Page 39 of Cognac Secrets

It’d been tough as hell when Sandrine had woken in the morning to the alarm going off. Her serene, almost shy and surprised smile as she’d looked up at me – at realizing that I wasstill there, had wrenched something in my heart left of center and it stayed there, like a bone out of joint. This grinding ache in my chest with every throbbing beat that only disappeared or eased when her green eyes turned luminous with pure joy as she looked at me.

I’d taken her again, slow, and passionate. Her body twining around mine, the way she draped off me so beautifully, as though she adorned me like Spanish moss from the old oak around here.

Fuck, I’d loved it. I’d loved it even more washing her clean in the shower, kissing her languidly, knowing it’d likely be a minute before I got to do it again.

“Real estate market is fucking balls,” I grated and the rest of the guys who were around the table perked up and looked at me.

“You lookin’?” Hex asked.

“Yeah,” I begrudgingly admitted.

It was theonlything I’d looked at for the last three days. That and crunching both sets of numbers – not just for my job but for what I could get for what I had banked. While I could afford something decent, I didn’t think anything would be nice enough to bring her into. Plus, I didn’t haveshitto fill a house with nor did I honestly have a fucking clue or care on decorating and that led me to the next problem I was wrestling with.

I wanted her to do it, but I knew it was out of pocket. I knew it was way too much for what I’d told her we’d needed to be.

“Shit,” Louie said with a big stupid grin. “You really fucking like her.”

I glared at him.

“You seriously being all Ms. Suzy Homemaker over agirl?” Axeman demanded.

“Why else would he consider buying a place?” LaCroix asked, his dark tattooed gaze locked on me, making me itch between my shoulder blades under the scrutiny.

“Wait, the chippy from the bar?” Axeman asked. “The dancing queen?”

“Don’t,” I warned him.

“Yeah, Sandy’s real nice.” Louie was frowning at Axe and I felt myself nodding along.

“Sounds like you got yourself bit by the looooove bug,” Chainsaw teased. My expression darkened as I played idly with my beer, running my fingers up and down the condensation on the outside of the bottle.

“Yeah,” I grumbled. “And how’d that work out for the last woman in that position?”

The table fell silent and Hex huffed a bit of a sardonic laugh and said, “Well, I reckon we don’t know on a kind of you’ve never told us about any of that. Only Ruth?—”

“What Ruth knew, you knew.” I fixed Hex with a look.

He nodded slowly and admitted what we all knew already. “Ain’t a fuckin’ thing go down around here that I don’t know about. It’s true.”

“So, you know,” I said and he nodded slowly.

“So,youknow it wasn’t your fault.”

I snorted and he fixed me with a hard look.

“Uh, anyone wanna share with the rest of the class? Y’all over here talking in code and shit.” Cypress leaned back in his seat and looked frustrated. I didn’t blame him. A bunch of shit had gone down with his family and the Bayou Brethren, and a shit ton of dirty secrets had spilled out about his sister and their childhood – about his nephew and where he’d come from.

It’d been some bitter fuckin’ pills for him to swallow, and I had to think that secrets in general were persona non grata in his life. By the same token, it wasn’t his life, it was mine, and some pains needed to remain private – even if they weren’t necessarily a secret.

“Rather not, if it’s cool with you,” I said. “Doesn’t involve you or any of yours. This is a lot of shit from way back, before the club.”

“Involves you, don’t it?” he shot back. “You’re my brother, so if’n you don’t mind that definitely falls under ‘me and mine,’ you fucking asshole.”

I laughed, and there was laughter around the table as I said, “Touché, motherfucker.”

“This is Louisiana, not Mississippi or Alabama,” he shot back, but his stern look had been replaced with a cheesy grin.

There was some more tittering laughter around the table as Saint came in and took his seat around the table, and asked, “What’s so funny?”

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