Page 97 of His Surrender
“Would it be okay if I invited Emery and Cason over?” I asked. “I’d like you to meet them.”
“You sure you can stand being around Emery right now after the wonderful day you had with him?”
He was such a smart-ass. I loved it.
“Yeah,” I answered, arriving at my house. I got out of the car and walked toward the front door. “Cross and I have a thing we do after each big case. We usually go to the 906 and have a few drinks. Winner buys.”
“If you’d rather go out with him, you can.” A car door slammed on his end of the line, and I heard keys jingling. “I don’t want to break your tradition.”
“Breaking tradition is good sometimes,” I said, thinking of how much better my life had been since breaking my own habits and opening myself up to the possibility of romance.
After talking to Remi, I called Emery.
“You and Cason have plans tonight?”
“Not that I know of,” he answered. “I assumed you and I were going out for drinks. Though I don’t know who’s buying since we both got the shit end of the deal today.”
“Come to my place,” I said, walking into my house and closing the door. A purring machine attacked me, rubbing against my leg. “I want you to meet Remi.”
“So it’s really happened.”
“What has?”
“Jay Foley, playboy extraordinaire, has fallen in love.”
“Shut up and get your ass over here.” I disconnected the call and bent down to greet Sputnik.
Love. I had told Remi I loved him while drunk, and I’d meant every word. But I hadn’t mentioned it since then. I didn’t know how to bring it up, and I guess I was too much of a chicken to just blurt it out.
The first man I’d ever saidI love youto had left me. Those three words seemed small in theory, but they held the mass of the sun. They could crush you if you weren’t careful.
I stripped out of my suit and freshened up in the bathroom before changing into jeans and a shirt. Instead of eating out, I’d wanted to cook. It relaxed me and helped clear my head. I had just dropped the noodles into the pot for the spaghetti when I heard a door slam. I walked over to see Remi walking toward the house. Emery’s Lexus pulled in right behind him. I returned to the stove as the meat in the skillet began to sizzle.
“Door’s open,” I called from the kitchen once hearing a knock.
“You don’t watch horror movies, do you?” Cason said, entering the kitchen like he owned the place. The kid had swagger. “I could’ve come in with guns blazin’. Or I could’ve been a serial killer who planned to abduct you by throwing you into my trunk and driving you out to my secret run-down cabin in the middle of the woods.”
I looked at Emery as he came to stand by his boyfriend. “You need to limit his movie time.”
Emery chuckled before pulling Cason against his side and kissing his temple. “We like our crime documentaries.”
“Hell yeah we do,” Cason said. “We just watched one about a dude who had a bunch of tigers.”
Cason’s ramblings about the show turned to background noise as my gaze landed on Remi. He wore red skinny jeans, a black shirt with a pinstriped vest over it, and his hair was swooped back in a classic style. He looked like a little rocker, and my blood rushed south.
I was suddenly thankful for my decision to put on jeans instead of the stretchy athletic pants I’d almost worn. There would’ve been no disguising the boner I was pitching.
“Oh, sorry. I didn’t mean to be rude,” Cason said, looking at Remi and holding out his hand. “I’m Cason.”
Remi shook his hand. “I’m Remi. Nice to meet you.”
I set the spatula on a napkin and walked over to greet Remi with a light kiss to his lips. He gripped my shirt when I started retreating and gave me another, this one lasting longer. When we pulled apart, Emery and Cason were watching us—Cason with wide eyes and Emery with a soft smile.
“What?” I asked. “Why are you two staring at us like that?”
“I just never thought I’d see the day when the blond bastard finally settled down,” Cason said.
Remi snorted a laugh. “You weren’t kidding about the blond bastard thing.”
