by Ramona Gray
Imagining the look of horror and disgust on Daisy’s face when he asked if he could kiss her pussy was enough to stop the purring. The silence seemed very loud as he and Daisy stared at each other. God, she had such pretty green eyes.
“I’m sorry,” she said.
He made a ‘no big deal’ motion with his left hand before changing the subject. “Just promise that you won’t slice my throat open.”
“I promise,” she said.
He tilted his head up, silently giving her the go ahead. She took a deep breath and drew the razor over his throat with slow and steady pressure before rinsing it in the sink.
“No blood,” she said.
“I might live through this after all,” he said teasingly.
She crinkled her nose at him, and he started purring again when she used her free hand to gently push his head to the right.
“I’m sorry,” he said.
“It’s fine,” she said. “I don’t mind. It’s kind of… nice.”
That made his lion purr louder and he gave up on trying to swallow the sound. It made his head ache to hold in the purring if he was completely honest.
“My lion is, um, very happy,” he said. “He doesn’t like the itchy skin.”
It wasn’t a complete lie. Being itchy and uncomfortable did annoy his lion.
“It’s really not a problem,” she said.
He kept his eyes on Daisy’s sweet face as she carefully and methodically shaved his throat before moving on to his face. He loved the look of concentration on her face, and the way she bit down on her bottom lip as she shaved him. Intent on her job, her fear had completely dissipated, even if she was kissing distance from him.
He deliberately stopped looking at her mouth. If he didn’t, he’d definitely get an erection. He closed his eyes and kept them closed while Daisy finished shaving his face. To his surprise and relief, she didn’t so much as nick his skin.
He opened his eyes after she’d rinsed his face to find her giving him a smug look that made him grin.
“You survived,” she said.
“I did. It feels a lot better already. Thank you.”
“You’re welcome.” She hesitated. “Listen, I was thinking you should let me wash your hair for you. You’ve got a handheld shower head. If you sit on the edge of the tub and tilt your head back, I can use it to wash your hair.”
He didn’t reply and she pointed to his bandaged left hand. “It’ll be easier on your finger if all you have to do is wash your, um, body.”
“Yeah, okay,” he said. Partly because she was right and partly because it meant Daisy being close to him for a little longer.
“Good. Sit on the edge of the tub.” The pleased scent drifting from her skin made his lion happy for the first time since Cooper had kissed Daisy’s perfect lips.
When he was sitting on the edge of the tub, she said, “We’ll take the sling and your shirt off first, so they don’t get wet. All right?”
He nodded and Daisy carefully eased the sling off his arm. His shoulder was throbbing, and he’d wished he’d taken some pain meds before he tried this whole shower thing. Of course, if he’d done that, he probably would slip in the shower and break his fucking left arm or some bullshit like that.
“Ready?” Daisy had the hem of his shirt in her hands and at his nod, she helped him take his shirt off his left arm before they started on his right. He gritted his teeth as she eased the shirt over his right arm. She went slow and was about a thousand times gentler than Boone had been last night.
He appreciated Wes and Boone and Grayson taking turns helping him each night, but he’d die a happy man if it was Daisy at his house every night helping him.
“You okay?” Daisy was eyeing him with concern.
“Yeah.” He took a deep breath, the sweet scent of his mate soothing his restless lion.
She was staring at his chest, at the array of tattoos that covered his arms and upper body. “You have a lot of tattoos.”
“Do you hate tattoos?” Jesus, he sounded like an idiot.
“No, not at all. I don’t have any, but I’ve thought about getting one. Yours, um, look really good. Maybe I’ll get the name of your tattoo artist.”
“Sure,” he said. He had no intention of giving her Gerald’s name. The guy was an excellent tattooist, but he was also a total horndog when it came to the ladies. Cooper wasn’t letting Daisy get anywhere near him.
Daisy moved to his side and grabbed the handheld before turning it on. When the water was warm, she smiled at him. “Head back.”
He tilted his head back, appreciating the way she cupped the back of his head and helped support it as she wet his hair.
“Keep your head back.”
He did what she asked as she grabbed the shampoo and poured some into his hair. Using her left hand to support his head again, she used her right to massage the shampoo in. At the touch of her fingers against his scalp, he could no more stop the purring than he could stop breathing.
It rumbled out of his chest, embarrassingly loud in the small bathroom, and he muttered an apology before purring even louder.
“I told you – I don’t mind,” she said.
She scratched at his scalp and he made a low moan of pleasure. “Shit, that feels good.”
She didn’t reply, but she used her nails to scratch all across his scalp, working the shampoo through his hair. The hair washing was over way too soon, he and his lion could have sat there all night while Daisy rubbed his scalp.
She rinsed the shampoo away and then used her right hand to squeeze some of the water out of his hair. “You have really thick hair,” she said. “Do all shifters have hair this thick?”
“Nah,” he said. “I have an uncle who went bald by thirty. He tried to hide it with a toupee but then he’d forget he was wearing it and shift. We have so many pictures of him in his lion form with this ridiculous fake rug sitting on top of his head.”
She laughed and his lion purred happily. We made our mate laugh. She loves us. Claim her as ours before another takes her.
Jesus, his lion was a right idiot lately.
She stepped away and dried her hands on the towel on the towel rack. He smiled at her. “Thank you.”
“You’re welcome.” She unwrapped the bandage on his left hand, leaving the steri-strips in place. “I’ll put a new bandage on once you’re done showering.”
She eyed his track pants. “You’re good to take your, um, pants off?”
“Yes,” he said quickly. “I can handle it from here.”
“I’ll be downstairs if you need me,” she said.
“Okay.”
Her gaze dropped to his naked chest and his lion went bonkers when it smelled the faint scent of Daisy’s lust.
Afraid he’d do something insane like start kissing her, he said, “Okay, well, you should go downstairs now.”
Her face flushed red, embarrassment replaced the lust, and his lion snarled angrily at him. Without saying anything, Daisy left the bathroom. Cooper ran his left hand through his freshly washed hair as his lion snarled and growled.
Ignoring his lion’s anger, Cooper took a deep breath. Daisy’s lust didn’t mean she wasn’t afraid of him anymore. It was just her body’s biological reaction, and it probably upset her to have that type of reaction to him.
She didn’t want him, and she never would.
Chapter Three
By the time Cooper returned downstairs, she’d used the microwave to thaw the mystery meat she found in the freezer and had the two cans of vegetable soup she’d discovered in a cupboard heating up in a pot on the stove.
“You’re cooking?” Cooper said.
She glanced at him. “Yes?”
“With what? I have no food.”
She laughed. “I found what turned out to be sausage in the freezer and a couple cans of soup in the cupboard.”
She turned down the burner under the pan of cooking sausages and stirred the soup before walking toward him. He was wearin
g a clean pair of track pants and he carried a fresh t-shirt and his sling in his left hand.
“Feel better?” she asked.
He nodded but she could see the weariness in his face and the pain lines around his eyes. Without speaking, she helped him into his t-shirt, blushing a little when her fingers grazed his bare chest. God, he really did have a beautiful chest. Wide and muscular and covered with a thin layer of blonde hair. She’d never actually seen a six pack on a man in real life.
His whole body was lean but powerful and the strength she sensed lurking below all that warm rough skin was… terrifying.
No, intoxicating.
She helped him into the sling, making sure it was in the right position. “Does that feel okay?”
“Yes, thanks.”
“Sit down. Dinner will be ready in a few minutes.”
She returned to the stove, stirring the soup and turning the sausages. She hunted through the cupboards and found bowls and glasses. She cleared a spot on the table and laid out silverware and filled the glasses with water.
She read the instructions on the bottle of pain pills before opening it and shaking out two on the table in front of him next to his glass of water. “Take some meds, Cooper.”
“They make me tired and slow,” he said.
“Were you planning on going somewhere after dinner?” she said.
He smiled a little. “No, but -”
“Take them,” she said. “It’s obvious you’re in pain.”
To her surprise, he took the pills with a swallow of water. Satisfied, she shut off the burners and quickly sliced up the sausage before adding it to the bowls. She poured soup into the bowls and carried them to the table.
She sat next to Cooper, mentally giving herself a high five at not taking the chair furthest from him and picked up her spoon. “Eat up.”
As Cooper clumsily picked up the spoon with his left hand, she winced. “Shoot. I’m so sorry. Soup wasn’t the best option for -”
“It’s fine,” he said. “I still can’t believe you actually found food in my kitchen to cook.”
He spooned some soup into his mouth, doing a surprisingly good job of it even with his non-dominant hand. “Holy fuck. This is delicious.”
She flushed, more pleased by his praise than she was willing to admit.
“Seriously. When did canned soup start being so flavourful?” he said.
“Well, I added some spices to it. You might not have food, but you do have seasonings,” she said.
“It’s amazing.” He was spooning soup into his mouth like he hadn’t eaten in days. Considering the lack of food in his house, that could have been a possibility. They ate in silence. She filled Cooper’s empty bowl with the remaining soup, and he ate the second bowl only slightly slower.
When they were finished, he sat back and wiped his mouth with his napkin. “If this is how you cook with just canned soup and mystery sausage, I’d love to taste what you can do with actual groceries.”
She set the empty bowls in the sink and filled them with water. “If you’d like, I can pick up some groceries tomorrow and stop by after work to make you dinner.”
“Oh, uh, I wasn’t…” Cooper cleared his throat. “I didn’t mean to make it sound like you had to cook me dinner again. Grayson said he would come by tomorrow night so…”
“Oh, right, of course,” she said.
He cleared his throat again. “But if you wanted to come over tomorrow night, I would appreciate it. I’m worried about Grayson doing too much with his injuries. He says he’s fine, but he came this close to having his spinal cord severed.”
“I don’t mind,” she said. “I like cooking.”
What are you doing? You want to give him another opportunity to hurt you? To maybe kill you?
She ignored her inner voice and turned to face Cooper. “I’ll talk to Grayson tomorrow at the office, let him know that I’ll stop by after work.”
“Thank you, Daisy,” he said.
“Anything in particular you don’t like for food?”
“I’ll eat anything.” He reached for his wallet that was sitting on the table. “Here, use my credit card to buy the groceries.”
She stared at the plastic card he was holding out. “You’re giving me your credit card?”
“Yes?” He stared at her in confusion. “I don’t expect you to buy my food.”
“I know, but…”
“But, what?”
“You shouldn’t hand your credit card over like this. I could go on a shopping spree or something.”
He laughed before wincing and rubbing at his arm above the sling. “I trust you.”
She took the card from him and tucked it into her purse. “What’s your food budget?”
“I don’t have one,” he said. “Buy whatever you want.”
God, what she would give to have an unlimited food budget. She wasn’t starving but her food budget was as low as it could go without starving herself. She missed being able to walk into a grocery store and not have to count every penny as she shopped.
Your own damn fault. You should never have trusted Jeff.
Lord, wasn’t that the truth.
An awkward silence descended. Cooper was still rubbing his arm and the pain lines had deepened around his eyes. She chewed at her bottom lip. She’d had an ulterior motive for stopping by tonight, but he looked like he was in a lot of pain. Maybe this wasn’t the right time.
You’ve put it off for long enough. You need to apologize. Hell, you’re lucky he hasn’t fired your ass.
“So, um, part of the reason I told Wes I would come by tonight is because I owe you an apology.”
“For what?”
“For,” her face was turning red, but she continued, “saying you were my boyfriend when we met with Lori’s crazy father at the coffee shop.”
He didn’t reply. Staring grimly at the kitchen table, she said, “I shouldn’t have done that because I know your cover story was that you were the editor of the website, but he, uh, he…”
“He scared you,” Cooper said quietly.
The kindness in his voice gave her the courage to look at him. “Yes. Very much. He started saying really rude comments and he kept touching me -”
“He touched you?”
“Yes, and I felt like I couldn’t get away from him and… Cooper?”
Her heart kicked it up a notch and she gripped the back of the chair in front of her.
“Yeah?” His voice was a rough growl and she swallowed hard.
“Your eyes are glowing,” she whispered.
He closed his eyes and she watched in fascination as the fur that was sprouting on his face slowly receded. She realized that she wasn’t even afraid. Maybe it was because she was certain his obvious anger was for Corbin, the gross jaguar shifter who she’d tried to grill for information.
She took a deep breath. Pretending to be a journalist for a fake website to get information from Corbin seemed exciting at first, until Cooper got stuck in traffic and she had to talk to the shifter by herself. Her fear had been out of control and the moment Cooper joined them in the parking lot of the coffee shop, she’d glued herself to his side.
Better the devil you knew than the one you didn’t, right?
Only, Cooper hadn’t felt like the devil. No, he’d felt like home and safety and everything she wanted. Before she knew it, she was clinging to him like an octopus and calling him her boyfriend and, she cringed inwardly, kissing him without his permission.
“Sorry,” Cooper said. His eyes were back to their normal blue.
“Th-that’s okay,” she said. “Anyway, I’m very sorry for forcing you to pretend you were my boyfriend and for kissing you without your permission.”
Something that almost might have been a strangled laugh slipped out of Cooper’s mouth. She flushed again, feeling like an idiot. “Thank you for not firing me for inappropriateness.”
“I would never fire you, Daisy. You’re the best admin person we’ve
ever had in the office.”
She smiled at him. “You’re only saying that because I help you with your computer.”
“No,” he said. His pupils had gone weirdly large, and his big body was weaving back and forth the tiniest bit. “No, I said it because you’re amazing. You’re really good at your job, and you’re so pretty, and I liked kissing you. I liked kissing you a lot.”
She stared at him and when he smiled at her, that weird little tingle happened in her crotch again. Christ, when Cooper smiled like that, even she had to admit he was gorgeous.
Please, like you don’t think he’s gorgeous one hundred percent of the time.
“I crocheted you a scarf,” Cooper suddenly said. “I crocheted it for you because you’re so pretty but I’m too embarrassed to give it to you.”
“Cooper are you – oh God, the pain meds have made you high.”
“Have they?” He blinked at her like a coked-out owl. Holding in her urge to giggle, she stepped toward him, touching his arm a bit tentatively.
“You should probably go to bed, Cooper.”
“Sure, okay.” He suddenly grabbed her hand. “Shit, do me a favour? Don’t tell Daisy that I crochet. I don’t want her to know because it’s not a manly hobby.”
“There’s nothing wrong with crocheting,” Daisy said.
“I’m really good at it. I made the guys dishcloths for Christmas and I’m making Wes a granny square blanket for his birthday. It’s gonna be epic.”
He grinned at her, and she tugged on his arm. “C’mon, Cooper. Time for bed.”
“Sure, okay. I crocheted you a scarf.” He studied her hair. “I found a colour that matches your beautiful hair. Do you like scarves?”
“I do,” she said. “Thank you for crocheting me a scarf. Stand up now.”
“Okay.” He stood up and she grabbed at his waist when he swayed on his feet.
Shit, if he couldn’t walk to the bedroom on his own, she’d have to call Wes or Boone. There was no way she could help support him.
“Cooper, can you walk on your own? Or should I call Wes?”
“I can walk,” he said. “It’s no problem. Hey, guess what?”
“What?” She walked behind him with her arms held out as if she might actually be able to stop him from falling.