“Eat,” he said. “Take a tour or whatever else makes you comfortable. I’m going to take a shower, and then I’ll show you your surprise.” He kissed the top of her head and headed toward a hallway beyond the fireplace.
“Wait. What about you? Aren’t you eating?”
“I’ll cram something down when I’m done. You eat. Take it out on the patio if you want. Kick back and enjoy the view.”
And then he was gone, leaving her alone with enough food to feed three starving men and enough time to give her thoughts too much room to wander. Her stomach let out a rumble of encouragement right about the time her gaze locked on a whole tray full of sweets. Tiny little tarts topped with glazed raspberries and blackberries, red-velvet cupcakes with fluffy cream cheese icing, and a whole mound of Mexican wedding cookies. Shoot, she could stick to that tray alone and be perfectly content for the rest of the day. Of course, then she’d have the sugar high from hell, and her nerves were already frayed.
She grabbed one of the ivory ceramic plates Zeke had laid out and piled on the goods. Three bite-size cucumber and cream cheese sandwiches on what looked like homemade bread, another with fluffy chicken salad and a few baby quiches she was pretty sure had bacon in them. For good measure she piled up a nice side helping of veggies and fruit, then snagged a fork and napkin and meandered to the back patio.
Unlike the front of the tiny home, the view from the backyard was all natural. No concrete, no metal hangars, no other homes in sight. She eased into one of two thickly padded loungers and curled her legs underneath her. Land unfolded for as far as she could see in soft, rolling planes. The grass had yet to hit full green, smatterings of winter’s brown still giving the overall tint a rich sage color. A few trees dotted the acreage to the north, but to the south there was a thicker cluster. It was beautiful. Untouched and peaceful, just like her own backyard. Though, she’d still pick hers with the water over this one any day.
Ten minutes and a demolished plateful later, she pried herself from her comfy spot, ready for a reward in the form of a red-velvet cupcake. She shut the back door behind her, turned for the kitchen table and forgot all about dessert.
Zeke stood with the refrigerator door open, his torso leaned in while he shifted something inside the cooler. The rugby clothes he’d worn were gone, replaced by a pair of faded Levi’s that molded his powerful thighs and butt, and absolutely not one other stitch of clothing.
He turned, a purple Gatorade in hand and flashed her with a big smile. “Hey. You like the view?”
Holy hell. What’s not to like?
Logically, she knew he meant the backyard, but in that second she couldn’t give a damn about anything except the man in front of her. She’d known he had a good build by the way his T-shirts fit him, but Mother of God, without a shirt he was lickably delicious. Not over-large where muscles were concerned but compact and defined. Perfect for tracing her fingers along each dip and curve. Or her tongue. She wasn’t picky.
She licked her lip, her eyes drawn to the dog tags that rested between his sculpted pecs. Weird. He never said anything about being in the military. Then again, they didn’t look like normal dog tags. They were nicer. Thicker with something masculine etched in black.
“Gabe?”
Her gaze darted to his, and she swallowed hard, her adrenaline-rushed fingers nearly fumbling her plate as she paced toward the table. “Sorry. I was...” Ogling your body like an estrogen-rich teenage girl. “Yeah. Trevor’s got a really nice place.”
“Yeah, he does.” He snatched the gray T-shirt draped over the back of the kitchen chair closest to him and pulled it over his head, but the devious grin on his face made it clear he knew exactly what had her so flustered. And he liked it.
Pulling the hem of his T down around his hips, he prowled closer.
She focused on the food, her pulse hammering loud in her head. Think, Gabe. Say something. Anything. “Did you get something to eat?”
“I got enough.” He stopped behind her, reached around and pulled the plate from her quivering hand. It clinked to the tabletop as he set it aside and turned her with hands on her hips. “The way you just looked at me, though, I think I’m juiced enough to go without food for days.” His hands on her hips squeezed and he leaned in close, skating his nose alongside hers. His warm breath tickled her skin, tinged with a sugary scent, when he muttered, “Trying real hard to stay on plan.”
Her lips parted on instinct, needing his mouth against hers more than she needed air. “There’s a plan?”
“Oh, yeah. There’s a plan. Otherwise, I’d have just kissed you this morning. But then we’d have never left the house.” He lifted one hand and cupped her nape, resting his forehead against hers as he closed his eyes. He pulled in a deep steadying breath through his nose and tiny shivers wiggled down her spine. God, he even managed to make breathing sound sexy.
He straightened, kissed her forehead and took her hand in his. “Come on, gatinha. Time for you to fly.”
Chapter Twelve
Zeke had done a lot in his life. Met amazing people, traveled to jaw-dropping locations and pushed his body with extreme sports, but not one of those experiences topped watching Gabe when Trev’s little twin prop had lifted off the runway. Or when she’d all but plastered her nose against the window trying to catch all the aerial sites at once.
Or when she was aroused.
Her catching him sans shirt had been more luck than planning, but even a blind man would’ve caught her checking him out. Hell, the sexual tension burning off her in those few unguarded seconds was palpable enough it sparked against his skin. He wanted more of it. More of the way her full lips parted and her eyelids hung heavy over her pale blue eyes. More of the flush that stole across her cheeks and collarbone.
He shifted in the driver’s seat and made room for his still semierection. The damned thing had all but popped the buttons on his Levi’s all afternoon, which had made for a hell of an uncomfortable flight. Knowing they were only ten miles away from her house where he could make good on his promise of kissing her silly made it worse.
Gabe leaned across the Camaro’s center console and held up her phone. “Look at this one.”
The shot she’d taken as he’d flown her over her home was about as good as a person could manage with a three-year-old, knock-off smartphone. He’d have to get her introduced to Knox soon. Whether she had ideas of pursuing her art on a bigger scale, or just for the joy of it, she deserved the best. Something top of the line with loads of options instead of a no-name device that was out-of-date.
“I like it,” he said. “Did you get the one flying back toward the house?”
She thumbed past a few more and angled the phone back where Zeke could see. “I didn’t like that one as much. I like it where you can see the shoreline better.”
He cocked his head and compared the two as she shuffled back and forth. The first one had more color. More life to it. “Yeah, I think you’re right.” Then again, almost everything Gabe had shown him on the way home seemed postcard ready in his book.
He downshifted and steered to the far right lane, angled for the exit that would take them across Lake Ray Hubbard’s bridge and her house on the other side. “You going to work your magic on them? Or just keep them like they are for a souvenir?”
She pursed her mouth in a cute, considering mew and zoomed in on one in particular. “I don’t know. I’ll keep the original for sure, but I never know if the things I try on my computer will work or not. We’ll see.”
She shut the app and smiled up at him. No tension marked the edges of her eyes, and she’d reclined against the seats as if she rode with him every day. For the first time since he’d met her, she seemed unguarded. Like a glimpse of the girl Danny had mentioned she used to be was peeking out from behind the mask she held up against the world. Damned if that didn’t make him feel
about twenty feet tall.
“I still can’t believe you can fly,” she said. “Is there anything you haven’t done?”
“Not learning to fly wasn’t an option for me. The first thing Trevor does with anyone he deems family is get them behind the yoke. He uses safety as an excuse, saying it’s good to have a backup, but the truth is he’s always looking for a chance to get airborne.”
She gazed out the windshield, her elbow propped up on the passenger door and fingers twirling a strand of hair around and around. Her mouth was soft with just a hint of a smile on the tips.
“You could learn to do it, too,” he said. “Trevor never says no to a pretty woman, let alone a potential student.”
One sentence and her demeanor went from bright and peaceful, to shuttered and cautious. She lowered her arm from the door and tucked both hands under each thigh. “Oh, no.”
Fuck, he hated that. Hated how easy it was to upend the balance and knowing whatever gave her emotions such a hair trigger had to run deep. “‘Oh, no,’ you’re not interested in learning to fly? Or, ‘oh, no,’ you don’t think you can do it?”
Her head snapped toward him, a cute scowl pinching her mouth up tight. “I could do it if I wanted to.”
“I couldn’t agree more. Plus, you looked like you were having fun when I let you take the yoke. So, why not give it a try?”
She fiddled with her phone in her lap. “I couldn’t ask Trevor to teach me. I don’t even know him.”
“You’ll get to know him.”
“No, I won’t. I barely see him.”
“You’ve barely seen him so far. If you’re with me, you’ll see plenty of him. Of all my brothers.”
“Stop it.” She paired the sharp command with a terse shake of her head and glared out the passenger window, her hands fisted tight in her lap.
Interesting. This hadn’t been the first time she’d bared her claws around him, but the tension in this particular response was just short of explosive. A powder keg barely contained and nestled up tight to an open flame. Oddly enough, he liked it as much as her sweet side, which only made him want to nudge his gatinha a little more. “Stop what?”
“Talking about things like we’re a long-term item. It’s not nice.”
“You don’t like the idea of me being around long-term?”
Her mouth pressed to a harsh line and her chest rose and fell in sharp, shallow rasps. Damn, but he wanted her past this shit. How a woman could spend a day like the one they’d spent together and not realize how into her he was floored him. It also made him rethink finding the assholes who’d fucked with her in the past. At this rate he wouldn’t stop at just pulverizing the bastards. He’d slaughter them and take his time doing it.
“Think about what you’re saying, Gabe. Do you really think a man like me would introduce a woman to my family if I only planned to see them once? Or take the time to give you a day that made you smile if I weren’t serious?”
She anchored her elbow back on the door and covered her mouth with her fist.
The clock on the custom navigation glowed a soft 2:07 p.m. Five more minutes until he got her home, then he’d have a few hours left to make his point. To reinforce she wasn’t some inconsequential drop in the bucket. He let her have her silence until he pulled into the subdivision and parked in front of her house. Unfortunately, she popped her door before he could make it around to her side.
He snagged her arm before she could make the sidewalk and carefully turned her, mindful of her ribs. “Talk to me, gatinha. I can’t fight what I don’t know.”
She tried to dig in her heels, to look anywhere but at his face.
He gripped her chin and steered it so she couldn’t hide. “I’m bossy, remember? I can keep at this all afternoon.”
“Why? Why keep pushing me?”
“Because I want you.”
“You mean sex.”
He tugged her against him so fast she gasped and clenched his arms for balance. He cupped the sides of her face. “I mean I want you. I want those smiles that make my day so bright it hurts. I want you to push healthy comfort food on me the way you do Danny and your neighbors. I want you curled up next to me on the couch while you watch movies and slip into make-believe. I want to do whatever it takes to make you look at me like you did this afternoon. And just so you can’t accuse me of being a liar, I’ll admit, I want the sex, too. Lots of it. I want to anchor my cock deep inside you and make you come so hard you forget about any other man who came before me.”
As quick as he’d fired her temper, her pupils dilated and her body went live-wire hot next to his. Sweet Jesus, he wanted to hone that emotion. To stroke and nurture it until she shattered. But not until he could set this roadblock aside. “Talk to me, gatinha. What makes it so hard for you to believe I might be around long enough for you to get to know the people I love?”
“Because people leave.” It was a whisper, nothing more, but it clawed him from the inside out, the shear vulnerability in her eyes gutting him faster than any blade.
He pulled her tight against him, cradling her head against his heart with one hand while the other banded around her shoulders. Anger flooded his bloodstream, scalding through every vein in need of an outlet. A target for his release. He kissed the top of her head instead, breathing in her light, exotic scent until the blood-red haze clouding his mind ran clear.
Inside his arms, her breaths slowed and evened. Her arms were wrapped around his waist, hands fisted in his shirt.
He pulled away enough to meet her gaze, but kept a steady hand at her nape. “I can’t promise you forever. Neither one of us knows what’s going to happen in five minutes, let alone tomorrow, or the day after that. What I can promise is that I’ll be upfront with you the whole way. If things aren’t working for me, I’ll share. No slinking away without warning, or dancing around anything. I’ll ask you to do the same. We’ll take one day at a time, but that means every day both of us putting ourselves out there. You’ll get to know the people I love, and I’ll get to know yours. If things work out, then you gain more family than you’ve got today. If they don’t, then we’ll both still have solid, good memories. Can you work with that?”
She nodded. It was small and hesitant, but her eyes sparked with hope.
He’d never forget that look. Not until the day he died. In a single second, she’d branded him. Marked and challenged him to conquer every damned one of her demons. “All right.” He smoothed his thumb along her lower lip. God, he wanted to kiss her. To seal his promise in a way she couldn’t ignore. That she’d never forget.
“We need to get inside, sweetheart. If we don’t, the first time I kiss you will be where all your neighbors can watch.” Not to mention, he’d have a hell of a time stopping once he got started. He let her go and urged her toward the front door. “Besides, I’ve got to work a shift tonight, and I want to see the pictures you took on a bigger screen before I go.”
Inside, the house was still and quiet except for Toothless, who leaped down from his perch on the front window ledge, leisurely assessed Zeke’s presence, then demandingly greeted Gabe with a stern meow. He rubbed his side along Gabe’s shins, spun and made another lap.
Gabe dug her phone out of her purse, tossed the bag to the floor, and swept Toothless up in her arms. She lowered her head close enough Toothless brushed his cheek against hers. “I know, I know. I missed you, too.” She glanced back at Zeke and headed down the hallway. “Give me a second. I’ll get my computer.”
Oh, no. If she was headed to her room, then he was going with her. Just checking her ribs that first night had generated a whole library of fantasies in that same location. Never mind the places his head had gone when he’d tucked her into bed a week later. The prospect of actually breathing life into one of those fine ideas wasn’t one he’d let pass. Plus, he’d have a chance to give her a
few memories to chew on when she was lying in her bed at night.
She startled when he ambled through her bedroom door and fumbled her computer charger. It clattered to the top of her desk then slithered down to the floor.
He motioned to the laptop pinched between her fingers, sat down on her bed and leaned against the padded headboard. “That where you keep everything?”
For a heartbeat or two, she stared at him, her eyelids doing the blinky-blink thing as though her mind couldn’t quiet register him visiting her room, let alone lounging on her bed.
Talk about the rooster in the henhouse. He hadn’t had this much fun getting under a woman’s skin in...well, ever. He grinned and crossed his feet at the ankle. “You okay?”
She snapped out of her stupor and studied the bed the way someone unfamiliar with silverware etiquette might gauge the settings for a sixteen-course meal. She opted for familiar, yet semisafe and sat on his side of the bed near his feet, opening the laptop and bringing the screen to life with a tap on the track pad. “I keep most of my pictures on the cloud because it’s safer. Plus, this computer’s old and not all that reliable. I saved up for a new one, but haven’t gotten around to buying anything yet.”
He eyed the distance she’d kept between them. “You should talk to Knox before you buy anything. He’s got all kinds of contacts if you want lots of bells and whistles.”
Her fingers froze over the keyboard and she opened her mouth as though to argue, but just as fast she frowned, closed her mouth and refocused on her work.
She’d fought it. Had wanted to push back about getting to know his family, but then knocked it back and rolled with it. It was beautiful. Such a small thing, but so utterly huge, too. Even if she’d handed him the moon, it wouldn’t have meant as much as her fighting her fears.
She swiveled the screen so he could see it. “I think the rugby shots turned out good.”
He cocked his head and pretended to study the screen. “I can’t see. Come closer.”
Wild & Sweet (The Haven Brotherhood) Page 13