Chapter 5
FIVE
A LOG
I was learning Knox Chambers was greedy.
I’d come.
He’d come.
And now, after working my neck with his mouth (deliciously), he trailed his lips down my chest, took possession of the underside of my breast, lifted it, and gave my nipple a sweet tongue roll (scrumptiously).
He moved from there to my mouth, touched his lips to mine, then rolled out of bed.
After I watched his fabulous ass…I mean him disappear, I reached for the covers, pulled them over me and rolled to my back.
That—sex with Knox—was freaking fantastic.
Shockingly so. Ridiculously so. Astoundingly so.
But sadly, common sense, as it was irritatingly wont to do, was rushing in, and maybe, now that we were out of the fun flirty bits, and into the naked in bed bits, it was time to consider (seriously tardily) if this had been a mistake.
He came back from the bathroom, turned out the bedside light (the only one we bothered—or I should say he bothered, he had me otherwise occupied—to switch on) and slid in bed beside me.
Guessed that meant he was spending the night.
I wanted that…so much.
But I was wondering at the intelligence of it…a lot.
I mean, there were huge things riding on this: crucial friendships, functional teams, stuff like that.
Shit.
He pulled me into his warm, big, hard body at the same time he smoothed a hand down my back, a cheek of my ass, the back of a thigh and hooked that leg over his hip.
Hmm.
Comfy.
“So, that was great,” I pointed out the obvious.
He chuckled. It was low, deep, delightful.
“Yeah, baby, that was great,” he agreed, humor still in his tone (also delightful).
“But, um…” I pressed my hands to his chest. “I think we need to discuss how smart it was.”
His arms were around me, and they convulsed…hard.
“You don’t think it was smart?” he asked, his tone now wary, and I instantly missed the humor.
“I don’t know. Do you think it was smart?”
“I think it was fuckin’ fantastic.”
“Well, yeah. We established that.”
“And you make me laugh.”
I’d noticed he’d done a lot of that at Mom and Dad’s house all day. And I thought it was awesome that he seemed so chill and in his element there.
“I’m funny,” I noted with zero humility because…what was the point? I could be a laugh riot. I knew this about me.
He gave me another squeeze, this one just wasn’t as intense. “You are, baby.”
“But life is full of thrills and chills and giggles,” I noted.
“Maybe your life,” he muttered.
Oh boy.
I slid my hands up his crisp chest hair so I could wrap them around the sides of his neck.
“Something going down?” I asked.
“You don’t know me very well.”
This was indeed true. I’d only known him a few months.
I wasn’t sure I was overjoyed he pointed that out after I let him fuck me, though.
“We’ll be rectifying that,” he went on.
I relaxed and smiled in the dark.
“I don’t know you very well either, and we’ll be rectifying that too,” he continued.
“But one thing to know about me, my life has not been shits and grins. I was at your parents’ Thanksgiving table because my family is a disaster.
Got two brothers and a dad I don’t respect, don’t even like, to the point I wrestle with the fact I actually hate them, and I will never again spend a second of my time with them unless it’s to attend their funeral. ”
We’d suddenly gotten very deep.
And shocker.
I was not at all scared of it.
Oh no.
I was there for it.
I was there for how easily he gave me that. I didn’t like what he said, but I liked that he trusted me with it. That he was open about it. That it indicated this wasn’t going to be about games and parceling out information and tests.
“So, what you’re saying is, there wasn’t a lot of laughter,” I surmised.
“Best thing I ever did was go into the army. Best thing that ever happened to me was being in the army. My life right now couldn’t be any more different than it was the whole time I was growing up. The whole entire time, Luna.”
I was still there for the honesty.
I just hated what he was saying.
I pressed closer and whispered, “Baby.”
“Yeah, it sucked,” he agreed matter-of-factly. “So, I can say that a beautiful woman with curly hair and dancing eyes and fierce friendships, who’s funny as all fuck…no. This is not a mistake. This isn’t a one-off. This is happening.”
I waited for him to ask me if I was on board with that, but he didn’t.
Which was when I started laughing.
“What’s funny?” he asked, sounding mildly miffed and all kinds of cute.
“You’re lucky I agree with you,” I did not lie. “But my decision is based mostly on the fact you really know what to do with your dick,” I lied.
That was when he busted out laughing.
He also rolled into me.
Oh yeah.
“Ready for seconds?” he asked.
“It is Thanksgiving,” I remarked.
I felt him smile against my mouth.
Then he gave me seconds.
* * *
My alarm went off, playing “Leia’s Theme” from Star Wars.
But I was already awake, and had been for a while, lying in bed, arms curled around a special secret I kept under my pillow, my face stuffed in it, stuck in my thoughts.
Or in my memories.
Beautiful memories.
That was one of only two nights we spent in my bed (the morning after the second night, intel about Jessie’s missing brother came in, everyone showed at mine, and luckily, he’d had plans to do brunch and go to the shooting range with Cap, and the news was so big, and it came in late morning, no one paid a lot of attention to the fact Knox was there with me, but we decided from there it was his place only… until we came out).
After it was over, I’d wished I’d had more time with him in my pad. More memories of him there.
Right now, I was realizing that was crazy.
Just the two were enough.
More than enough.
Suddenly, the lyrics to “Me and Bobby McGee” came into my head, specifically, “I’d trade all my tomorrows for one single yesterday.”
And I felt those words down to my bones.
“Shit,” I said out loud.
I had it bad.
I knew that, deep down, but now, with all that was happening, I knew it.
Jacques wiggled in and snuffled my neck.
I needed to walk my dog then feed him.
Then go feed Knox.
I turned and cuddled Jacques.
He licked my jaw.
“I’m an idiot,” I told my dog.
He didn’t think so and communicated this by licking my jaw again.
This was what dogs were good at. Because even if you were an idiot, they made you feel like you weren’t.
But since I had no choice—I had two boys to take care of—me and my dog got out of bed to face the day.
* * *
As I hit the doorbell by Knox’s front door, I realized I should have demanded a key from him last night.
Or I shouldn’t have returned the key he’d given me after we broke up.
Ahem.
But what if he was upstairs, still asleep?
My shift was seven to four. It was super early.
When we were together, I’d learned he was an early riser, like me.
But…
The door opened.
“Yo,” he greeted and shift-hobbled out of my way.
He was in pajama bottoms and nothing else.
Good God, that chest, even partially bandaged.
Oh, heck yeah.
I was such an idiot.
I walked in and smelled garlic.
Since most of his bottom floor was open plan (the only things that weren’t were a powder room, obvs, and an office), I could see he had scrambled eggs in a skillet, a stack of buttered toast, the jelly out and waiting, and a plate covered with a paper towel on top of which was a small mound of cooked bacon.
Knox could eat, but he couldn’t eat all that.
I darted my gaze to him and accused, “You made breakfast.”
“I keep telling you, I’m not an invalid,” he replied, walk-hobbling to the kitchen. “Sit your ass down. It’s done and time to serve up.”
This meant he didn’t make himself breakfast.
He made us breakfast.
“I’m supposed to be looking after you, remember?” I snapped.
But still, Knox had made me scrambled eggs before.
His eggs were almost always fresh due to his incomprehensible love of grocery shopping.
He slow cooked them so they were fluffy and silky, not tough, and he added minced garlic and cheese.
If he was feeling fancy, he sautéed mushrooms (alas, I did not buy him mushrooms last night).
So, obviously, I wandered to his kitchen and commandeered one of the two plates he had out.
“I can scramble some eggs and fry some bacon, Luna.”
He was the only double gunshot wound victim, four days post incident, who probably could.
But I wasn’t going to quibble, as evidenced by me scooping eggs onto a plate I already had three rashers of bacon on.
“Sit. I’ll do your plate too,” I ordered, and watched as he set aside his crutch and lowered himself to one of his steel I’m a Man with Taste! barstools with a slight grimace on his face.
He’d done too much, the big idiot.
And I’d given him shit about those barstools, because they looked good, but they weren’t comfy.
I bet he was rethinking his design choice now.
I did not give him shit this time.
“You need some aspirin or something?” I asked as I made his plate.
“I’m good. I’ll take something after I eat.”
“Okay,” I said, sliding his food in front of him, going direct to his cutlery drawer and getting us both knives and forks.
I handed him his, took my plate and sat down next to him.
I reached for the jelly.
He didn’t slather his toast with grape jelly because he didn’t eat it.
That jar of jelly was probably there from when I was there (unless Cheyenne ate jelly, which I found doubtful considering her size four ass).
I wondered if it was still good.
Since I had a cast iron stomach and an aversion to plain toast, I didn’t wonder long and dug into the jar.
“How did the sitting go with Dream?” he asked his plate.
Okay, yeah.
Okay, right.
We were friends.
Friends shared.
Friends cared.
We hadn’t been super-good friends before he got shot because I was wounded and pining, he was…whatever he was, he’d then got a girlfriend, I’d then faked a budding relationship with his bro…which led us to our recent past and him getting shot.