Cozen
Page 27
Losing her job meant she couldn’t use the backroom in the bar to sleep, either. There went her damn bed.
And the roof over her head.
She’d figure it out.
She always figured shit out.
“Hey, you okay?”
Cozen glanced up—worry saturated her insides as she thought the shopkeeper had noticed her, and was about to send her on her way. It was supposed to rain tonight, or so she overheard someone saying. She really just needed a bit of shelter to keep her out of the wetness, and the overhanging roof with the wicker furniture behind the café on the beach would provide that.
She wasn’t going to do anything.
Not steal, or whatever.
She only stole when things were really bad.
Instead of the shopkeeper, Cozen found someone else entirely.
A beautiful man.
Brown skin with a golden glow. Dark eyes, and a charming smile. He was a couple of years older than her, at least. Tall, with wide shoulders and a body that looked like he might be a boxer. Something radiated from him that almost made Cozen feel safe.
She didn’t know what it was.
No one ever made her feel safe.
Against the backdrop of the colorful sky and the rushing tide on the beach, the guy almost looked God-like.
A saving grace for her, maybe.
She didn’t even know if she believed in that kind of thing.
“You okay?” he asked again.
Cozen swallowed hard, and stood up from the chair. “Yeah, I’m just … waiting for a friend.”
“A friend?”
She nodded. “Yep.”
“So, you won’t mind if I sit here and wait with you, then?”
“Uh …”
“Just to make sure nobody bothers you while you wait,” he added quickly.
Shit.
Cozen struggled to refuse.
The guy just sat his ass down.
She sat back down, too.
Then, he held out a hand to her, and smiled widely. He showed off straight, white teeth that only added to his gorgeous appeal.
“Hi,” he said.
Cozen took his hand, and he squeezed her fingers softly. “Hi.”
“Sargon Makri.”
“Cozen Taylor.”
“You don’t have a friend coming, do you, Cozen?”
Her breaths ached.
Her body was tired.
She was hungry.
Alone.
Scared.
“I haven’t had a friend coming for me in a really long time,” she admitted.
Sargon’s fingers tightened around hers, and he tugged a little to bring her a bit closer to him. “Could I be your friend, then?”
She hadn’t told him no.
Actually, she told him yes.
He’d taken her home to meet his mother and father—Mia and William Jones. Strangely common American names for people who spoke with a heavy accent, and did their prayers five times a day on beautifully ornate prayer rugs.
And yet, they were the most amazing people she had ever met in her life. People who took her in without question, and gave her all the things she had been missing. Love, a family, and home. They protected her, adored her, and taught her how to do the same for them.
But they were not ordinary people, either.
A family of thieves.
God knew …
God knew Cozen fit right in.
“My little thief—my beautiful woman. You were named most appropriately, Cozen. You took from me; you stole from me; you kept what you took with you. And you won’t ever give it back, now. But that’s okay. You can keep my heart.”
His vows to her had been unconventional.
At best.
And entirely beautiful.
He promised her forever.
As long as she kept his heart.
So she did.
He was waiting for her on the back porch of their beach bungalow like he always did when he knew she was coming home. Leaning against the railing in his signature silk shirt with the top two buttons undone, and black slacks, he was more relaxed than she had seen him in months.
“About time,” he told her.
Cozen grinned. “I had to make a stop along the way.”
Sargon cocked a brow. “Where to?”
“Had to drop off a ring, for one.”
“For two?”
She nodded down the beach. “Took a walk.”
Sargon chuckled, and came down the last two steps. “What, a walk down memory lane?”
“I like memory lane when it’s for us. Those are my very best memories.”
Her husband’s grin softened into a smile, and before she could say another thing, he pulled the leather cord up over his head that he had been wearing for months. A quick tug with his hands, and the leather snapped apart. The golden band dangling from the end dropped into his palm, and he held it out to her.
Cozen took her wedding ring back, and slipped it on. Sargon waited patiently as she removed his ring from her thumb, and handed it over, too.
For a moment, they were quiet.
Peace settled back in to their lives.
They were normal again.
Together again.
Perfect again.
“Come here,” he demanded.
Cozen found herself wrapped in his strong embrace before her next blink. Home, and love, and serenity surrounded her. Strength, and comfort, and faith soaked into her bloodstream.
She tipped her head back to find Sargon staring down at her. He dropped a quick kiss to her lips, and then another one just as fast and as sweet as the first.
“You almost lost this job,” he told her.
Cozen sighed. “It was never going to get to that point. You were too close for it to fail. That was the problem. You got too close this time. You never get this close—always just far enough away to watch me work, but never close enough to step in. What happened?”
Sargon shrugged. “Circumstances, I guess.”
“Good thing you were there. It helped in the end.”
“You could say that.”
“You know what amazed me, though?” she asked.
Sargon grinned to show off that dimple of his. “What?”
“I think you made me fall in love with you all over again.”
His laughter was a balm to her soul.
Like his life was the balm to her heart.
The breath to her blood.
The sea to her sky.
The spark to her fire.
This man was her everything.
“Mmm,” Sargon hummed, “I have many talents.”
“Let’s not do this one again, though.”
He cocked a brow. “No?”
“Every thief has that last job, right?”
“So my parents like to say.”
“So you say, too.”
Sargon cleared his throat and tugged her in close to his chest again, so she could hide away from the world. “My job ends when your job ends, Zen. You know that.”
“I found my job—my last job.”
“Oh, we’re going to be like a normal married couple now, or something?”
She laughed lightly. “We’re normal.”
“I mean … define normal, sweetheart.”
“Our kind of normal.”
“Fair,” he replied. “Mom and Dad are coming over for supper. They want all the details about the job—you know how they are.”
“Living vicariously through us, now.”
“You love it, too.”
She really did.
“I can’t believe you fucking drugged me,” Sargon muttered.
She pressed her lips together to keep from laughing. “You know that would have looked bad for you to leave the house with me. What if someone figured out we were working together? Better to have the Griffin family looking for the female thief than both of us.”
“I don’t think they’ll be looking for either
“Mmm, why not?”
He squeezed her tighter. “I just assume the Griffin brothers will be a little too distracted to realize the ring was stolen right away. They’ll have far too much to deal with, and maybe by the time they do realize it is gone, you won’t be the first person they look to.”
“I don’t understand.”
“They have to handle the death of their father. Lots of arrangements, I assume.”
Cozen stiffened. “Jett’s dead?”
“Yeah.”
“How?”
“A weak heart and drugs do not mix, Zen.”
Well …
Shit.
Sargon squeezed her again, and murmured against her hair, “I know it wasn’t your intention.”
“No.”
“But the silver lining is that the Griffin family’s attention will be elsewhere for a while, and that is never a bad thing in this business.”
True.
Cozen tipped her head back to look up at her husband once more. “I made one more stop, by the way.”
“Oh, for what?”
“Had to grab something at the pharmacy.”
The edge of Sargon’s mouth quirked up in a half-smile. Like he just knew what she was going to tell him, and he couldn’t wait for it.
He’d been asking for this one thing from her for two years—she kept putting it off because what if.
What if that job came up, and she had to refuse?
What if she had a little love at home that she didn’t want to leave?
What if it wasn’t the right time?
What if …
What if no longer applied.
What if no longer mattered.
Cozen pulled the little plastic pink and white pregnancy test from the deep pocket of her summer dress—she loved dresses with pockets. They hid all kinds of secrets.
This one was a good secret.
Sargon kept one arm tight around her waist as he took the test flashing with the word pregnant from her fingers, and looked it over with a growing smile. What were the chances her birth control would fail when it was supposed to be nearly one-hundred percent effective?
It felt like another sign.
Something else to tell her now was the time.
Now was their time.
“You could have told me …”
“I wanted to wait.”
“Until what?” he asked.
“Until it was just us again. Until we were us again.”
He kissed her again, then. Harder, deeper, and longer. A lingering kiss that seared her soul, and set fire to her heart.
This was love.
He was love.
“We’re always us, Cozen.”
Well …
They always would be, now.
First and foremost, thank you so much to my editor, Eli, for all her hard work on this book. And for never figuring the last twist out until the very last second. Your voice messages made my whole day.
To my readers, thank you for always coming along on this trip with me. It’s fun, right? It’s better when we’re doing this together.
To the ladies who proofed this book, all my love. I appreciate your help, and am forever grateful.
For London—who put the bug in my ear to write this book, and who made the beautiful cover for Cozen—well, here we are, hon. It’s hard to believe from one chat, it went this far, ha. Then again, with us, it’s not hard to believe at all. We cannot be contained. Thank you.
To my hubby and my beautiful boys, keep stealing hearts like thieves. Like you stole mine.
Hugs, loves.
Bethany-Kris is a Canadian author, lover of much, and mother to four young sons, one cat, and three dogs. A small town in Eastern Canada where she was born and raised is where she has always called home. With her boys under her feet, a snuggling cat, barking dogs, and a spouse calling over his shoulder, she is nearly always writing something ... when she can find the time.
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Copyright © 2018 by Bethany-Kris. All Rights Reserved.
WARNING: The unauthorized reproduction or distribution of this copyrighted material is illegal and punishable by law. No parts of this work may be reproduced, copied, used, or printed without expressed written consent from the publisher/author. Exceptions are made for brief excerpts used in reviews.
eISBN 13: 978-1-988197-60-9
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This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, organizations, corporations, locales and so forth are a product of the author’s imagination, or if real, used fictitiously. Any resemblance to a person, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
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