“Okay. I’m…making coffee.”
“Good.”
“Good.”
Neither of us moves.
We just stand there in this elegant hallway, two feetapart, breathing the same air.
I’m ridiculously aware of how tall he is and how enticing he smells. And the way the veins in his forearms vibrate when he’s tense. It’s something I’ve noticed in class. Like when Vienna asks him questions and spins everything into a proposition for sex.
Before I can talk myself out of it, I step closer. Just one step. Enough to tilt my chin up and press a soft kiss to the edge of his jaw.
“If I didn’t tell you yesterday, thank you, husband,” I whisper against his skin.
His breath hitches, and his hands close around my waist, but I’m not sure if he wants to pull me closer or push me away. It’s…neutral. Just a grip.
“You did. It all happened fast…wife.”
Surprised by the playfulness, I force myself to turn away before I jump him. Or completely crumble in front of him. I pretend I don’t feel his stare on my back as I wander toward the kitchen.
He heads off toward the primary bathroom for his shower. I pull at the collar of my tracksuit, telling myself it’s just the heat that kicked on and not how Cormac’s hands gripped my waist when I kissed him.
Staring at this vast kitchen with miles of cabinets, I wonder where the coffee is. I’m going to be living here, I’ll need to figure out where everything is, but I don’t have the brain space to memorize it all.
From a drawer on the island that separates the kitchen from the living room, I find a pad of yellow sticky notes and a pen.
Hmm. A woman would have put this here.
Ignoring that, I go through each cabinet, shocked at the neatness and organization. In the cabinet with pastas and soups, I grab a can, expecting to see it out of date, but nope.
Without processing that, I jot down ‘pastas and soups’ on the sticky and slap it on the cabinet door. I go through the entire row and grumble when I don’t spot coffee anywhere.
He drinks it. I’ve seen him.
I’m about to get started on the bottom row when Cormac walks in, dressed in jeans and a sweater appropriate for the fall weather cooling every inch of the city. He looks like he’s stepped off the set of a movie, and I feel like I’ve been hanging around the Craft Services table too long.
As I straighten, his eyes hit me, and something hungry flashes in his eyes. His nostrils flare. His jaw clenches.
“Hey,” I rasp, heat shooting straight to my knees. “Sorry, I didn’t find the coffee yet.”
His eyes narrow at the messy stickies all over his million-dollar kitchen. An exaggeration, of course, but that’s how the power dynamic imbalance feels right now.
His throat bobs once, and he says, “I have those pods.”
He brushes past me and opens a wide cabinet door on a hinge. Behind the door is a coffee maker and an espresso machine. Next to it is a tall cylinder filled with coffee pods in various flavors.
A buzzer spins me around. I’m not sure where it came from, but my heart spikes.
Pierce… He found me already.
I’m not afraid of the weasel, so long as I have working legs to knee him in the balls. I’m just afraid of being a hassle for Cormac. A nuisance.
Cormac puts a hand on my shoulder to settle me down. “Relax. It’s breakfast. I ordered something before I went into the shower.”
Yeah, he smells like soap and powder, and his skin is still a little damp.
“You, you bought breakfast for you…and me?” Myvoice cracks like he just gave me a kidney.