Page 33 of Hero: Claimed

In the back hallway, I walk past several rooms. One of them belongs to Blue and one to Blaze. I stop first in front of Blue’s door with my fist raised to knock when I hear a distinctly male grunt followed immediately by a female, “Oh, god.” So, Blue’s out. Next, I walk down to Blaze’s room and when I knock, the door squeaks open and I see Blaze leaning against his unmade bed, hunched forward with a spoon in one hand and a lighter in the other. A sour, chemically smell creeps toward me and I pull the door shut to keep him from discovering me there. Users can be unpredictable when they’ve been caught using and I don’t want any part of his wrath.

How do I tell Levi? Would he even believe me? I mean, I know what I saw. The Pythons are a clubfullof addicts. Including my dad.Shoot. Well, I’m not going to the store anytime soon, but Levi still needs to be fed and even though my heart’s not in it any longer, I raid the clubhouse kitchen to come up with a meal for us.

With Blaze still on my mind, I head back outside into the cold. My mood lifts when I open the door to my new home. Warmth suffuses the space, pouring out of the open door at me, and not just from the heat of the pellet stove, but seeing that beautiful new sofa and recliners filling the space.

Thank goodness I learned how to cook. From the haphazard ingredients I managed to whip up a pumpkin, sage, and mushroom lasagna with cream sauce, breadsticks, and a big salad. While the lasagna bakes, I scrub down the table—I mean, it had been sitting in a warehouse until we purchased it and warehouses have rodents and the like. There’s purloined beer chilling in the fridge next to the salad. Okay, next on the list is to set the table, which is only complete when I light the candles brought from our room in the clubhouse when I brought over the bed linens.

It looks amazing and smells amazing-er. I’m so caught up in cleaning and cooking, I don’t notice the front door open until Levi’s voice carries through the space. “Saw the lights blazing.”

My heart jumps as I walk over to him, wiping my hands on a towel. “Welcome home, Levi.”

The heat that blazes in his eyes startles me for a moment and I take a small step back instead of advancing forward. Levi halts my retreat, capturing me in his strong arms. “Fuck, bird,” he whispers right before he kisses me, and it might be one of the best kisses of my life.

Before we can get too invested in the kiss, a kiss where he’s already slid his hand under my blouse, gliding the back up slowly as if to divest me from it, his other hand firmly on my backside, the timer on the oven goes off. Of course, it does. He ends the kiss, pressing his forehead against mine, shaking it slowly from his silent laugh, so it rubs against mine at the same time and we both sigh.

“It’ll be worth it,” I promise, my hands still gripping his cut, unwilling to be the first to end the moment.

“Already is,” he says back and I’m certain he’s not talking about the lasagna. Finally, Levi proves he’s the stronger of the two of us, dropping his hands and stepping back on one foot. “Baby.” He whispers that one word, shaking his head again, this time as if shaking off a trance.

I clear my throat. “Go wash up,” I order because with him this close, filling all my senses, food is the last thing on my mind and the man works hard. He deserves a full belly.

He walks to the bathroom and I turn to pull the pan from the stove, setting it on a hot pad in the center of the new table, between the lit candles. The already-dressed salad and platter of breadsticks also rest between the candles.

“Bird, this is amazing.” He pulls a chair to sit while I bring him his chilled beer.

“Thanks, babe. I thought since they delivered the new furniture, you’d want to christen the new place.”

“They brought the bed, so yeah, Idefinitelywant to christen the place,” he answers right away and I chuckle softly. The man always has some form of canoodling on the brain, and I must admit, I’m down with it, too.

We spend the next hour or so eating, drinking and discussing our days—the good and the bad for him, but only the good for me since I’m not ready to ruin this night with Blaze’s issues. It’s not until I feel like he’s going to have to roll me away from the table that the meal officially comes to an end. Then, in true Levi fashion, he convinces me to wait on cleaning up by using his lips and hands and feet to move me back into the bedroom. The freshly made bed doesn’t stay freshly made for long. And the things he does to me, tonight, well, let’s say it’s a good thing we have our own place because everyone would know what we’ve been up to otherwise.

Between rounds four and five, I snuggle next to Levi and ask against his chest, “Do you think it’s okay for me to go out without a guard yet?”

“Don’t know, bird. It bothers me, that asshole finding out where you are. I gotta keep you safe… Why?”

“I couldn’t find anyone to take me to the store and had to pilfer the clubhouse stockpiles for tonight’s feast.”

He laughs. “I’ll replace it, don’t worry.” And everything about the conversation is so… so… domestic. Nothing like I pictured when I first met him.

We fall asleep naked and content to be so. Both of us got so caught up in our evening’s activities that we forgot to set an alarm, meaning as wonderfully languorous as our evening had been, we’re rushing around like a couple of chickens with our heads cut off this morning. I’d brought over some of our clothing when I brought the blankets, but aside from a quick dual shower, there’s not much time for anything else, including making breakfast, which I thought I’d get to do for him. We don’t have a coffeemaker yet. I was going to brew it on the stovetop, but that’ll take too long.

I look at Levi, shoving his keys into his pocket. “I tried.”

“Baby, you did more than try. The whole reason we’re behind is because you were so goddamn successful.”

Okay, well, I suppose as evenings go, it had been spectacularly successful. He holds his hand out to me and I take it. Before we leave, he drapes the brown leather jacket that he’d loaned me that day over my shoulders. It’s freezing outside this morning—probably one of the coldest days we’ve had this year—and it’s still dark. With his arm around my shoulder keeping me pulled close, we walk over to the clubhouse to grab coffee. We both desperately need coffee.

Hannah has the sweet dark roasted nectar of the gods brewing when we walk into the common. The sweet smell of brown sugar and maple fills the room. “Hey, sissy,” I call over to her.

“Oatmeal’s on the stove, guys. Have at it,” she responds and I kiss her cheek as Levi and I pass her.

He grabs two bowls from the cabinet for us and I fill them with the simmering gruel, topping them with the brown sugar, raisins, cinnamon, butter, and milk. Levi and I stand against the wall eating in our own little private circle when I think about Hannah and Blood in the next room and that we should probably go mingle, despite how much I enjoy having him all to myself. Apparently, we’ve become the couple who can read each other’s thoughts because without me having to say a word, he slides his arm around my back to lead me back out to the bar.

Now, with some coffee giving life to my brain, I’m aware of Blue and evenBlazesitting at the bar eating. Blaze. What the hell am I supposed to do with that situation? It makes me lose my appetite, but if I don’t eat, my man will definitely get suspicious, so with a sour stomach, I continue to shovel oatmeal in my mouth while purposely avoiding looking at Blaze, even when he says, “Hey, Brin.”

“Hey,” I say back to my spoon around a mouthful of cereal. Eye contact, who needs eye contact? I’ve got food. I’m a big girl. No one would suspect anything but that I really enjoy my oatmeal. That’s when Duke, Caitlin, and two young kids—that is Duke carrying the baby and Jade walking in holding her mom’s hand—enter the clubhouse and neither Duke nor Caitlin look happy. As a matter of fact, they look downright annoyed. The kids just look tired. I feel them. I wish it were the weekend again so Levi and I could stay in our brand-new bed to cuddle the morning away.

“S’up, prez?” Blood asks.

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