Chapter 29
Chapter Twenty-Nine
The House
I was in the middle of dicing carrots when the front door opened. Archer strode inside.
“What are you doing here?” I asked. “It’s lunchtime.”
“I know it’s lunchtime,” he said as he came to me, removing his cowboy hat and setting it on the counter. He took the knife from my hand and placed it on the cutting board. “I’m hungry.”
“You usually have lunch at the Ridge,” I stated. “So why are you home in the middle of the day? And how did you get here?”
“I borrowed Brooks’ truck.” His eyes darkened. “And I told you. I’m hungry.”
I licked my lips. “Oh . . .”
He dropped to his knees and wrestled my leggings down until they pooled at my ankles. And then he grasped my ass and hauled me toward him.
My fingers sank into his hair as he pleasured me right there in the kitchen.
“Good God!” I gasped as I came down from my orgasm.
“My name is Archer,” he said.
I rolled my eyes at him as he slowly rose to his feet.
“Well?” he asked, a wicked grin on his face.
“Well, what?”
“Do I get a gold star?” he teased.
“How about a sandwich?”
“My hot-as-fuck, orgasm-having girlfriend wants to make me a sandwich? How did I get so lucky?”
I’d been in the middle of pulling up my pants when his words stopped me. I looked at him.
“What?” he asked with a frown. “Oh, you freaked out because I called you my girlfriend.”
“Yes, but no, that’s not what had me pausing. Oddly.”
“The hot-as-fuck part?”
“Not that either.”
“Then what—the orgasm part?” He raised his brows. “I barely have to touch you before you’re begging me to make you come.”
I glared at him.
“What? It’s true.”
“Yeah, I know it’s true. But it’s not normal for me.” I slid my eyes from his and went to the sink to wash my hands.
He came up behind me and placed his hands on my hips. He was still hard, and it made a gasp escape my lips. Well, of course he was hard. He hadn’t gotten to come.
“Talk to me, Wyn.”
I turned in his arms and faced him. “I’ve never been like that . . . before you.”
The hard planes of his face softened as he reached up to cup my cheeks. “I’ll take care of you. Always.”
We stared at one another, and I knew he didn’t just mean physically.
I tilted my head back to receive his kiss. I tasted myself on his lips and it only inflamed my desire. Despite the orgasm, I was ready for another.
And another.
I pulled back and pressed a hand to the middle of his sternum. “Sit. Let me make you some food. And then you’ll have dessert.”
“Dessert?”
I flashed him a devious grin. “Me. On my knees for you.”
“Good Lord,” he muttered.
He took a seat at the kitchen table as I moved around the kitchen.
“I had pastries and coffee with the girls this morning,” I said.
“Yeah? How’d that go?”
“I told them,” I said. “About us.”
“Ah, finally admitting there’s an us. Good.”
“Hush,” I said with a laugh. “I can’t lie to them. I’ve never been able to lie to them. Besides, they’ll see the spring in my step, and I only own so many turtlenecks. So, I came clean.”
“Does that mean we can take this thing public? And by public, I mean tell Lenni. It would’ve been nice to sit on the couch next to you last night while we watched Return of the King.”
“Yeah,” I agreed. “It would’ve been nice to cuddle.”
“So?” he pressed. “We need to tell her.”
I nibbled my lip.
“Wyn? You’re not seriously going to keep using Lenni as an excuse, are you?”
I shook my head as I reached into the refrigerator and pulled out a jar of pickles. “No.”
“Then we tell her.”
I tapped the lid of the pickle jar as my thoughts wandered. Finally, I said, “My whole life is changing.”
“So is mine.”
“We jumped from nothing to something really fucking fast.”
“Wyn?”
“Yeah?”
“Share my sandwich,” he said. “And stop trying to rationalize it all. We’re together. And we’ll tell Lenni.”
“How am I supposed to explain this to my parents?” I demanded. “They’re going to think I’m insane for staying here for a relationship.
“Come here,” he commanded. When I didn’t move right away, he stated again, “Come here, Wyn.”
I brought the jar of pickles with me and set it on the table. Archer reached out and pulled me onto his lap.
“You listen to me. And you listen good.” His eyes bored into mine. “This isn’t a relationship. It’s the relationship. The one that works. The one that lasts.”
“How can you know that?” I asked, my voice trembling. “It’s been so fast.”
“Woman,” he said with a labored sigh, “the moment I saw you braiding Lenni’s hair, I was done for.”
I blinked. “That was the first time we met.”
“Yeah.”
“But how can you—that’s crazy.”
“Maybe.” He shrugged.
“What happens when it wears off?”
“When what wears off?”
“The sex haze! I give it four months, tops, before you’re like, Oh God, how do I get this broad out of my house?”
“Wyn?”
“Yeah?”
“Shut up.”
“You can’t tell me to—”
“Shut up,” he said again, a slow smile appearing on his lips. “You gotta stop thinking with your head. That’s your issue.”
“No. That’s what’s been wrong. I’ve always thought with my heart, and it got me into trouble. I pick the wrong men.”
“I’m not the wrong man.”
I blew out a breath and grabbed the jar of pickles. I attempted to open it, but it was sealed tight.
Archer took it from me and with one effortless twist, the seal broke with a pop.
“I loosened it for you,” I stated.
“Sure, you did.” He set the jar down. “I’m not the wrong man. I’m your man.”
His words turned my heart into marshmallow fluff. “I’m gonna keep freaking out.”
“Okay.” He gently tapped my hip, urging me to rise.
“I’m going to pick stupid fights to try to push you away.”
“How self-aware of you,” he remarked, standing.
“I’m going to cry randomly because I believe this is too good to be true.”
“Crying doesn’t freak me out.”
“You freaked out because Lenni cried,” I reminded him.
“I freaked out because she wouldn’t talk to me. So I had no idea how to fix it.”
“You can’t always fix things, Archer,” I murmured, turning away.
He grasped my arms and forced me to face him. “Like hell I can’t.”
“This isn’t yours to fix. It’s mine to fix.”
“So, fix it here,” he said. “With me. With Lenni. With your friends. Just be here. Everything else will sort itself out.”
“And that’s another thing!” I stated, wrenching away from him. “What am I supposed to do now?”
“Existentially, or like—”
“Financially. I can’t still be Lenni’s nanny. That would be weird. You paying me to take care of her while we’re also sleeping together? That feels very . . . ya know.”
“I think I’m getting a migraine.”
I glared at him. “That’s not funny.”
“I know.” He rubbed his temple. “It fucking hurts.”
“You’re an ass,” I snapped.
“Twenty minutes ago, I was a god. My how the mighty have fallen.” He sighed.
“I warned you. I warned you it would be like this.”
“Okay, here’s how this is gonna go. You listening?”
“I’m a plague upon your house,” I muttered, my eyes dropping to the floor.
“How biblical,” he teased. “Wyn, look at me.”
My head snapped up.
“You’re fired.”
“What?” I gasped. “You just said—”
“You’re fired. The rest of your two weeks’ notice is null and void. You’re no longer Lenni’s nanny. You’re no longer the housekeeper. You’re no longer the cook.”
“But someone has to take Lenni to school and pick her up. As for all the other stuff—”
He covered my mouth gently with his hand to silence me.
“I could hire someone to do all that. The cooking, the laundry, driving Lenni to and from school. We don’t need that. We need you. Just you. Do you understand what I’m saying?” He dropped his hand so I could reply.
“Not even a little bit.”
He took a step closer to me. “You were never just the nanny, Wyn.”
I swallowed. “I’m not her mom.”
“No?”
“She has a mom.”
“Had,” he murmured, his eyes turning somber. “She had a mom and she’s gone. But now she has you. We both do. You don’t need to worry about a job, Wyn. You’ve got the most important job in the world.”
“And what job is that?”
His smile was tender. “Loving us.”
My breath hitched, but I didn’t reply. I couldn’t.
“You think you’ve hidden it so well,” he said, wrapping his arms around me. “I’m going to take care of you, Wyn. I already said that, didn’t I? You won’t have to want for anything. And that’s what I’ll tell your parents the next time you talk to them.”
My hands slid up his arms to envelope his neck and I pressed closer. “Archer?”
“Hmm?”
“Dessert’s gonna have to wait. Your lunch break is almost over.”