inside of her. “As far as I can tell, you never really bother with appearing virtuous, why start now?”
“Because you do.”
She frowned. “I do?”
He reached out, wrapping his arm around her waist and pulling her up against him so that her back was resting against his chest, his hand splayed over her stomach. “Yes,” he said, his breath hot on her neck. “You’re such a prickly little thing. Like a sea urchin.”
She scowled, whipping her head around and looking up so that she could see him. “That is the most unflattering comparison I have ever heard.”
He ignored her. “Prickly, near impossible to get to the center of. Yeah, hate to break it to you, baby, but that’s you.”
“A virtuous sea urchin?”
He chuckled, low and soft in her ear and her knees forgot their function, buckling beneath her, only his strong hold keeping her from crumpling into a Rebecca-shaped heap on the floor. “I didn’t say you were virtuous, I said you gave the appearance of being virtuous. It’s all a part of that untouchable vibe you have going on.”
She struggled to get out of his hold, pushing her hair off of her face and turning to face him when she succeeded. “I’ll tell you what. Why don’t you skip the psychoanalyzing, and just feed me bacon.”
“If you prefer.”
“Who doesn’t prefer bacon over self-examination?”
“Well-adjusted vegetarians?”
She snorted. “Well, I hate to break it to you, but the two of us are neither of those things.”
She took a seat on the couch with a glass of wine provided by Gage, and continued to watch him wander around the kitchen looking like some strange fantasy she hadn’t even realized she had. But oh boy, did it ever work for her.
His muscles shifted and punched with his every move as he efficiently prepared their plates. And every time he bent down for something she hoped that his jeans would slip a little bit more. They never did. They were some kind of magical, infuriating cut designed to drive women crazy.
She couldn’t remember ever being taken care of this way before. Jonathan had cared for her every practical need, and she couldn’t fault him. He had been a kid, doing his very best to take care of a kid. But no one had ever done this. This felt luxurious, lavish.
Dinner tasted amazing, the kind of rich comfort food she had never indulged in growing up, because it was too complicated for her to make and too expensive to buy. They talked about their days. He about the progress he’d made with the Main Street buildings, and she about the incredibly loud tour group that had nearly rattled her ceramic birds off their perches with their noise, and about the loose floorboard she kept stubbing her toe on, even though she knew it was there.
And then, when it was all finished, he did the cleaning up while she lay down on the couch, listening to music that he played from his phone to a wireless speaker.
She closed her eyes, humming along until she must have fallen asleep, because the next thing she remembered was being picked up, held against Gage’s chest and carried to the bedroom. When he tried to set her down, she clung to him even harder, reluctant to lose this feeling. Of being small, of being light and easy to hold on to. Of being completely and utterly sheltered in the strength of his hold.
Of being safe.
“I’m just going to set you down on the bed,” he whispered, his words as rough as the stubble that scraped against her cheek when he spoke. “I’m not going to leave you.”
She let him set her down, and she felt the mattress depress behind her, felt him stretch out alongside her, curving his hand around her body, holding on to her protectively. He seemed to remake himself to fit around her, something she would have thought impossible for such a hard man to do, and yet, he did it.
Her last thought before drifting off with him was that it should be unsettling to fall asleep with someone like this. But it wasn’t, not with him. Hadn’t been even the first time. Somehow, being with him, though in a strange bed, made her feel an awful lot like she was home.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
“WHAT ARE YOU doing here?”
Gage ignored Rebecca’s evil glare as he walked over the threshold into her shop. “I came to fix your floorboard.”
“This is real life, Gage. This is not porn. So, whatever you were thinking