The Pact

by Max Monroe

  “I’m the asshole?” I retort and nod toward his attire. “Says the man who’s standing in front of me in a T-shirt that looks like he joined the Girl Scouts.”

  Jude glances down at his chest and grins. “Sophie got it for me. Well, actually, I got Sophie the first one, and then she got me one too. It’s a Secret Club T-shirt.”

  I still have no idea what that means.

  “The badges have to be earned.” He waggles his brows. “You want to know how I earn my badges?”

  I shake my head. “Nope.”

  “What?” he questions. “Why not?”

  “Because it’s pretty damn obvious it’s related to sexual shit, and I’d prefer to stay oblivious to your sex life.”

  “Like I’d even fucking tell you. What happens in the Secret Club stays in the Secret Club.”

  “Fantastic,” I respond and decide it’s high time I got the hell moving. Not only do I have a dinner to make, but I need to stop at the grocery store to pick up a few things.

  Jude calls out toward me, something about being a dick, but I just lift my hand in a wave and head toward the subway. Though, once I find an empty seat toward the back of the train, I can’t stop myself from starting some shit on my youngest brother’s behalf.

  Phone in hand, I fire off a text in the ongoing group chat with my brothers.

  Me: Jude’s in the Girl Scouts now. And, personally, after seeing his T-shirt with all the badges he’s earned, I’m really proud of him.

  Knowing my brothers, it’s only going to take that one text to get them going.

  Ty: Aw, congrats, bro! Let me know when you’re selling cookies because I’ll buy a shitload from you. Especially Thin Mints. Those fuckers are like candy-coated crack.

  Remy: That’s awesome, man. What’s your troop number?

  See what I mean?

  Jude: I’m not in the fucking Girl Scouts, you idiots.

  Ty: But you earn badges?

  Jude: Sophie and I earn badges.

  Remy: So, you and Sophie are in the Girl Scouts?

  Jude: I’m thirty-eight fucking years old, and I’m a man, bro. I’m not in the Girl Scouts.

  Ty: But you earn badges?

  Jude: Yes. It’s a thing between Sophie and me, and Flynn is just being a lying prick.

  Remy: Are you sure you’re not in the Girl Scouts?

  Ty: Right? It sounds like the Girl Scouts.

  Jude: Fuck you guys. It’s not the damn Girl Scouts, it involves orgasms, you dicks.

  Ty: Dude, does your troop leader know about this? I feel like you guys are going to get kicked out.

  Jude: FUCK YOU GUYS.

  Ty: Okay, but don’t forget to let us know when you’re selling cookies.

  Jude: I HATE ALL OF YOU. ESPECIALLY YOU, FLYNN. I KNOW YOU’RE READING THESE TEXTS BUT NOT RESPONDING, YOU CRYPTIC BASTARD.

  I smirk to myself and slide my phone into my pocket. I know I keep shit close to the vest, but I can’t deny this conversation gave me a hell of a lot of enjoyment.

  My phone buzzes a few more times in my pocket, most likely Ty and Remy still razzing Jude, but when the subway comes to a halt at my stop, I grab my duffel and head in the direction of the grocery store.

  I have a meal to cook and a wife to feed.

  Daisy

  “Honey, I’m home!” I exclaim as I walk through the door. Keys on the cute table I set up by the door, I kick off my heels and head straight into the kitchen with two bags of groceries where the delicious aromas of cheese and pasta and garlic fill my nose.

  “Oh wow, it smells good in here.”

  Flynn glances over his shoulder as he drains hot water from the pasta. “Dinner is almost ready.”

  “After the afternoon I’ve had dealing with Tara and her dramatics, this is the best news I’ve heard all day.”

  “I take it the Wicked Witch of the Real Estate East is still alive and well?”

  His commentary makes me giggle, but it’s also a pleasant surprise. Over the past few weeks, Flynn has received more than an earful regarding my lovely—more like, horrible—coworker, and apparently, he really did listen to everything I told him. “Oh yeah, alive and well and probably out buying a new broomstick as we speak.”

  I get to work on putting away groceries that consist of some fruit, yogurt, and frozen meals that can be cooked very quickly.

  Once everything is put away, I refocus on the man at the stove. In just jeans and a white T-shirt, Flynn looks…well, hot. With his tight ass and muscular back and biceps bulging beneath cotton, I could take a photo of him right now, post it on my Instagram account, and have thousands of men and women go nuts in a matter of minutes.

  And thirst traps aren’t even my aesthetic, but I know Flynn would spur a reaction.

  Probably because he’s doing exactly that to you right now…

  I make a valiant effort to shift my focus and note the creamy white sauce that bubbles in the skillet. I grin and walk over to the stove to discreetly dip my finger in for a quick taste test, but I’m stopped in my tracks when Flynn’s arms wrap around my waist.

  “Don’t even think about it,” he whispers into my ear, and before I know it, my bare feet are no longer touching the floor and I’m being carried over to the kitchen table. My ass is in the chair a few seconds later.

  It’s then that I realize the table is already set with plates and napkins and cutlery. A vase with a bouquet of flowers and two already-lit candles sit in the center.

  Holy moly, this is fancy. Like a romantic dinner date.

  Well, even if it’s temporary, he is your husband.

  An annoying pang sets up residence in my chest, but I don’t have time to question its cause because Flynn is leaning down and pressing a soft kiss to my lips.

  “You stay right here.”

  “Right here?” I tease, smiling up at him. “In this chair?”

  He smirks. “Yes.”

  “What if there’s a fire?”

  “I’ll handle it.”

  “What if I have to go pee?”

  “Hold it.”

  “What if—”

  He cuts me off with another kiss and proceeds to whisper firmly against my lips. “Keep that little ass of yours in this chair while I plate our food—or else.”

  “Or else what?” I waggle my eyebrows. “You gonna spank me?”

  “Oh, baby, don’t tempt me.” A deep, hearty chuckle rumbles his chest, but before I can do exactly that, he’s turning on his heel and heading back to the stove to plate our dinner.

  Forget the dumb stove and spank me with your penis!

  Okay…that was weird.

  Mind you, the dinner smells delicious, but all that spanking talk has my appetite focused on something else. A myriad of dirty-as-hell thoughts fill my head, and I shift a little in my seat.

  There has to be a way to put a pause on this dinner and revisit it a later time… I mean, that’s what microwaves are for, right?

  “Stop thinking whatever you’re thinking and prepare to enjoy the feast you demanded.”

  I look up to meet Flynn’s amused gaze as he sets two platefuls of fettuccine Alfredo with garlic bread on the table.

  “How do you know what I was thinking?”

  “Because you’ve got that look,” he answers cryptically and sits down in the chair across from mine.

  “What look?”

  He just smirks, doesn’t answer my question, and grabs his fork to dig in.

  “I didn’t have a look,” I state, but he is completely unfazed. “I didn’t have a look,” I repeat, but Flynn just twirls pasta around his fork to take a big bite.

  “Eat your food, babe,” he says once he finishes chewing. “After dinner, if you want to try to tempt me into spanking your sassy ass, be my guest.”

  Damn, can he read me that well?

  I put on a show of acting like I’m innocent and narrow my eyes at him. “I wasn’t thinking about that.”

  “Then what were you thinking about?” he challenges
, calling my bluff.

  “Uh…” I pause. Shit. “Um…couch…es…I was thinking about couches. For a new listing.”

  His steady gaze drips with “I call bullshit.”

  “Shut up,” I retort on a snort and proceed to take my first bite of Flynn’s fettuccine Alfredo. The instant the creamy pasta hits my taste buds, I practically fall out of my chair over how damn good it is. “Holy hell, you can, like, really cook.”

  Flynn looks up from his plate, and I don’t miss the amusement that flashes across his eyes. “Were you expecting something inedible?”

  “No… Well, maybe? I don’t know, but this is insanely good,” I answer, and an apologetic smile lifts the corners of my mouth. “I wasn’t doubting your cooking skills. I just didn’t know what to expect.”

  “You were expecting something revolting, which is why you brought home two bags of groceries,” he retorts with a sly grin.

  “I wasn’t.”

  He just stares at me.

  “Okay, fine. I was. I mean, I hoped you would exceed my expectations, but just in case the meal didn’t turn out, I grabbed a few easy-to-make options to have on hand as a backup.”

  “You brought home microwavable freezer meals, babe. I think it’s safe to say you were anticipating a fucking disaster.”

  “I wasn’t!” I exclaim through several giggles. “I mean, I might’ve had the fire department on standby just in case, but…”

  A soft, raspy chuckle jumps from his lungs.

  “So…is this meal a one-hit wonder? Or can you cook more things?” I question and take another bite of my pasta. “Because, seriously, Flynn, this is otherworldly.”

  “I can cook, Dais. Lots of shit,” he comments. “And I do recall I’ve made you a few things before. Steak. Eggs. Grilled chicken.”

  Okay, he has a point. He has cooked for me a time or two, but this is, like, gourmet kind of cooking. The type of cooking that involves spices I’ve probably never even heard of.

  “And how did you learn this awesome skill?”

  “I don’t know.” He shrugs. “My mom, my aunt Paula, a few cooking classes here and there.”

  “Wait…Flynn Winslow took cooking classes?”

  He furrows his brow. “That’s strange to you?”

  “I don’t know…” I look up at the ceiling and then back at him. “Maybe? I mean, you’re like the big, bad, sexy leather-jacket dude on a Harley, but you also cook like Julia flipping Child? It’s unexpected.”

  He just smirks and dives back into his food.

  And since I’m starving and this is the best damn fettuccine Alfredo I’ve ever tasted in my life, I do the same. But also, I make a mental note of the newest insight into Mr. Mystery.

  He can cook. Like, really cook.

  He’s even taken cooking classes!

  I don’t know why but the mere thought of Flynn in a cooking class makes me smile.

  “Why are you smiling?” he asks, surprising me, and I look up from my plate again to meet the depths of his ocean-blue eyes.

  “Because I’m a woman who loves delicious food, and one who just found out she’s married to Wolfgang Puck. Wait, no, Emeril Lagasse. No! Curtis Stone. Yeah, he’s the cutest of them all.” I wink. “Plus, the idea of you in a cooking class with a chef’s hat on is an amazing visual.”

  He shakes his head on a laugh. “I’ve never worn a chef’s hat in my life.”

  “Oh, don’t even try to ruin this visual, Flynn. In my fantasy, you’re definitely wearing a chef’s hat.”

  “In your fantasy?” he questions with a raise of one curious brow. “If you want me to fuck you with a chef’s hat on, all you have to do is say so.”

  “You wouldn’t, you liar.”

  He just stares back at me, and I know instantly, he actually would do that. Flynn Winslow is a man of his word. And he’s also a man I’m always desperate to find out more things about. Things that no one else knows. Only me.

  Yeah, yeah, yeah, but what about the chef’s hat fucking, Daisy? Or the spanking? Those sound promising…

  “Flynn!” I call toward the living room where I know post-dinner Flynn is currently relaxing on the couch, watching whatever boring sports game is on ESPN. “Your presence is requested in the kitchen!”

  A minute later, he’s standing in the doorway, and his eyes survey my setup on the counters.

  “What is all this?”

  “Cake baking time,” I answer and hold out the paper chef’s hat I made just for him. “Here. Put this on.”

  When he doesn’t take it, I stand up on my tippy-toes and shove it on his head. After one pat to his broad, firm chest, I grin up at him. “There. Perfect.”

  “What’s the plan, Daisy?”

  I wink and hold up a box of Betty Crocker cake mix. “The plan is to let me see Chef Flynn in action.”

  Pretty sure the real plan is to entice Chef Flynn to bang you…

  “Anyone can make cake from a box, babe.”

  “Yeah, well, it’s what you had in the cabinets,” I answer on a shrug. Plus, I, personally, don’t have a clue how to bake a cake from scratch. That would’ve required far too much Googling for what I’m actually trying to achieve here.

  Cake is great. Fantastic, even. But getting Flynn to do dirty, sexy things with me? Well, that beats cake every day of the week. And, trust me, I’m a cake-lover from way back. I could write a twenty-paragraph essay, APA formatted, with the bibliography, on my love for it, but nothing beats a naked Flynn getting me to do bad-girl kinds of things.

  “And don’t worry, I made us both chef’s hats for the baking cause,” I add and snag my white paper hat from the counter and pointedly put it on my head.

  A smile whispers across his mouth, almost lifting his lips up at the corners.

  “So…Chef Winslow, are you ready to get started?”

  “Do I have a choice?”

  I shake my head, and his smile is visible now.

  “Let’s bake some shit!” I exclaim, fist-pump the air, and grab him by the hand to drag him the rest of the way to the counter where I have his KitchenAid mixer set up. “First of all, I’ve always wanted one of these mixers, and I’m almost positive I’ve never dated a man who owns one.”

  “Married,” he corrects me with a playful tap to my butt, and I giggle.

  To my surprise, Flynn actually gets to work, grabbing the box of cake mix. But he doesn’t do what I expect him to do. Instead of checking the instructions on the back and opening the package, he returns it to the cabinet and proceeds to get out containers of flour and sugar.

  “What are you doing?”

  “If we’re baking a cake, we’re doing it right.”

  “Wait…you know how to make a cake? Like, without Betty Crocker’s assistance?”

  He doesn’t respond. Instead, he grabs milk and butter and eggs from the fridge and proceeds to start adding shit to the bowl locked inside the mixer.

  With a flick of his wrist, the mixer is on and spinning around the wet ingredients.

  “Oh my God, this is better than I even imagined,” I mutter more to myself than him and snag my phone off the counter. “I have to get photo proof of this or else your sister won’t believe me.”

  Flynn chuckles at that and tries to grab my phone with a playful hand, but I dodge his movements with a few bobs and weaves. “Traitor.”

  I grin and snap a quick action shot.

  And just for good measure, I take three more photos of big, bad Flynn standing in front of the KitchenAid mixer with a paper chef’s hat on his head.

  To be honest, the whole scene is far hotter than I ever thought it could be. Like my own personal food porn, but minus the food.

  Hello, ovaries. Please don’t explode.

  But before I can even fire off a message to Winnie, my phone vibrates in my hands with a text.

  Duncan Jones: Daisy, baby, how have you been? Damien told me you’re in New York for the next couple of months, and since I’m going to be in the Big Apple next weeken
d, I was wondering if you wanted to schedule that rain check. Pretty sure you owe me a date. ;)

  “God, no! No, no, no, no!” The Michael Scott GIF of him reacting to Toby’s unexpected presence in the office flashes in my mind. And then another stupid text chimes through.

  Duncan Jones: I won’t take no for an answer, and I promise you’ll have the time of your life.

  “Uh…excuse me?” I question out loud, staring down at the screen of my phone in irritation. “That’s not how it works, bucko.”

  “Everything okay?”

  I glance up to find Flynn looking at me with concern, and the sounds of the mixer have been silenced by the off switch.

  “Yeah,” I answer through a sigh. “Just some unwanted attention from a guy I worked with at the LA office.”

  “Unwanted attention?” he asks, and I hold my phone out toward him so he can read the text messages.

  “Well, he sounds like a real fucking prick,” Flynn comments, and I shrug.

  “He’s…a little overzealous.”

  “He won’t take no for an answer,” Flynn repeats Duncan’s words. “That’s not overzealous, babe. That’s harassment.”

  “I don’t think he realizes that.”

  “Who is this fuck?”

  “Just some agent at the fir—” I pause for a moment when all the pieces of the puzzle fall into place. “Actually, you’ve seen him. You know who Duncan is.”

  Flynn quirks a brow.

  “He’s the guy you thought I was running away from at the Wynn. Right before I made you take me for a ride on your bike and wed me into holy matrimony.”

  A smile lifts the corners of his mouth, and moments later, his fingers tap across the screen.

  “What are you doing?”

  With one more tap to the keys, he hands my phone back, and I look down at the screen.

  Me: This is Flynn Winslow, Daisy’s husband. It’s time you lose her number. That is, unless you’d like for both of us to join you on the forced “rain check.” If that’s the case, then name the time and place, and we’ll be there.

  Oh, holy macaroni. Pretty sure he just threw down the gauntlet.