Page 103 of Desperate Pucker
“What are you watching?” he asks, looking over at my laptop.
I turn around and see a paused still from the cat video.
“Oh.” I let out an embarrassed laugh. “I, um…I was watching funny cat videos to cheer myself up.”
His mouth curves up in an amused smile. “Did it work?”
I shake my head. He traces his fingers along the hinge of my jaw. “How are you feeling now?”
“Better now that you’re here.”
He takes me by the hand and leads me over to the desk chair.
He takes off his coat, sits down, and looks up at me. “Come here.”
I sit on his lap. He nods at my laptop screen. “That one’s pretty funny.” He pulls up another video. “Have you seen this one?”
A video starts playing of an orange-and-white cat stealing a loaf of bread from a counter and scampering off. Off camera, awoman scolds him in Russian while she tries to pry the loaf from his mouth.
I burst out laughing.
“You haven’t seen this one before?” Ryker says.
I shake my head, tearing up at how hard I’m laughing when the cat growls, refusing to give up the bread.
“I wish I could understand what she’s saying,” Ryker says.
“She’s saying, ‘Give me the bread! It’s bread, you fool! Give it!” I say between laughs.
Ryker looks at me, brow raised in surprise. “You speak Russian?”
“Only a little. A few of my figure skating coaches were Russian, so I picked up on some of it.”
We both laugh as the woman yanks up the loaf, but the cat refuses to let it go. Even when she lifts the loaf higher up, the cat holds on with its mouth and front claws, hanging in the air.
“What’s she saying now?” Ryker asks.
“‘Come on, Borya. Give it! Are you going to hang here long? Are you serious? Give it!’”
The bag bursts open and slices of bread go flying everywhere. Ryker and I fall forward, we’re both laughing so hard.
“She just called him a bastard. And a reptile,” I say.
After a minute, we stop laughing. He looks at me, his gaze warm. His fingers brush the hinge of my jaw.
“Better?” he asks in a soft, low voice.
I nod, then run my hand through his hair. He closes his eyes and hums.
“I know that wasn’t very friends-with-benefits-like behavior, the way I acted when I saw you with Alina.” Nerves crackle in my tummy at what I’m about to say. “I just don’t like the thought of you with another woman.”
“I don’t like the thought of you with another man,” he says without missing a beat.
I bite my lip. “What does that mean for us?”
I can’t commit to Ryker…but I don’t want him to be with anyone else.
“I think that means we shouldn’t see other people,” Ryker says.
