Chapter Thirty-Two
TIG
I had been up for almost an hour. A part of me wanted to get out of bed, locate my phone, put it on a charger, and check in on what everyone had come up with.
I needed to get Cass back. Part of it was for personal reasons, not able to handle shit like that happening to a woman without doing everything I could to get her out of that situation.
The other part was because Kenz needed her back.
She needed her back because she was her best friend, she loved her, this was eating away at her.
But I also needed her back because the decision was made last night, once and for all.
Kenzi and I, we were happening. Case closed.
But we couldn’t do that right until she had her girl back.
So all that was on my mind, laced intermittently with flashes of her from the night before: her eyes filled with need, her perfect goddamn body bare to me, the taste of her sweet pussy, the way she screamed my name when she came.
As much as I knew I needed to get back to work, there wasn’t a force on fucking earth that was going to make me get up.
Why? Because Kenzi was asleep on me. No, not resting on my chest. Not with an arm thrown over me.
No, she had somehow in her sleep completely climbed on top of me and was stretched over me like a very warm, very soft, very sweet blanket.
Her face was pressed into the side of my neck, her breath warm.
One of her hands was curled into a fist and resting on my shoulder.
The other, inexplicably—because it couldn’t have been a comfortable position—was on my stomach.
I wasn’t fucking up the moment.
Kenz was sweet and giving in my arms, of course; she had been open and unreserved.
But in general, she had her guards. They weren’t exactly impenetrable, and they were likely only in place because she dated one too many of the wrong kind of fucking guy.
I would get permanently underneath them eventually.
But for the time being, the only way she was completely soft was when I was inside her or when she was asleep.
I was going to enjoy it while it lasted.
That was until there was a pounding on the door downstairs, the noise carrying since the floor below was such an open space, making Kenzi’s entire body jolt hard as she pushed up, instantly awake, but eyes uncomprehending for a moment.
“Someone’s at the door, honey,” I offered, making her sleep-hazy eyes clear as she gave me a tight nod, dropping off to my side, reaching up to wipe at her eyes with her hands.
I felt sad for the loss, but the pounding continued, so I dragged my ass out of the bed, grabbing a pair of jeans and a tee and went into the bathroom.
I reemerged a minute later to find her almost as I left her, still completely naked and unconcerned with it, knees to her chest, her arms wrapped around her legs.
I walked over to the bed, still pulling my shirt down, leaning down to kiss her temple. “I’ll be right back. I left a toothbrush on the counter for you.”
Her head turned, ducked slightly to the side, with a look in her eyes I wanted to understand. It was something deep. I wanted to ask what put it there, understand it, but the pounding was still going on, so I didn’t have the time.
With a sigh, I moved off toward the stairs and down to find Brock at the door, leaning on the doorjamb, knocking half-heartedly with the other hand.
His face was scruffy, and his clothes wrinkled from all night in the car, but other than that, he looked fresh as a daisy. I knew from experience that he genuinely could go three or four days straight without sleep and never lose his sharpness.
“You know the code,” I answered, pulling the door open and watching him step inside.
He turned back to me, lips tipped up into his trademark smirk.
“Figured if you weren’t answering it was because there was something going on that I maybe didn’t want to walk in on.
Love you like a brother, man, but I would be a happy man if we can maintain the kind of relationship where neither of us has seen the other’s cock. ”
I closed and locked the door, resetting the alarm. “Why would you think—”
“Oh, fuck off with that,” he said, laughing.
“Swear to Christ you had to drag that lower lip off the floor when she came into the office slinging her attitude around. You have a type, Tig, and Kenz fits it to a T. That and she’s fucking gorgeous, and I’d be questioning your sexual orientation if you didn’t want to get up in there.
Besides, you had your hands all over her at the office, and you were obviously coming back from dinner.
Don’t need to be a PI to put this shit together, y’know?
” He was talking as he walked toward the hidden staircase, reaching in, and plugging in the code.
He yanked the door open and yelled up the stairs.
“Oh, Kenz! I am coming up. I hope you’re decent.
Well, actually, I wouldn’t mind it if you weren’t, but you get what I mean. ”
And then he was jogging up the stairs, leaving me to follow behind, resetting the lock. I was being overly paranoid, but I wasn’t taking one single chance with her until the psycho was in a cage or grave.
I walked in to find Brock walking toward the kitchen, where the strong scent of coffee was already wafting through the air, and Kenz was standing.
But not in her dress from the night before.
Oh, no.
She was in one of my tees.
Granted, I was tall as fuck, but she was long and leggy herself, so the dark blue hem fell barely to mid-thigh. Her hair was pulled back, and her feet were bare.
Fucking gorgeous even without all her usual adornments.
And not the least bit insecure at being seen without them, which was even sexier.
“Oh, you’re making me breakfast?” Brock asked, eyes lighting up, all charm as usual. “I’m famished.”
I moved closer and found that, sure enough, she had already located pans and had two on the stove. She went toward the fridge pulling it open. “What’s the matter, Brock, can’t find a woman who wants to put up with you for long enough to cook for you?”
“Not one who will kick me in the balls while she does so, like you,” he said, raising a brow at her, making her turn over her shoulder, giving him a fake-stern look for a second before smiling big, open.
“Stop being such a horndog, and I will stop picking at you.”
“Hey, not every guy is as lucky as Sawyer and Tig, Kenz. And if I am going to be single, I am going to enjoy the fuck out of it.”
“Well,” she said, setting a big bowl and a carton of eggs on the counter, shrugging, “I can’t really fault that logic.”
“So what are you making me? I want a double serving for sitting in that car all night.”
“Eggs and pancakes,” she said, shrugging, moving around and looking inside all my cabinets until she found all the ingredients she wanted, piling everything on the counter.
“I would make breakfast potatoes, but someone only keeps sweet potatoes in the house. Like some health freak,” she said, sending me a look with a curled lip.
“He also doesn’t have any blueberry syrup for coffee. Which is a sacrilege.”
She was making requests.
It was a roundabout way of doing it, but she was doing it. She wanted me to get some of the stuff she liked in my place. Because she planned on being around.
I fucking liked that.
Blueberry syrup and white potatoes were at the top of my list the next time I got to the food store.
She moved toward me, going for the drawer where I kept the spatulas and shit.
And I didn’t give a fuck that we had company.
I grabbed her, pressed her back against the counter, and crashed my lips down on hers.
It wasn’t short either. It was long and deep and hot enough for her to melt into me, to make a low, throaty whimper against my lips.
When I pulled back, her eyes fluttered open, looking both turned on and a bit confused.
“Didn’t get to say good morning before,” I explained, and she lit the fuck up. Her smile stretched wide enough to make her eyes crinkle.
“Well, good morning,” she said, her voice almost shy for a second. Then, as if maybe sensing that was exactly how it sounded, the next words out of her mouth were pure Kenzi. “Now get the hell out of my kitchen, so I can make love to this beautiful thing you call a stove.”
I chuckled, grabbing the coffee pot and pouring cups for Brock and me, jerking my head toward the living room, and he followed.
“I’ve known Kenz a long time,” he said, taking the mug from me.
“Yeah, I got that.”
“What I’m saying is, I’ve seen all the sides of her: sloppy drunk, sobbing over some schmuck who broke her trust, teasing, smartass, ball-busting. And I have never seen her smile like that.”
I moved off toward the bedroom, grabbing my cell out of my pants and coming back to plug it in next to my office desk. “She’s a good woman. I plan to keep that look there as much as possible.”
“Out of curiosity,” he said, looking devilish, “are Paine and Enzo aware you are fucking their little sister?”
Yeah, that was another talk I needed to have.