Dear Roomie (Rookie Rebels #5) - Kate Meader Page 0,37

get any particular pleasure out of it. Kennedy obviously did, but then she got pleasure out of everything. And Reid got pleasure out of her.

The gym beckoned. It would be better for his mental health. His dick health.

Instead he asked, “How can I help?”

“Dice this pepper. Oh!”

“What?”

“I just noticed these.” Tentatively, as if they were a gift, she touched the three mugs he had removed from the cupboard that was too tall for her, and placed on the counter. “You left these here for me?”

“Oui. You need your coffee, don’t you?”

“I do. Thanks, that was kind of you.” The softness on her face at this one small thing made his heart leap like Bucky when he spotted a squirrel at the park. She uncapped one of Bast’s beers. “You sure you don’t want one? I still think it’s odd that he brought it, knowing you won’t drink it.”

“All part of his evil plan. He’s a devil in disguise.”

“Cute. I’m guessing he got all the personality in your family.” She took a drink of her beer and he looked away so he wouldn’t add a shot of her slender throat to his fantasy list.

“Yeah, that’s Bast. Mr. Personality.” He didn’t want to talk about his brother, so he changed the subject. “Did you grow up in Chicago?”

“No, in a small town in Indiana, just outside of South Bend.”

“But your grandmother’s here?”

“Yeah. She’s pretty excited that I know you. The mere mention of your name sent her into a Reid-gasm.”

Not an image he relished. “Tell me about her.”

She gave him an odd look, and maybe it was an odd request. Mostly he just wanted to hear her speak. He hadn’t expected he would enjoy that. He didn’t enjoy people as a rule, so no one was more surprised than him.

So she talked and he listened, and then he ate the hottest curry he’d ever experienced, and took it like a champion because that’s what he aspired to be.

14

The next morning Reid was up at five for a run, Bucky at his heels, as he stumbled toward the kitchen to start the coffee. Caffeine was his one vice during the season. His only vice.

But he was steadily working another one into his routine: fantasizing about his roommate. The curry she’d made last night (only 400 calories per serving, roomie!) was hot and spicy, and he’d headed to the gym straight after so he could sweat it—and her—out of his system. By the time he returned, she had gone to bed, having left a note to say Bucky had already been taken out.

Reid took him out for another walk because the little con artist gave him the eye.

Now he was up early, congratulating himself on getting six hours sleep. Sure, he’d only woken up three times.

Jerked off twice.

Dreamed about Mrs. Potato Head who insisted he call her Ms. Sweet Potato Head.

Woke up with the theme from The Rockford Files on a loop in his head.

Damn dog better be worth it.

Probably not, he decided, because look the fuck here, if it wasn’t his roommate up before him, hanging in the kitchen with headphones on as she mixed something in a bowl. This should not have been a big deal except she wore a tank top and white panties.

Skimpy.

White.

Panties.

His dick jumped to life, like Bucky sensing his next meal.

He moved into her sightline to let her know he was there, when really it would have been better if he’d stealth-moded his way out of there. That way he wouldn’t have seen the subtle sway of her breasts as she faced him, the clearly hard nipples that seemed to point at him in accusation.

Can’t look. Can’t touch. Can’t taste.

These tits are not for you, dickhead.

In the split second as she turned and before she reacted to his presence, he caught sight of that dark patch of hair beneath the almost translucent white fabric, that triangle that hid nothing and tempted him to dream of falling to his knees and placing his mouth right there.

“Oh, sorry, I thought you were still asleep.” She waved over her body, almost an apology that only made it worse because now he was even more aware of those curves. The dips and swells, the places he wanted to visit with his tongue. “I only meant to nip out of my room for a second to whip up some blueberry muffins.”

Nip. Every word was loaded.

In the half-shadow of the under-cabinet lighting he noticed something else. Scar tissue on the side of her torso,