There were a lot of things she wanted him to do but it was her turn first.
“Just stand there.”
A bus lumbered by outside as Reese reached him. She was dropping to her knees to take him in her mouth when she heard Claire call out, “Hi! I’m home. What are you guys up to?”
The door slammed. Reese froze half bent, before recovering herself to step in front of Knight, attempting to block him from Claire’s view.
Knight made a choking, strangled sound.
Claire screamed. “Ohmigod. Oh, shit, Derek!” She closed her eyes tight and clutched her hands in front of them. “Yuck, yuck, I think I burned out my retinas! Why don’t you guys put a note on the door or something?”
Knight’s cheeks were a dusky red, in what Reese thought was the closest she was ever going to see him to a blush. He bent over and tugged on his pants without underwear and hastily zipped them up. “A sign on the door that says what?”
He backed up towards his bedroom, swiping the rest of his clothes off the floor. “You can open your eyes now.”
“How about a sign that says Do Not Disturb?” Claire popped one eye open and peered through her fingers, like she didn’t trust what she might see.
“This isn’t a hotel. So I guess if you’re going to live here we’ll have to make some adjustments.”
“Oh, didn’t Reese tell you? I guess you were toopreoccupied.She and I found a sublet together. We move in on Friday and have it for three months. Cool, huh?”
Knight didn’t look like he thought it was cool. His jaw dropped, he shot Reese a frown, then stepped the final step back into his bedroom and slammed the door shut.
“Well, that was really embarrassing,” Claire said, tossing her hair back and dumping her purse on the couch. “Don’t you think?”
“Actually, I’m fine.” Unlike Knight, she still had her clothes on. If you didn’t count her panties, which were lying on the floor by the bookcase, but hopefully they weren’t noticeable. Now if Claire had walked in a minute later…that might have been embarrassing.
Reese sat down on the ivory couch next to Claire. It was another piece of furniture she wouldn’t have thought was Knight’s style. Curious, she asked Claire, “Did your brother pick out all this furniture? This isn’t as dated as his suits, if you know what I mean.”
Claire made a face. “Dawn picked this stuff out. When she left, she said Derek could have it, because she just wanted to move forward or something bitchy like that.”
She should have known. The couch was kind of ugly. And lumpy. What was that thing poking her in the butt?
Annoyed, she stood up.
“I’ll be right back, Claire.” She headed for the bedroom.
“Oh, take your time. I’ll just turn up the TV really loud.” Reese laughed and opened Knight’s bedroom door.
He was standing by the bed zipping up his jeans. He looked at her in alarm. “Don’t touch me, Reese.”
“What? Calm down.”
“I’m serious.” He held out his hand. “If you touch me, I’m not responsible for my actions and I really don’t want to fuck you with my sister in the next room.”
She rolled her eyes. “I’m not here to bang you. I wanted to talk to you about me moving in with Claire.”
He ran his hand through his hair, making it stick up. “Yeah, what exactly is that all about?”
“Well, I couldn’t afford to stay in the hotel for who knew how long. And Claire needed a roommate for the sublet for three months, which will give her time to find an apartment on her own. So it works out for everyone.”
His expression was unreadable. “You could have stayed with me, you know. ”
Yeah, if she wanted tocompletelyfall in love with him. No thanks.
“I didn’t think that was a good idea.” She wouldn’t be able to see him yawning out of sleep each morning, brushing his teeth and smiling at her over coffee and not want to just fling herself in his arms and beg him to let her stay permanently.
That was a struggle she could do without, when he so kindly explained that she was great in the short-term but she annoyed him too much for the long haul. It would be hard enough to spend the next three days with him.