Page 93 of Resting Grump Face
Ryker points at the fresh wound on his head. “You knocked me out and then tied me up in your basement.”
I defend myself with a swing to his arm. He doesn’t move an inch, more dust swirling all around us.
“That was an accident. Paul thought you were a secret agent or something, trying to bust him for his secret booze operation down here.” I motion towards the table with his equipment.
“ATF!” I hear Paul claim from behind me. “ATF!”
“I didn’t even know about it until Earnest texted me to come to the basement… armed.”
“So no one’s making any drugs here?” Ryker’s pillow aims for my head, but I duck quickly enough and counter with a hit to his pecks.
“Depends on how you define drugs. Vodka, gin, nothing above 42 ABV, I believe. Paul was a distiller for almost 50 years, so he knows what he’s doing.”
My pillow hits Ryker square in the chest and makes him cough from all the dust coming out. I use the moment to land two more hits that make him stumble backwards. His legs catch on the edge of the couch and cause him to fall over right onto it. Without hesitation, I jump on top of him and raise my pillow for the final blow.
Predictably, Ryker has already deployed his best defense tactic. The back of his hand wipes over his face, revealing his immaculate smile.
Not this time.
I clutch the edge of my pillow, flex my muscles for the final blow and?—
“You know I love you too, right?”
For a moment, I stare at the tiny particles around us. A single beam of light shines down from the tiny window in the wall, illuminating Ryker’s face on one side only.
I do know that. I have been feeling it for a while now.
“I’m sorry I thought you were a weird stalking kidnapper. It’s just that… It’s…”
“You were expecting me to use you for a story, for your connections, like your ex?”
Ryker nods and lets his hands glide over my thighs and onto my back, carefully pulling me closer. “Can you forgive me?”
“Depends,” I say, let the pillow drop behind me, and place my hands on his chest as my face hovers over his. “Are you going to kick my friends…” I look over to where I expect the O-Team to be but only see an empty basement.
“They left when we started fighting,” Ryker explains, gently grabs my chin and pulls it towards himself. “Or making up. But no, of course not. I won’t kick them out. I wasn’t going to do that either way. You know, I had that meeting with Dicky set up almost two weeks ago when you found out about the eviction of all the residents. I was going to buy the building in case my lawyers couldn’t figure out a solution. So I’m thinking, as their new slumlord, your friends probably deserve a rent decrease. How does free sound? For all the trouble they had to go through.”
“Like kidnapping you?”
Ryker smiles. “Only fair, isn’t it? Now stop talking about the geriatric gangsters and fucking kiss me already.”
When our lips finally meet, it’s like all my worry, all my anxiety is blown away once again. I want to stay mad at him at least a little longer, but I don’t think I have it in me.
The heavy hand in my neck makes me feel secure, protected, and the hips that grind against mine cause me to get wet inan instant. Or maybe that’s the water I sprayed onto his crotch earlier, it’s hard to tell.
Ryker struggles to kick the pillow-weapon that’s wedged between his thighs off. So I grab it, hit him square in the face, and throw it away.
“Sorry, had to make sure you can’t claim you didn’t lose this fight either.”
My Ryker smiles and relaxes underneath me. “If this is what losing to you is like, then I’ll be the happiest loser there ever was.”
It takes us no time at all to get undressed. The making up part, however, takes a while. We make up on the sofa, we make up on the floor in front of it, we even make up against a barrel filled with illegal contraband.
35
RYKER
Our plan of confronting Barb the next day is foiled by our urge to fornicate instead. After we reconcile in the basement of Haven, we spend the next couple of days in my bed, only taking breaks to eat takeout, shower, and sleep every once in a while.
