Heavy Secrets - Elle Aycart Page 0,9

Jewelry doesn’t work with her.”

Cole had messed up often enough. He could buy her the biggest rock in Tiffany’s, but it wouldn’t do him any good. Expensive stuff didn’t impress Christy.

“So?” James pressed.

“I’m flying her down to Vegas,” Cole admitted.

“You what?”

Cole let out a slow breath and ran his hand through his hair. “They are hosting some freaky Star Trek convention. Celebrating the preview of a new Star Trek movie too. I’ve been hearing Christy talk about it for a fucking month already. All her geek friends from LA are going, so I’m taking her.” Apparently spending Valentine’s at a convention was sort of a tradition among them.

Stunned silence.

James looked at Cole, then at his brother Max, and exploded into laughter. “You’ve got to be shitting me.”

“Nope.”

James tried to sober up but failed miserably. “I don’t know what worries me more—that you’re going to a Star Trek convention, or that you know a new Star Trek movie is being previewed.”

“Tell me about it. Even Klingon doesn’t sound weird to me anymore. Sick, really,” Cole muttered. “Anyhow, I’ve got us a room at the Venetian. I’m hoping to keep her entertained enough that she’d rather stay in it with me than go out.”

“So you plan to fuck her into submission. Or into exhaustion. Whatever comes first, huh?”

“Damn right. Do you have a problem with it?”

“Nope.” James chuckled. “Great plan. Tried it a time or two myself.”

“Rate of success?” Cole asked matter-of-factly.

“Not that high, I’m afraid.”

Yeah, he was in the same boat. Case in point: their whole relationship. Never mind how hard he tried to keep the upper hand, all it took was a look from her, a caress, and he was putty at her feet, with his chest clenched and his cock stiff, ready to please her. Bonkers, really.

“If it can’t be helped, I’ll go with her to the convention, but I’m drawing the line at dressing up.”

Again, stunned silence.

He should have kept his trap shut.

Max cleared his throat, that damn cocky grin making an appearance on his smug face. Thank fuck he’d lost the braids and the Viking beard. “I hear they’ve opened a sci-fi sex club in Vegas, you know, for those who like their sex…theme oriented. Maybe you can go there with her.”

Sure, he’d get a tail and some blue paint, and ta-da, Avatar.

James was silent, but his shoulders were shaking from laughter.

Cole’s murderous glare, as always, was totally ignored. “Not fucking dressing up. Not in a sex club, not at a con.”

“Aww, come on. Rent the Vulcan outfit. Just in case,” Max insisted. “For the sake of bulletproofing the whole thing. I could download you some info on Vulcan neuropressure massages. To keep it real.”

“Neuropressure massages?” James managed to get out between chuckles.

Max waved at him. “Not clear on it. Something to do with their pointy ears, I think.”

As James and Max laughed their asses off, Christy and Tate came back from the house and into the porch.

A very pregnant Tate went straight to sit on James’s lap. Christy, still self-conscious around people, circled her arms around Cole from behind and kissed his jaw. “What were these two laughing about?”

“Nothing,” Cole grumbled. “Just setting some things straight.”

Christy moved to sit on a chair beside him. No fucking way. Cole grabbed her and settled her on his lap, his chest clenching as she snuggled against him and rested her head on the crook of his neck.

He used to hate intimacy. Used to feel suffocated. Now? Now he didn’t seem to be able to breathe without Christy nearby.

He hadn’t realized how much he’d missed spending time alone with her now that Martha was always around. Thank God tonight they were going out for dinner and dancing.

Christy placed her hand over his, playing with the engagement ring she’d given him a while ago. Nothing flowery, just a white-gold band that marked him as hers. He loved it. Loved being hers.

“Your kick-ass phone’s got that supermegapixel camera, right?” Max asked her.

“Sure. Why?”

“Just don’t go anywhere without it next week. Promise. We want full coverage. Anything that strikes you as…unusual, please take a pic.”

No need to make her promise anything. Christy’s e-toys were all but surgically attached to her. That said, he’d rather die a horrible death than dress up or get caught in a picture with any of those sci-fi nuts.

“And you,” Max said to Tate, his face splitting in a devilish smirk. “I hope your molding skills are up to date. Because really, some things, when broken, are impossible to