my feet down on the floor as he pulled me into a sitting position. “How ’bout you stay with me until your exams are over?”

  “What?” Was he asking me to live with him? After a couple of dates?

  He laughed. “Don’t give me that look. It’s not what you think.”

  “What is it then?” I asked, inching back on the couch. When he was so close, I could smell that amazing cologne he favored and I was at risk of doing any damn thing he suggested.

  “You said you can’t work many hours at the bar while you’re studying, right?”

  “Yeah, mainly just the odd shift here and there.” I’d been careful about my money, making sure I’d have enough to carry me through the coming weeks, but it wouldn’t be easy to survive without a paycheck.

  “So how about you stay at my place and cook for me? Maybe even teach me to cook a few simple dishes so I won’t starve without you this summer. I’ll pay you whatever you were making at the bar.” Before I could react, he said, “Think about it. It could be the perfect solution. It might take, what, an hour or so a day, and you have to prepare your own meals anyhow. Am I right?”

  I nodded, trying to process his proposal. Could I really handle living under the same roof with Nex? Waking up with him every morning, falling asleep in his arms every night? God, how the hell was I supposed to leave after weeks of that?

  “You’d still be making money and have plenty of time to study for your exams. Plus, you’d get to indulge your favorite hobby while doing something nice for the guy who’s crazy about you.”

  He did make it sound like an irresistible offer, but I couldn’t rush into something like this. I needed time to think about it. “I’d feel weird taking money from you,” I said, wrinkling my nose. “Especially for something I’d gladly do for free. I’m already using your truck, that—”

  “If you won’t let me pay you, the offer is off the table, Jac. I refuse to take advantage of you like that.”

  He was offering to pay me what I’d be making at Downlow? That was way too much for an hour or two of work each day. “I know why you’re doing this,” I said, wrapping my arm around his neck.

  “You figured me out,” he said, skimming my cheek with his sexy stubble. “I can’t get enough of you.”

  “I’m serious,” I said, unable to resist the urge to kiss him when those potent baby blues of his zeroed in on my lips. “You’re just trying to figure out a way to help me out with school and living expenses. I love you for it, but—” I clamped my hand over my mouth when I realized what I said. I closed my eyes, mortified, when Nex chuckled at my reaction. “Oh my God, I did not mean that the way it sounded. I know it’s way too soon to be talking about… that. I mean, we barely know each other, right?”

  “I know all I need to know about you.” He kissed my burning cheeks repeatedly, still smiling. “And I made this offer for one reason—’cause I really do need to start taking better care of myself. Even Mac thinks so. You’d be helping me out more than I’d be helping you out if you agree to this.”

  It didn’t feel right, getting paid to do something I loved for a man I lo—was growing to care about more every day. “Can I think about it?”

  “Sure, take all the time you need. But keep in mind, the longer it takes you to decide, the more of those artery-clogging restaurant meals I’ll have to eat.”

  I slapped him upside the back of the head, making him laugh. “Don’t try to make me feel guilty. You can order healthy meals in a restaurant, you know.”

  “Please, we work in an industrial area. It’s fried eggs and hash browns for breakfast and burgers and fries for lunch or we starve.” He nuzzled my neck, making me pull him closer as I tried to focus on his words. “My brother’s lucky. He has an amazing woman to make him a healthy breakfast, pack his lunch, and she has dinner waiting for him when he gets home.”

  I hated to think of Nex eating that crap all day, every day, but I couldn’t make this decision lightly. “Can I let you know by the weekend?”

  “Sure. I have one more question to ask.”

  “Uh-oh,” I said, pulling back to look at him. “Should I be worried?”

  “When I dropped the boys off at home tonight, Mac told me to invite you to dinner tomorrow night. She said she’d love to get to know you better.”

  “Really?” I was surprised she even remembered me, since our paths had only crossed that one time at the bar.

  “Why do you sound so surprised? Mac knows you’re important to me. They’re my family. Naturally, they’d want to get to know you better. She said something about inviting Seb too. So what do you say? You game?”

  “Sure.” I knew for this to work, I had to be willing to have a relationship with his family. “I’d love to come. Tell Mac I’ll bring the dessert.”

  Chapter Thirteen

  Jaci

  Mac and Ryker could not have been any more welcoming, so when the guys announced they were heading outside for a beer before dinner, I was looking forward to a little girl time with Nex’s sister-in-law.

  “So he finally wore you down, huh?” Mac asked as she popped a covered casserole dish containing rice in the oven before checking on the barbeque spareribs in the slow cooker. “I remember the night you guys met. I wasn’t sure he would ever get you to agree to go out with him.” She turned around, winking at me. “I am so glad you made him work for it. These Steele boys aren’t used to that. Women are us
ually the ones chasing them down, and let me tell you, it’s sickening.”

  I continued washing the fruit for the platter Mac had asked me to prepare. “I wasn’t playing hard to get or anything,” I assured her. “I just promised myself when I moved here I wouldn’t get involved in anything serious.”

  “Really?” Mac asked, piercing the corn on the cob she had cooking in a large pot on the stove. “Why’s that?”

  “I dated the same guy for a long time. I think everyone, including him, just assumed we’d get married someday. When I came here¸ I decided I wanted to be free for a while, just enjoy life without having to answer to anyone.”

  Mac laughed. “Then Hurricane Nex swept into your life and shot all those plans to hell, right?”

  “Something like that,” I admitted, smiling. “He is a tough man to resist.”

  “Especially when he turns on the charm.”

  Even though I didn’t know Mac well, she made me comfortable enough to ask, “Does he do that with every girl he meets, turn on the charm?”

  “He doesn’t have to,” Mac said, rolling her eyes. “Like I said, they don’t make him work for it.” She turned to face me. “But I’ve never seen him this infatuated with anyone, Jaci. And I’ve known him his entire adult life.” She smiled. “He’s like a little brother to me, and I love him like crazy, but I know he doesn’t make it easy. He’s strong-willed and opinionated. They all are. They all need women who are equally as strong and not afraid to stand up to them, which explains why they’re all single, except for Ryker.”

  I rinsed and dried my hands before setting the fruit platter on the center island. “I wouldn’t change a thing about him,” I said, surprised to hear myself admitting that aloud. “He’s nothing like I thought he would be when we met. I wrote him off as a player, just looking for a good time.” I reached for my glass of wine. “And I have no doubt he’s been that, but he’s not like that with me. He’s been patient and understanding. He took the time to get to know me and didn’t push when I said I couldn’t go out with him.”

  “You mean he became your friend first?” Mac asked, tongue in cheek. “That definitely is different for Nex.”

  “I feel like he really knows me,” I admitted. “We’ve only had a few dates, but the months we spent before that—talking, getting to know each other—makes it feel like we’re a lot further along in the relationship, you know?”

  Mac refilled my wine glass along with hers. “I do. Sometimes it just sneaks up on you. You start spending more and more time with someone, telling yourself you can never be more than friends. Before you know it, you’re seeing them every day, and on the days when you can’t see them, you’re miserable.”

  I grinned. “Sounds like you’re speaking from experience. The same thing happened with Ryker?”

  “Yeah, I was pretty young when we first met. I had a boyfriend, was working part-time, and getting ready to go to college. I thought things were going pretty well for me. I was on the right track, starting to figure out what I wanted for my future.” She laughed, shaking her head. “Then Ryker walked in to my workplace and told me I was going to be his.”

  “Wow.” Mac’s husband was seriously hot, like his brother, so I could only imagine how Mac had reacted to that statement.

  “Exactly.” She sat on the stool next to me, reaching for a square of cheese from one of the two appetizer platters she’d set out. “He didn’t care that I already had a boyfriend or that my parents hated his guts or that I was a virgin,” she said, blushing as she whispered the last word. “He made up his mind then and there that I was it for him, and he didn’t stop pursuing me until I saw it too.”

  “Sounds familiar.” Though I couldn’t deny that I was beyond flattered that Nex chose to pursue me when there were so many other beautiful women who wouldn’t have made him work for it. “You said your parents hated him?”

  “In the beginning, they did,” she said, tucking a lock of hair behind her ear. “And really, who could blame them? My dad was a cop. Ryker had been in trouble with the law. Nothing serious, but enough to raise the red flag as far as my parents were concerned. He was in a motorcycle gang, fought a lot, experimented with drugs…” She shuddered. “I just thank God our boys never went down that path. Ryker’s poor mother was a saint. I honestly don’t know how she managed six of them on her own.”

  “Must have been a strong lady.”

  “Why do you think they gravitate toward strong women when they decide they’re ready to settle down? There’s a reason.”

  “You really think Nex is ready to settle down?” I asked, shocked by the implication. I knew he was older than I was, but in my experience, guys like Nex usually held out as long as they could before getting tied down.

  “That’s the feeling I’m getting,” Mac said, covering my hand with hers. “And it’s only been the last few months, since he met you, that I saw a change in him. As far as I know, he hasn’t been dating anyone else since you two met and believe me, that in itself is a really big deal.”

  “I’m sure it is,” I said, sharing her smile. “How did you handle the fact your parents hated Ryker?” I asked, thinking about my mother’s reaction when I told her a little bit about Nex.

  “I didn’t try to push it,” Mac said. “I was legally old enough to make my own decisions. They knew that. We’d always had a good relationship and they respected my right to choose my own boyfriends, but they never missed an opportunity to warn me about the potential pitfalls of falling in love with a man like Ryker.”

  “Did that dissuade you at all?”

  “In the beginning, it did,” she admitted. “They were my parents. I loved them. I didn’t want them to worry about me. I wanted to make them proud.”

  “But?”

  “I had to live my own life, follow my heart. There came a time, not too long after we met, that I couldn’t deny the truth any longer. I was in love with him. I wanted to spend my life with him.”

  “And your parents came around eventually?” My mother had an iron will and once she made up her mind about someone, I’d never known her to change it, even when she was wrong.

  “They learned to love Ryker. He became the son they’d always wanted. I’m not saying it was easy or it happened overnight, but they saw how much I meant to him, how well he treated me. They realized he wanted to clean up his life, to be a better man because of me, and that earned him their love and respect.”

  “That’s nice.” I still wasn’t sure my story would have the same happy ending Mac’s had. Her parents sounded like reasonable people. My mama? Not so much.

  “But, honey,” Mac said, curling her hand around my forearm, “you ultimately have to decide for yourself what makes you happy. If being with Nex is what you want, go for it. Your family will come around eventually, and if they don’t, it’s their loss because I know Nex is an incredible guy, and I can already tell you’re a sweetheart.”

  “Thank you,” I said, giving her an impulsive hug. I’d always wanted a big sister, and if things with Nex and I worked out, maybe I’d have one in Mac. “I really needed a little reassurance. Things have just been happening so fast, and I’m so confused.”

  “Nex said something about you having to go back to Georgia for the summer?” Mac asked as she slid off her stool and walked over to the stove. She turned the gas burner off and drained the pot the corn had been cooking in before turning off the slow cooker.

  “Yeah, I need to spend some time with my mama. She’s got some health problems.”

  “I’m sorry to hear that.”

  “Can I ask you a question?”

  “Anything.”

  Nex’s proposal was still weighing heavily on my mind, and I needed another opinion. Jade thought I should go for it, but she thought nothing of sleeping with a man on the first date, so we didn’t always see eye-to-eye. “Nex kind of offered me a job.”

  “What kind of job?”

  “Well, I love to cook, and he claims he eats like crap most of t
he time because he can’t cook.”

  “He’s not lying about that,” Mac said, raising her hand. “I’m on him all the time about eating better. It amazes me that a guy who spends as many hours as Nex does in the gym thinks nothing of going out for a burger and fries with the boys after his workout.”

  I grinned, imagining the picture Mac painted. That sounded like Nex. “He invited me to stay with him for the next few weeks during exams, since I can’t manage my regular shifts at the bar.”

  “So you can cook for him?” Mac asked, taking the casserole dish out of the oven.

  “That, and teach him to cook a few basic dishes. Maybe I’d even cook in bulk one day on the weekend, toward the end, and freeze some things so he could just pop them in the microwave when he gets home from work.”

  Mac nodded. “Yeah, I do that a lot. I love to cook too, but with our crazy schedules, it’s sometimes hard to get a home-cooked meal on the table every night.”

  “But he wants to pay me what I was making at Downlow, and that just feels like charity.”

  Mac laughed. “You don’t want to know how much that boy spends dining out. He goes to this place that sells gourmet burgers and pays twenty dollars for a burger.” She rolled her eyes. “I’m not kidding you. Twenty dollars for a freakin’ burger with all these weird toppings that make you wonder how the hell they make it sound appetizing.”

  “Hmmm.” I knew the kind of burgers she was talking about. I’d experimented quite a bit with different recipes and found a few that had my friends begging me to make them again.

  “So whatever he’s offering to pay you would no doubt be a savings for him, plus he’d be eating healthy, home-cooked meals, right?”

  “Yeah.” Since cooking was a hobby of mine, I’d also read a lot of books about nutrition, to ensure I was preparing balanced meals. “So you really think I should do this? I wouldn’t be taking advantage of his generosity? I mean, he’s already lending me his truck, which is pretty much the nicest thing anyone has ever done for me.”

  Mac’s jaw dropped before she snapped it shut. “He’s letting you drive his truck?”