Unbound (Crimson Romance) (14 page)

“You’re going to hang it up?”

“You want me to throw it on the couch?”

She laughed. “I guess not.” She took off her coat and handed it to him. “How about a tour?”

“How about lunch first? I’m starving.”

Her stomach chose that moment to grumble. She laughed and pressed a hand to it. “It sounds like I am, too.”

“Lunch it is.” He stepped around her and headed for the kitchen.

She followed him. They walked to the end of the hallway, which opened into the living room. She noticed there wasn’t a television in the room. The living room and kitchen were open to each other.

She stopped as the hardwood floors of the living room gave way to the smooth tile floors of the kitchen. The gray tiles were complemented by dark brown cabinets and gray granite countertops. When she looked straight into the kitchen, the cabinets formed an open “U” shape.

On the far wall, a six-burner stove top was framed on either side by glass-fronted cabinets that stretched from the countertops to the ceiling. To the right, there was a huge window in front of the double sink. At the end of the counter, stainless steel double ovens gleamed. The rest of that wall between the kitchen and the living room held glass doors that led outside. To the right, the cabinets formed a bar. Two black leather barstools sat on the outside of the “U” for seating.

“Oh, wow,” she breathed.

“What?” He glanced over his shoulder to look at her.

“This is a fabulous kitchen,” she told him.

“It gets the job done,” he replied.

“What? Look at this. ‘It gets the job done.’ Are you kidding me?” she asked. “This is my dream kitchen! I could cook in this kitchen every day and not get sick of it.”

“You can cook lunch then.”

“Really?”

“I’m joking.”

“I’ll cook,” she offered. “I’d love to.”

“Go for it.” He sat down on a bar stool at the far counter. Glancing over his shoulder, she saw —

“Is that a second living room?” she asked. She crossed the kitchen and stepped through the open doorway. She glanced behind her to look at him. “Why do you have two living rooms?”

“It’s supposed to be a dining room. I eat at the bar, though.”

“You have two living rooms and no television?”

He shrugged. “I don’t watch TV.”

She laughed and moved back into the kitchen. “Can I poke around in the cabinets?”

“Go for it.”

She did. Poking around in his cabinets, she made a discovery that put lunch out of the question.

“Do you realize you don’t have any food?”

“What?”

“You have a bottle of vegetable oil, a container of salt, Ramen noodles, and an empty box of Fruity Pebbles in your cabinets.” She opened the refrigerator. “And you have a bottle of beer, a brown something, what looks like fuzzy macaroni, and…” She pulled out the carton of milk and sniffed it. “…spoiled milk in your fridge.” She put the milk back and closed the refrigerator. “So?”

“You’re a cook.”

“Exactly. I’m a cook, not a magician.”

He chuckled. “I didn’t realize things hadn’t gotten so low. It’s been a crazy week. We’ll head back to town. Grab some lunch.”

“And go grocery shopping?”

He nodded. “We probably should do that.”

She sighed as she followed him back out to the foyer. “I can’t believe we have to go back to town. I would much rather explore your house.”

“I can go pick up groceries if you want to stay here.”

She thought about it for a moment. She really wanted to stay. She could explore the house and poke through his things — She stopped herself. That would be such an invasion of his privacy. She knew it. She also knew she would do it anyway if she stayed. She was just so curious about him.

“Do you realize groceries consist of more than Fruity Pebbles and Ramen noodles?” she asked him, motioning for her coat.

He handed it to her with a grin. “Not if I’m doing the shopping.” He opened the front door for her.

“Fruity Pebbles? Really?” She stepped out the door and went for the truck. “You’re a grown man.”

“What? They’re really good!”

She rolled her eyes. “You’ll definitely need help shopping.”

• • •

After having lunch at the diner, Payten and Dean headed to the general store in town to pick up enough groceries to last them a couple days. They had decided to make a trip later in the week to the grocery store in the neighboring town. Back at his house, he put away groceries while she sat on the counter of the bar and watched.

“What’s up the stairs?” she asked him.

He turned to look at her, then in the direction she pointed. A staircase ran along the back side of the living room.

“Master suite,” he answered.

She considered that for a moment. “I realize I was pretty out of it last night and this morning, but I don’t remember any stairs.”

He shrugged. “I’m lazy. I use one of the rooms down here so I didn’t have to go up and down the stairs.”

She laughed. “So, lazy, what’s the plan for the rest of the day?”

“Dinner.”

She checked her watch. “It’s not even five.”

“What would you like to do?”

“Well, you don’t have a television. Do you have a computer?”

“Nope,” he answered.

“How do you live without a television or a computer?”

He shrugged. “I didn’t have either growing up at Dad’s. I guess I never really got around to getting them.”

“Well, you don’t seem like the baking type either. What else does that leave?” she asked.

He thought about it as he rolled up the plastic bags from the groceries and tucked them into a basket under the sink. “I read.”

“Yeah? What kind of stuff?”

“Lots of stuff.”

“Like?”

He leaned up against the counter beside her. “James Patterson, Dan Brown, J.D. Robb, Kathy Reichs.”

“The first two, I might have guessed. The last two, not so much. J.D. Robb? You realize that’s Nora Roberts, right?”

“Nora who?” he asked, grinning.

She elbowed him.

He laughed. “Yes, I realize J.D. Robb and Nora Roberts are the same writer. And, no, I don’t read romance novels generally.”

“Generally?”

He shrugged. “Sometimes that’s all they have at the store.”

“Have you read any Hailey Ryans?”

He smiled. “Yes, I have. She seems to be one of Ryan and Hailey’s favorite authors.”

She smiled back.

“They’re Ryleigh’s books, aren’t they?”

“I’m not supposed to tell,” she answered.

“I figured they were.”

“She’s brilliant, huh?”

“I see a lot of Jonah in them,” he answered. “It’s weird.”

“Jonah?” she sputtered. “You’ve got to be kidding. Jonah?”

“Yeah. You don’t see it?”

She shook her head. “Not at all.”

“Come with me.” He grabbed her hand and waited for her to jump down from the counter. He led the way to one of the two doors on the far wall of the living room. He opened it and pulled Payten in after him.

“Holy cow!”

“What?” He looked over his shoulder at her.

“You read? That might be an understatement. Look at all these books.”

Bookshelves filled with books lined the room. She scanned as many of the titles as she could. Poetry, mystery, science fiction, fantasy, philosophy, children’s books. The variety would make her head spin if the sheer number of books weren’t enough. A desk sat toward the middle of the room, and a recliner sat tucked into one of the corners.

“The only thing missing is a fireplace and a cat. This is quite a library.”

Ignoring the comment, he moved toward one of the bookshelves. She followed him.

“Wow. You have all of Ryleigh’s books.”

“Hailey makes sure I get them when they come out.”

“Have you read them all?”

He shook his head. “I’ve only read a couple of them. Like I said, I see a lot of Jonah.”

“No way,” she repeated.

He pulled one of the books from the shelf. He skimmed the back, then began flipping through the book. He stopped and handed the book to her.

“Second paragraph.”

She took the book and skimmed the paragraph. “Holy cow.” She read it again. She looked up at him. “That’s Jonah.”

He nodded.

She closed the book and skimmed the back. “He’s a minor character, but he’s there all right. This is one of her first books though. It’s forgivable.”

He pulled another book out. “This came out last summer.” He flipped through the book, then held it out for her. “Bottom of the second page.”

She read it slowly. “Well, hell.”

He smirked. “Told you.”

She frowned. “He’s still a minor character, but that’s so strange. How do you remember that?”

“I read a lot.”

She snorted. “I got that. I meant, how did you remember where it was?”

“No clue.”

“That’s cool,” she said.

“Thanks.”

She looked around the room. “So, the only thing to do around here is read, huh?”

“Pretty much.”

She skimmed the titles of the books her friend had written. “I haven’t read that one,” she said, pointing. “You could read it to me.”

He grinned at her and picked up the book. “I haven’t read this one, either. How about the couch?”

“Sounds great.”

• • •

Several hours later, Payten stared at the ceiling listening to his voice. He sat at one end of the couch while she lay with her head on his thigh. The words of her friend’s book had never sounded so good to her as when he read them.

They had taken turns reading. She had started and kept reading until her stomach started rumbling. He had sat at the bar in the kitchen reading to her after that while she cooked dinner. After dinner, they drifted back toward the couch.

She reached her hand out toward the coffee table. In a move that she had performed repeatedly in the past two hours, she snagged his glass of water off the table and held it up for him. He smiled down at her and paused to take a drink.

“Isn’t your throat tired?” she asked him.

He shrugged. “It’s getting good.”

She laughed. “Ryleigh would be proud. Let me read for a little bit.”

“Sure thing.”

He passed the book to her. She squirmed a little, trying to find a comfortable way to hold the book above her. She gave up and rolled off the couch to kneel on the floor.

“Scoot down,” she told him.

When he slid toward the middle of the couch, she took his place on the couch. She sat with her back against the arm and put her legs in his lap.

“Much better,” she told him with a grin before she started reading.

She hadn’t been reading long when she felt his hand move on her leg. She glanced over the top of the book at him while she continued to read. He slouched far enough in his seat to rest his head on the low back of the couch, and his eyes were closed. Her legs stretched across his waist rather than in his lap. His fingers gently rubbed half circles on her thigh. It seemed innocent enough, but she remained very aware of it.

His hand stopped, and he cracked open one eye.

“What?” she asked.

“You stopped reading.”

“Sorry,” she muttered. She started reading again.

As she read, he slowly drove her crazy. Half circles on her thigh turned into stars above her knee. Those turned into a slow rub from her knee to the middle of her thigh and back again. She glanced up at him every time he switched, but he never opened his eyes. He seemed to not realize what he was doing.

“You want me to read?” he asked.

“Why?”

He opened his eyes and tilted his head up. “Your throat sounds a little dry.”

She shrugged and stole a drink from his glass. “I’m good.”

When she started reading again, she realized what was coming in the book. The characters were about to have sex. She’d lied about reading the book. It was one of her favorite of Ryleigh’s books, and she’d chosen it assuming the first sex scene was so far into the book they wouldn’t reach it.

You have two options, girl,
she told herself.
One, tough it out and read it. Pretend like it’s no big deal. Or stop reading. Make him read it. Fake a seizure or something.

I like option two. Two is good. Seizure faking is bad, though.

“You know what? My throat is kind of dry. Would you mind reading for a little?”

“Not at all.”

She passed the book back to him and tried not to sigh with relief. As he began reading, though, she realized a different problem.

Oh, God, what if I giggle? Oh, man. Giggling is bad. Damn you, Ryleigh!

Dean read about the man’s hand sliding over the woman’s breast as his own hand slid over her thigh. She realized giggling would not be the problem. Not jumping the man in his own living room was going to be the problem.

“Umm…Dean?”

When his gaze settled on her face, he gave her thigh a gentle squeeze and smiled at her. She did what came naturally. She leaned over and kissed him.

Maybe she had only meant to give him a peck on the lips. Maybe she hadn’t. She didn’t know what her intentions had been, and when his tongue followed hers back into her mouth, she didn’t care.

As they kissed, he pulled her onto his lap. His hands started on her hips, but slipped under her shirt to skim along the skin of her back. She buried her hands in his hair, holding his face to hers. She understood his fascination with her hair then. His was thick and soft. Sliding through her hands, his hair was a caress all its own.

His hands moved from her back to her stomach, then up to cup her breasts over her bra. The gentle squeeze he gave them made her moan. She broke their kiss long enough to jerk her shirt and bra off over her head and drop them to the floor before coming back to kiss him again.

The feel of his hands on her bare breasts took her breath away. Soon, it wasn’t enough. She needed more. As if he could read her thoughts, he pulled his mouth away from hers. The protest she started to make ended on a whimper when he took her breast in his mouth.

With each long, slow pull of his mouth on her breast, she felt fire build inside her. He alternated between sucking and flicking the tip of her breast with his tongue. The sensations pushed her higher. Her hands found their way back into his silky hair, holding him to her.