My Cone and Only (King Family #1) - Susannah Nix Page 0,38
hundred percent Andie’s bitch. Just like that, she’d become the center of my universe.
Most nights she picked up takeout for us on the way home. We’d crack open a couple of beers and sit at her kitchen table while we talked about our respective days like a damn married couple. It was the kind of comfortable domesticity I hadn’t experienced much in my life, other than the time I’d spent with Andie’s family growing up.
For reasons I didn’t fully understand, it was something I’d always shied away from when other women had tried to offer it to me. I’d never wanted to stick around and do the things normal couples did. Unless I was doing them with Andie, apparently. I could have stayed all night doing nothing more than talking to her.
But I didn’t. I always limited myself to one beer, then made myself go home as soon as we’d cleaned up dinner. Staying any longer would be too risky. I might be tempted to drink more, and then I might let my guard down, and then I might do something stupid and ruin this great thing we had going.
It was Friday today, and I was looking forward to the weekend. Not because I was taking it off, but because Andie would be working beside me. Last weekend we’d rebuilt the front steps together and replaced the rotted floorboards in the porch, and damn, if the sight of her working a nail gun wasn’t one of the hottest things I’d ever seen.
Pure torture, mind you, but the sweetest kind of torture. The kind I couldn’t wait to repeat tomorrow.
When I heard Andie’s car pull up an hour earlier than usual, I dropped my paint scraper into my toolbox, wiped my hands off, and went around the house to greet her. I’d gotten her a surprise today, and I couldn’t wait to show it to her.
Her face looked like a thundercloud as she slammed the door of the car, and as soon as I got close enough to get a whiff of her, I had a guess as to why.
“What the hell is that smell?” I scrunched up my nose as she shoved her messenger bag at me.
“Bark beetle pheromones.” Instead of going in the front door, she headed around to the back of the house.
I followed her, hanging back a safe distance from the stink. “Why do you smell like beetle pheromones?”
“Because I spilled the damn solution when I was baiting traps.” She sat on the back porch steps and started untying her shoes.
I tried and failed to suppress a grin. “So you smell like sexy beetle juice?”
She shot me a dark look. “Har har.”
“Wait—so does this mean every beetle in the area is going to show up and try to have sex with you?”
“Yes, actually. Which is why I need to get these clothes in the wash before I end up ground zero in a beetle orgy.” Before I had time to avert my eyes, she stood up and pulled her park service polo shirt over her head.
Andie had never been shy about her body. I’d learned that the hard way when she’d showed up at the Holler the first time and stripped right in front of me as I was trying to get her to leave. I’d nearly stroked out when she’d untied her bikini top, baring her breasts to me, god, and everyone else at the swimming hole that night. My eyes had been faster than my reflexes, so I’d gotten a knockout view before my nervous system had started functioning again and I’d managed to look away.
This time I tried to play it cooler. If Andie didn’t consider it a big deal, then me clutching my pearls and acting the prude would only make things more awkward.
At least she was wearing a bra this time. A very practical black sports bra, even. Nothing more revealing than you’d see at the gym or a public pool. No reason to get worked up or excited. The sight of her bare stomach definitely shouldn’t make my blood rush straight to my crotch, but then neither should those khaki pants she wore either.
Speaking of Andie’s pants, she was already unfastening them, and before I knew it she’d shoved them off her hips and down to her ankles. I swallowed at the sight of her plain black panties and the exposed curve of her ass cheeks as she bent over to pick up her discarded clothes.