Page 48 of At Last

14.

Caitlin

There’s a knock on the front door.

I lay the roller down on the tray to rest in the rich, almost copper-hued tan paint the home store labeled “suede”. A flat color, it looks like suede as it dries. And I pull the rag tucked into the waistband of my old sweatpants to wipe what wet paint I can from my hands while I move to answer.

Why would one of the brothers or their old ladies use the front? From the time Jade and I started staying hereallour guests use the side entrance. That first dinner party we threw being the only exception, and really, that one is on me. I greeted our guests from the front, holding the door open to welcome them.

Paint had already dried in my hair and dried in patches on my face, seeing as before I started on the living room, I gave Jade back her pink, princess bedroom just as Duke had decreed.

Yesterday couldn’t have been anymore special. I woke up to my first Saturday in Duke’s house naked with him holding me, different from the rest of the mornings since we’d been here because on those days, I woke up naked and alone in bed. Those days he’d gotten up with my daughter to make her breakfast.

I stretched then snuggled even closer to him when I felt his eyes on me. Tilting my head to look at him, his silver-gray eyes smiled with crinkled lines around the corners as he ordered, “Lips.”

To which I happily obliged. Long, sweet and even tinged with morning breath—delicious.

After I pulled back he bizarrely ordered, “Mouth.”

Mouth?But I’d just given him that.

“Huh?” I asked, blinking several times.

“I ain’t had your mouth on me since Nashville. My dick is hard and twitching, and I need you to suck me Doc. Suck me like you did that night.”

So I did. But unlike Nashville, he gave me minewhileI was giving him his.

When we finished, he kissed me deep again. Duke, I found, liked to kiss. And he was good at it. So good. Incredibly good. “Best I ever had,” he whispered against my cheek, lips moved to press there.

From there we commenced showering, dressing and heading out to the kitchen where I made him and Jade my special Belgian waffles with Bing cherry compote and whipped cream.

I found it odd, what with it being almost June in Kentucky, that he ordered me to wear jeans. Since I figured Duke had a reason for that, I had. As well as Jade.

While my little girl and I were finishing the breakfast dishes, I heard a loud thump like a box plopped on the island, behind us. When I turned, I found I was close. It was two boxes stacked one on top of the other. The top one being smaller.

He handed the smaller box off to Jade, the bigger one to me. We pulled the tops off to reveal black, leather boots for me. Sexy, flat three-inch heel biker boots. For my girl, he’d gotten her leather boots, oh yeah. Pink, little girl Harley boots.

She.

Squealed.

Who even knew they made pink leather boots?

“What’s this for?” I asked. Because I knew leather boots would not come cheap.

“Put ’em on.” Was his answer. “Follow me.”

Both Jade and I pulled our boots on and scurried outside to join Duke next to the carport. Not next to his truck, though it was there. Or what I’d come to think of as my truck, thought that was there, too. But his Harley. Now I know nothing about models, all I know, it was a huge black and chrome monster with one of those sleek, black sidecars attached. Inside the sidecar sat a Jade-sized pink leather jacket to match her boots, and a pink helmet with ‘Harley Princess’ scrawled in a pretty periwinkle script across each side.

Commence squeal number two.

He had a black jacket and helmet for me.

I started to ask when he’d done this but he shut me up by cupping the back of my head with one of his enormous hands and pulling my face in for a quick lip touch.

Without her even having to ask, when he finished with me, he bent over to give my daughter her kiss as well. She was training a big, burly,badassbiker.

And further, he went on to pluck her up in his arms and drop her inside the sidecar where he got her situated and buckled.

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