Chapter 2
NASH & VELVET
A TEXT
Two years after they got together
Nash’s POV
Velvet
Fingernails down your back.
Nash
Fuckin’ hell. I’m an hour from you, stuck doing club shit for at least the next two hours, and you send me that. A man could die from a text like that when he can’t do anything with it.
Velvet
A man should make sure he gets home as fast as he can when he’s finished doing club shit. Especially when he didn’t take care of his woman at the beginning of the day like he should.
Nash
It’s not my fuckin’ fault our neighbour has a thing for you and decided to spend half a fuckin’ hour talking your ear off this morning. That half hour was your chance, baby. Next time, I suggest you cut your conversation short.
Velvet
Next time, I suggest my man comes to my rescue so his woman can have her way with him.
Velvet
Also, are you cooking dinner tonight?
Nash
I’m reading between the lines here and am going with yes.
Velvet
See, this is why I married you.
I call her and she answers on the second ring with “Hey, you.” Fuck, Velvet’s voice never fails to wrap itself around my dick. Fucking never.
“You having a bad day, sweet thing?” Velvet only ever wants me to take over dinner when she’s had a bad day. I’ll cook whenever, but she generally prefers to handle it because she prefers her own cooking.
She sighs and I swear I feel it from all the way across town. She’s having a shit day. “Yeah. I’ve had asshole client after asshole client today. I don’t know why people can’t just be nice. It’s not that hard to smile and treat your beauty therapist like an actual human.”
“Are you finished for the day now?” I vaguely recall her telling me something about being able to take an early mark this afternoon.
“Yes, thank God. I’m gonna go home, take all my clothes off, and spend the afternoon in the bath. And I’m gonna eat cake while I’m in that bath. More than one piece.”
“Fuck, you had me at ‘take all your clothes off.’”
“Are you sure you can’t get out of work this afternoon?”
“I fuckin’ wish I wasn’t as sure as I am. Scott’ll have my balls if I bail on this job.”
“Ugh.”
It’s not often that Velvet tries to get me to change my plans, so this tells me just how rough her day has been.
“I should be home by six. I’m taking you out for dinner.”
“I don’t want to go out for dinner tonight. I just want you to come home and take me to bed. And do that thing you do that I love the most.”
“You’re gonna have to elaborate here. There’s a lot of shit on that list of things I do that you love the most.”
That makes her laugh, which was my goal, but she quickly turns serious again, and her voice softens as she says, “I just want you to hold me, Nash.”
And just like that, Velvet brings me to my fucking knees.
Hell, I live on my knees for this woman.
Any hour of any day, I’ll do whatever the fuck she needs me to do to make everything okay for her. To make life good for her. To fucking ensure she’s happy and feels as loved as she is.
“You got it, sweet thing.”
“I love you,” she says, her voice still soft.
“I love you too. And I fuckin’ swear, if those clients give you this much hell again, I’m fuckin’ coming in there and making it so they know never to fuckin’ do it again.
” I fucking mean it, too, which is highly fucking likely why Roxie and Velvet go above and fucking beyond in their efforts to keep me away from the salon.
“Yeah, baby, I know you will,” she says, and I don’t miss the smile in her voice.
“You good if I go? J needs my help.”
“I’m good. You always make sure of that. I’ll see you tonight.”
We end the call and I make my way to where J’s dealing with a woman who’s losing her shit over us making the noise we’re making at the house next to hers. It can’t be fucking helped, though. The job we’ve been sent to handle involves us making a lot of fucking noise.
I’ve almost reached him when another text comes through.
Velvet
You, me, my nails down your back, tomorrow morning. And if Larry wants to talk my ear off, you’ll make it so he doesn’t.
Nash
Fuckin’ hell, you’ll be the fuckin’ death of me, woman.
Velvet
Good