Page 69 of A Favor Owed
“What?”
“That’s our deal. We can hide whatever we want but no lies.”
He puts his beer down and nods slowly. “You’re right. That’s the deal. No lies, no blowing our cover. Right?”
I swallow back the dread rising in my throat like bile.
As if sensing that I’m about to bolt, he comes over to me and takes my face in his hands. “I’m not ready for that dead end, Ange. Are you?”
I stare at him. “No,” I whisper.
“The most important stuff I know about you I started learning on the first day of class, when Baker called on you with some bullshit question and you handed him his ass. The best stuff I know about you I’ve learned since I kissed you in the jacuzzi. Nothing else matters, okay?”
“Okay.” I still don’t have a voice.
“I think we need to modify our deal.” He brushes a strand of hair out of my face and tucks it behind my ear. “No questions. Questions lead to dead ends. What do you think?”
I don’t want the road to end. I don’t want to lose him, not yet, not when there’s no risk to him. I don’t want to unleash a flood of dangerous truths and slam into that dead end.
“Deal,” I whisper.
He pulls me against him, wraps his arms around me. “Everything’s okay,” he says. “Don’t freak out on me, all right? Are you freaking out?”
“No,” I murmur against his chest. Now that I’m over the initial shock, I’m irrationally but ecstatically happy that he figured out this detail about me. I’m terrified about how I may have let slip the dots he’s connected, but I’m so desperate for him to know the real me that it doesn’t matter. I’m practically giddy over it.
“Cool.” He slaps my ass. “I’m gonna finish making dinner.”
“I’ll help you.”
“Well, now that we’ve established you’re Italian,” he says with a cocked brow that makes me laugh, “I think it’s safe to let you in the kitchen. Do you know how to cook?”
“Not really, but my pasta always comes out al dente.”
“Good enough for me.” He puts a pot of water on the stove to boil and hands me a box of imported pasta. “Knock yourself out.”
“So what’s the occasion?” I ask when we’re sitting down to dinner.
“You’ve survived a week of living with me,” he says. “I thought that was worth celebrating.”
“I’ll drink to that.” I hold up my glass of Chianti.
“Slainte,” he says, tapping my glass with his beer bottle.
“Salut,” I say in Italian, smiling.
After dinner, I go to the bedroom to change. Most of my clothes were ruined in the fire, so I’ve taken to wearing Brady’s T-shirts to bed. I’ve just slipped one on when he comes in.
“Damn, Pines,” he says, running his hands down my body as he looks at my reflection in the mirror. I watch my face heat up as he trails kisses down my neck. It heats up even more when he pulls the shirt over my head. “Look at you,” he whispers. But I’m looking at him, at the expression on his face. It’s desire and awe and something else, something more vulnerable.
I turn in his arms, and he exhales as though he’s been holding his breath. His hands trail over my back and down to my underwear as I pull his shirt over his head and undo his jeans. He backs us up to the bed and sits down on it, hiking my legs up and around his waist. I press myself tightly against him and kiss him, the friction of my breasts on his chest making both of us groan.
He unbraids my hair and threads his fingers through it while kissing me from my temple down to my shoulder.
“Have I ever told you how much I love this tattoo?” he murmurs, tracing it with his fingers and his lips. “It’s another thing that gets me hard at inappropriate times.”
“Fortunately, this is not an inappropriate time,” I say, my voice tight with desire.
“No, it is not,” he agrees. “I can’t think of a more appropriate time, in fact.” He pulls me farther onto the bed with him, until my head hits the pillow and he’s on top of me. He slides my underwear off before going for his boxers.
