Page 49 of Cognac Secrets

“We are?” she asked and turned to look at the plastic draped front porch.

“It doesn’t look like much right now,” I confessed. “It’s a major work in progress, but it’s mine,” I told her.

“You bought ahouse?” she asked, astonished.

“I did,” I said, grinning.

Her green eyes sparkled in the dim and distant street light from up the block.

“How? I mean,why?” she asked.

“It was time,” I said with a lift of one shoulder into a shrug that I knew was way too nonchalant for the situation. I mean, buying a house was a big deal. Especially for a guy like me… I didn’t do roots. I didn’t do permanence. Staring into Sandrine Starkweather’s eyes from inches away as I’d drawn her into my arms on that early summer sidewalk, I realized part of the reason for that.

There was just something about her that felt likehome…which was terrifying in and of itself if and when I really stopped to think about it.

I mean, I’d loved Mia heart and soul – or so I’d thought, but I’dneverfelt like I did with Sandrine.

This was something else… something different… something special and the feelings I harbored when I looked at her were something incredibly secret. Something I wasn’t comfortable with anyone knowing, something I wasn’t comfortable drawing attention to. A secret drowning in cognac and a breath I’d hold until the day I’d die at this rate.

The way I felt about Sandrine was something incredible. Something that could be dangerous if the knowledge fell into the wrong hands – and Iknewwith the front part of my brain that was a throwback to having to keep everything on the down-low with Mia, and that Sandrinewas notin any way, shape, or form, my woman who had died… but I still was wrestling with fully reconciling these similar but not the same feelings.

I was a hot mess. I knew that. I was wrecked in so many more ways than by grief… but I was trying here, and I have to tell you – that had to count for something, didn’t it?

“So, all this being cagey, and sneaky, and putting me off was because youbought a house?” she asked. “Why didn’t you tell me!?” she demanded.

I laughed and asked her, “What did you think I was doing?”

“Somebody else,” she said with a grin. “Just that you didn’t want to tell me for whatever reason.”

I felt my face grow serious, maybe too serious, as I shook my head slowly.

“Nobody else,” I said drawing her into me, my hands sliding into the back pockets of her jeans.

“I mean, it’s fine if you were,” she said softly. “That’s the arrangement we have after all… right?”

“Right,” I hedged carefully… and I asked before I could stop myself. “What about you? You fucking anybody else?” I was closing the gap between us, and she sucked in a sharp breath, shivering like she’d suddenly caught a chill when it was like the high seventies out here, pushing eighty.

“No,” she breathed, her breath washing over my lips.

“You sure?” I asked playfully, a wicked edge to my voice as I teased her.

“I don’t want anybody else,” she blurted and immediately clapped both her hands over her mouth jerking back away from me, eyes wide and horrified at her slightly drunk confession.

Drunk thoughts; sober feelings…I immediately thought to myself.

She’d started the evening sober as a judge, but had loosened up as the night had gone on… and now she was standing in the circle of my arms confessing she didn’t want anybody else but me… andfuckwas that a high better than any fucking drugs or alcohol I could ever consume.

“Yeah?” I asked, pulling her back closer to me, sliding an arm up her back, pressing her gently with my hand, encouraging her to bring herself back in. She melted under my touch and became pliable, her own hands falling from her lips and sliding up my arms and around my shoulders.

“Is that bad?” she squeaked, panic painting her tone. “Did I just ruin this?”

I kept my eyes on hers, locking gazes, and shook my head very slowly, very carefully, as I creeped forward with every intention to kiss her fuckingbreathless…but at the same time, trying not to scare her when she was already skittish as hell and a bundle of nerves.

“Not bad at all, baby,” I murmured in reassurance just before our lips touched.

She made a small whimper when I kissed her, and her stiff posture in my embrace eased, her muscles loosening seemingly one group at a time, until she was pressed tight against my body, her arms locked around my shoulders, her hands pressing the back of my head, nails slightly digging into my scalp as she urgently pressed my mouth against hers.

Her tongue slid against mine in a sensual, sinuous dance, and I found myself moaning against her lips, pulling her in tight until she made a surprised almost squeal into my mouth and I quickly eased off in my enthusiasm.

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