Chapter 4
AVERY
I looked out the window of the parlor and watched as Sheriff Crowe’s squad car disappeared down the driveway.
She’d been the last of the police, and it was strange to feel the house settle into quiet.
It had been a hive of activity since the moment I’d stepped into the entryway, and my shoulders sagged with relief.
No more white forensics van out front, no more police cars or uniformed officers passing by the windows.
The table lamps — clearly on a timer — blinked on, casting the room in a cozy glow, and I realized with surprise that it was almost dark.
I was thirsty, starving, and really had to pee. Again. I’d used the bathroom right when we’d come inside after the police arrived, but that had been hours ago.
I stepped into the hall, used the powder room I found near the stairs leading to the upper floors, then followed the sound of voices to the back of the house.
I passed a library lined with books that went all the way to the ceiling, complete with one of those rolling library ladders that looked totally magical.
There was a media room with a projector screen and movie-theater-style seats, a wood-paneled room with another TV that looked like a living room, and a sunroom lined with windows, the property lit up like a high-end resort on the other side of the glass.
The voices got louder as I reached the end of the hall until I finally stepped into a massive kitchen that looked like it ran the entire length of the house. The man named Beck was there, stirring something on the stove, along with the two other guys who’d found me in the gazebo.
And holy guacamole. They were as hot as I remembered.
I’d kind of started to think I’d imagined it, that I’d gotten confused by the whole “dead body” thing, and I’d convinced myself that when I saw them again they’d have turned into grizzled old men, like a twisted version of Cinderella at midnight.
But nope. They really were hot.
Beck was stirring whatever was in the pot while the blond who’d been holding garden gloves at the gazebo sat in one of the chairs at a kitchen island as big as my entire apartment in the city.
The black-haired guy leaned against the counter, looking annoyed and grumpy.
Tattoos crawled out from under their clothes, and I could practically smell the testosterone in the room.
“Hey,” Beck said, spotting me in the doorway. “All done?”
“Done?” Why did I sound like an idiot?
“With Sheriff Crowe.”
“Oh, yeah. She just left. I think they’re all gone now.”
The blond stood and pulled out one of the chairs at the island. “Have a seat. You must be beat. I’m Noah by the way. Noah Bennett. I do the landscaping.”
“Avery,” I said on my way to the chair.
Dimples dented his cheeks as he flashed me a grin, and my heart almost stopped beating. “I remember.”
Right. I’d introduced myself at the gazebo.
But who could blame me for losing my cool? His sun-bleached hair made me think of summer picnics and rumpled sheets in the afternoon, and there was a calm in his green eyes that made me feel like I was sinking into a tropical pool of water.
He had broad shoulders, the shoulders of someone who did real work, and his hand, resting on the back of the chair, looked rough and calloused in a way that set my pulse pounding.
I wondered what his hands would feel like on my naked body, then felt my face heat as I slipped into the chair.
“Do you like mac and cheese?” Beck asked, turning off the heat on the stove.
He pulled on an oven mitt and poured some kind of cheesy sauce into a waiting casserole dish already filled with macaroni pasta. A salad was already prepared in a large bowl next to the stove.
“Who doesn’t?”
He laughed and the rumble of it went all the way to my toes. “Good answer. I’m more comfortable around a bundt pan than a casserole dish, but this should do for dinner.” He looked over at the black-haired man, leaning against the counter. “You going to be a gentleman and introduce yourself?”
And speaking of pulse-pounding, the guy’s biceps bulged under the short sleeves of his T-shirt as he crossed his arms over his chest, and I caught sight of the bold gray and black lines of his tattoos: bricks and columns, foundational elements I’d never seen inked onto someone’s body.
He was like a diamond, hard and bright, his steel gray eyes as sharp as a blade, his jaw defined enough to cut glass. A heavy watch glinted on his wrist — an actual watch — and I realized I couldn’t remember the last time I’d known a man with a watch.
“Who said I was a gentleman?”
Beck sighed. “That’s Dane. He manages the finances and stuff, takes care of repairs around the house. If you need something done or want to know more about the house, he’s your man.”
I nodded but didn’t bother saying anything, because honestly? The guy was giving off big-dick energy, both the good and bad kind.
Beck sprinkled bread crumbs on top of the casserole dish and then put it in the oven.
“That’ll only take a few minutes,” he said, returning to the island. “Want some milk and cookies while you wait?”
“Milk and… cookies?” As far as I knew, my ears were working fine, but since I’d never been offered milk and cookies by an inked baker with panty-melting brown eyes, it didn’t hurt to make sure.
“It’s been a rough day.” He turned to pull a glass down from one of the cupboards. “You probably need some milk and cookies.”
He opened the fridge and poured milk into the glass, then plucked two cookies off a baking sheet cooling on the stove. He set them on a plate and pushed them toward me. “Enjoy.”
“Um… thanks.” This was weird.
Really weird.
Like a cross between an episode of Law & Order and Gilmore Girls.
Except I was the only girl.
He watched me closely as I bit into the cookie. Nutty oatmeal hit my tongue, along with butter, brown sugar, and slightly bitter dark chocolate. I closed my eyes with a sigh and inhaled deeply for the first time since I’d found the dead body in the gazebo.
“Wow… that’s amazing.”
Beck beamed. “See? Milk and cookies.”
I nodded, fighting a smile. “Milk and cookies.”
I met Noah’s gaze, locked on my mouth, and lifted my eyebrows in question.
“You’ve got a little…” Before I knew what was happening, he touched his finger to my bottom lip, then held it up. “Chocolate.”
He put the finger in his mouth to lick off the chocolate, but instead of being freaked like any normal person, my nipples got hard.
Jiminy cricket, I needed to unpack my vibrator stat. I was clearly too horny for my own good.
“We got your bags out of your car and took them upstairs,” Noah said. “I hope that’s okay.”
“It’s fine, thank you.” I took another bite of cookie.
Beck took plates down from one of the cupboards and started setting the long wooden table in the dining nook next to glass doors that led to a terrace.
“Evelyn cooked a lot, said she enjoyed it. We’ve mostly been doing takeout since she passed, but if you tell me what you like I can plan to make dinner most nights. ”
“You don’t have to do that.” I was beginning to think it would be smartest to keep my distance.
“Eat alone if you want,” Dane said.
Noah frowned at him. “Dane just means that you shouldn’t feel obligated to eat with us if you want to do your own thing.”
I didn’t know what to say, mostly because right then what I wanted was a tie between running to the farthest corners of the big house to avoid the three men who seemed to suck all the oxygen out of the room and getting naked with them — all of them — right there in the kitchen.
Beck went to the oven to pull out the mac and cheese. “We can figure all that out later. Avery’s probably tired and hungry. Let’s eat.”
I forced myself to breathe. I could eat one meal with my hot new employees without wanting to rail them. I’d figure out the rest later.
This was fine. Everything was fine.