Total pages in book: 55
Estimated words: 55769 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 279(@200wpm)___ 223(@250wpm)___ 186(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 55769 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 279(@200wpm)___ 223(@250wpm)___ 186(@300wpm)
She turned her head and pressed it against the side of his neck.
“Love you,” she whispered, so soft, it was good he had excellent hearing.
“Love you too,” he whispered back, not nearly as soft, and slanted his head to tell her what he wanted.
She gave it to him, her mouth.
He kissed her as he shifted her to her back, him on top.
When he stopped kissing her, he lifted his head and looked down at her through the shadows of her darkened bedroom.
When they got married, started a family, they’d have to move. It’d suck. He’d been coming to this duplex for as long as he could remember. It reminded him of Grandma Ellen, a woman always full of vibrancy and energy and love. And now it was all about Indy, who was all of the same.
But it was too small for a family.
However, even when they moved, he was giving Indy a free hand to decorate their bedroom.
This room was her. The real her. All woman. The power of the feminine. Having it and flaunting it. But there was a delicacy to it. Her hidden core. The softness. The sweetness. The vulnerability she refused to show, except to the man who she let sleep at her side.
And that was powerful too.
He felt like an invader in this room. He’d worked hard for the honor of being in her bed.
It was part of the spoils of winning India Savage.
He’d wanted her since he knew what girls could be to boys.
Now she was his.
And he didn’t ever want to lose that feeling.
“Is there a second wave of people you need to call to tell what happened with Cherry?” he teased.
She’d been on the phone all afternoon. He might be wrong, but he thought she’d even made a call to a friend in England.
“Not exactly,” she returned. “But there will be follow up that’s necessary to bask in the afterglow.”
He grinned at her through the dark.
With the sudden change in her vibe, Lee knew what was coming when she rested her hand on his cheek and swept her thumb over his lips.
“Those marks on her face—” she began, her voice now quiet, concern threading through it.
And there was the softness.
The sweetness.
The real Indy.
Absolutely at the top of his list.
Even so.
“You’re not responsible,” he replied firmly.
“Her car exploded, Lee.”
“You’re still not responsible.”
“I know, but—”
“I get it. Wilcox isn’t available for her to be mad at, but that doesn’t mean she gets to take her shit out on you. You didn’t plant that bomb. You also didn’t walk up to her while she was enjoying a night out with her girls and say nasty shit to her or in front of her mother. Honest to God, if that car bomb hadn’t happened, and she walked into LD and saw us, what do you think she’d do?”
“Come over to visit and spread her brand of bitchy cheer all over our burritos.”
“Exactly.”
“No one should mess with an LD burrito,” she mumbled.
“Gorgeous,” he called tersely to get her complete attention.
“What?”
“It sucks that happened to her. But if you don’t learn your lesson not to be a total asshole after rollin’ around in hot and sour soup, when your car explodes, you learn. If you don’t, it’s fair game how those lessons are taught. I don’t suspect today’s gonna turn her into Mother Theresa, but maybe it’ll have penetrated, even a little bit.”
“I’m not sure. Cherry has pretty fortified bitch defenses.”
Lee started chuckling, even if that was true.
“I mean, what she did to you,” she continued. “It was pretty ballsy she went on the offensive at all, considering your history.”
“Agreed.”
“Are you…over that?”
“I didn’t knock her up, fortunately, so I was over it after I finished things with her. But I don’t want to have to buy an industrial washing machine to clean your clothes should there be a next go ’round with you and her. Denver is a big city. But it isn’t big enough for the two of you if she doesn’t back off.”
“It wasn’t me who threw the soup,” she informed him.
“Whatever,” he muttered.
“It wasn’t.” That was more heated.
Lee sighed. “Honey, can this be the last time Cherry is in our bed?”
She gave that a second to mull over, then agreed. “Absolutely.”
He kissed her quick then pulled them both out of bed so they could do the sex clean up and hit it to actually sleep.
He had her pinned mostly under him in bed, the soft drone of traffic on Broadway one block away acting as their white noise, and he was close to drifting off. He already thought she had, when she mumbled sleepily, “I forgot to tell you. Ally texted while I was talking to Marianne. She scored some tickets to RHCP.”
Well…
Shit.
At least whatever he was in for wouldn’t be boring.
And fuck him, he’d never admit it, not out loud, but whatever it was, he was looking forward to it.