“You’re very distracted.”
She turned to him at the car. “Really? Am I? Shocking when I have so little to do just now.”
“Sarcasm. Unusual.”
“Are you trying to poke me until we get into a fight?”
“You should let me drive.”
“Why is that? You have a car here, don’t you? Why are you riding with me anyway?”
One of those brows went up. “You’re staying at my house.”
“I am? And what makes you think that?”
“Would you like to continue this in the car? Or out here in the open?”
She jammed her key into the lock and got in, tossing her stuff into the backseat. She popped the trunk so he could stow the weapons.
“Now.” He stood in the driver’s side door, clearly waiting for her to move aside. She started the engine instead.
“Time’s a wastin’.” She put it into gear and he heaved a put-upon sigh and walked around, getting in on the other side.
“My car isn’t here. I had it taken back to my house. We should stop at your place on the way so you can bring stuff to my place that would make you comfortable.”
“You live across the city. I live five minutes from here.”
“I live in an enclave and you’re trying to convince your people it’s the safest thing. Shouldn’t you be a good example?”
“You don’t even believe that. You’re just saying it to make a point.”
“I do believe you’d be safest at my home, actually. And it’s not me who is trying to pick a fight.”
“Puhleeze.” She drove to her place, annoyed that he was right about being a good example. “I like my apartment.”
“No, you don’t. You have pictures on shelves, but none on the walls. The walls are all still white. You haven’t painted anything. You sleep there, but you don’t live there.”
“Suddenly you’re an expert on how I live?”
“I know you better than you want to admit.”
That much was true.
“I haven’t had much time.”
“You’ve lived there for a year and a half. You’re a nester, I can tell. You have not nested there. Feel free to nest in my home all you want. Since we’ll be living together I want you to feel at home.”
“You totally are trying to start a fight.” She pulled into her spot and noted the graffiti. “Great.”
He didn’t say anything, but she knew he added it to the
Her place was fine. The building was well lit and her neighbors were an assortment of artists and other types that seemed to love having endless potlucks and building-wide block parties every few weekends. After the revelation—as the media had dubbed the day when the world realized there actually were witches and Vampires —she’d been stopped and hugged more than once by her neighbors.
But Faine was right. She hadn’t really settled into her place. The house she’d shared with Lark had been a home, but this apartment was a place to sleep and eat. She just kept putting finding a house to buy into the
She would be setting a good example by moving into an enclave. She would be safer and, damn it, she would be with him and that made her happier than she ever expected to be.
She pulled out a big suitcase and he gave her a look. “What? You win. Happy?”
In two steps he was on her, pulling her close, crushing his mouth against hers. Her spine loosened as she held on. His taste thundered like her pulse. He took over, the scent of his skin, the feel of his muscles as they bunched and shifted like the predator he was, she greedily took him in. Even as she knew somewhere in the back of her head that he was being a bossypants.
When he finished and she struggled to regain her composure, he set her back. “I am happy, but this is not a game where you lose and I win. I want you with me in my den. It’s my nature to want my woman in my home where I can keep her safest. I want to be with you because I like to be with you and it makes having lots of sex with you easier if you’re within reach whenever the mood strikes.”
She rolled her eyes.
“You’re grumpy because your world is falling apart and you’re doing your best to build a new future.”
“I’m grumpy because you are pushy and bossy and you take over when you should back off.”
He grinned for a moment. “
He was so right she should be embarrassed. “You have other attributes that seem to blind me
He laughed. “Thank goodness then. Come on. Pack up. Shall I grab the books on your shelves so you can study them at my house?”
“Fine.”
She moved into the bathroom to gather her toiletries. And to get some space. He clouded her judgment with his . . . well, his gorgeousness and his ability to be really good at everything and the way he just let her be bitchy and kissed it out of her when he got a mind to.
Lord, she was in such trouble.
She tried to be annoyed that she’d have to drive so far to get to the office, but when she licked her lips she tasted him again and it fled.
Her clothes went into a garment bag. She only wore a few different pairs of shoes to work, but she brought many others to his place because one never knew when she might want to wear some pretty heels after all.
If he claimed to want to be with her, he needed to understand she had a lot of clothes. And shoes. And bags. And books too.
He’d clearly run some boxes down to the car while she had pulled her stuff together in the other room because her shelves were a lot more bare when she came out.
“I took the liberty of grabbing the teas and your teapot and some of the stuff in your fridge so it won’t spoil. Will you allow me to drive home? I know all the back ways and you can make calls if you need to.”
“See? How hard is it to ask instead of giving an imperious
“We both have to adjust, no?” He kissed her again and took her suitcase and garment bag when she was hormone addled.
“You can drive if you’ll point the car through the In-N-Out drive-through on the way.”
“I can do that.”
He walked out, wearing a smile and when he wasn’t looking, she gave one too.
“THERE are two full closets. I’ll give you the one here in the master and take the one in the other bedroom.” He brought her suitcases into the house.
She shoved a few more fries into her face. “I can take the other closet. There’s no sense in you moving everything.”
“I want you to feel at home here. A safe place.”
He was so sweet she couldn’t resist moving to him and kissing him. “Sorry about the salt.”
He licked his lips. “Somehow you can make salt sexy.”
She moved into the room she’d slept in just a week before. A week. Jeez. So much had happened in that time.
The closet was gigantic with racks for shoes and bags and lots of space to hang things. Even without the utterly beautiful male standing a few feet away looking adorably uncertain, she’d live there for this dream of a closet.
“This is a fabulous closet. I’ll take it.”
