“When she returns,” Chloe bit out, “she will phone me, and I will be expected to hop to it and give back her cat. Well, I don’t know if she’s fit to own a cat. I found Smudge in mortal peril!”
A reasonable person might have pointed out that no cat had ever died of falling from a tree, and also that cats were uncontrollable creatures, but luckily, Gigi wasn’t reasonable. She said in soothing tones, “The woman is an unfit mother. I’m sure of it.”
“So am I! Do you know—” Chloe was cut off by a knock at the door. Her middle melted like chocolate fudge cake. She hadn’t realized the time. It was Red. The skin over her collarbone tingled, as if he’d marked her with his heated gaze.
“Are you there, darling?” Gigi nudged.
Chloe cleared her throat and locked her inappropriate thoughts away. Back in the vault you go. “I have to go. Someone’s at the door.”
“Someone, hm?” Gigi said gleefully. “Why, darling. Whoever could it be? You sound flustered.”
“I’m not flustered. And I don’t know who it is.”
“You sound,” Gigi murmured, “as though you are telling fibs.”
How could she tell? She could always tell. It must be a grandmotherly superpower. “We’ll talk about this later,” Chloe squeaked. “Got to dash love you bye!” She ended the call, huffed out a breath, then patted her robe self-consciously. Between worrying about tonight and worrying about Smudge, she’d somehow managed to lose all sense of time—and now Red was here, and she was barely dressed, and oh, God, this was all going horribly. She grabbed Smudge for good luck and rushed to get the door.
Still, she felt oddly buoyant—almost giddy—as she went.
Redford was big and broad on her welcome mat, his smile almost tentative, his hair spilling over his shoulders like liquid fire. He was wearing jeans and a flannel shirt, the sleeves rolled up to expose forearms ridged with fine veins and thick tendons, and sprinkled with barely visible, golden hair. Not that she was staring, or anything.
“Evening,” he said, his voice low and rich. And calm. Always calm. Clearly, he was not at all bothered by the fact that the last time they’d seen each other, he’d slid his tongue over her ear.
Well, if he wasn’t bothered, then neither was she. “I’m very sorry,” she said, holding Smudge against her chest. “I’m afraid I’m going to make us late.”
*
Chloe’s email that afternoon had been short and to the point, but Red must have learned her language these past few days, because he’d known straightaway she was upset.
Took Smudge to the vet. He’s chipped. Has owner.
Oh, yeah. She was upset. But she obviously didn’t want to talk about it, so he hadn’t planned on bringing it up.
Then she answered the door with that apologetic frown, her lip caught between her teeth and Smudge held against her chest, and he couldn’t have kept his mouth shut for all the money on earth. “Are you okay?” he asked, completely ignoring what she’d just said, because apparently he was that kind of guy now.
She raised her eyebrows, that divine, Rococo face as striking as ever. “I’m in a mood, but then, I usually am. Why?”
“I got your message about Smudge, and—”
“I don’t want to talk about Smudge,” she said, her voice sharp.
Not so long ago, that sharpness would’ve jabbed him like a thorn. Now it popped his heart like a balloon, because he knew it meant that she was hurting, and hiding, and dealing with her feelings all alone.
Women who saved cats and wrote ridiculous lists and took deals painfully seriously shouldn’t deal with their feelings alone. No one should.
But before he could tell her that, something about her seemed to soften, and she said quickly, “We’re going to have fun this evening. It will be a list-ticking success. That’s what I want to think about. Not Smudge.”
He ran a hand through his hair and nodded, holding her gaze. Her eyes were big and dark and a little too bright behind her glasses. He wanted to touch her, but all things considered, that was probably a bad idea. So he kept his clumsy hands to himself, and swore silently that he’d make her smile tonight. One way or another. “All right,” he said.
The tension between them dissolved, or maybe it had just faded for a while. “Come on, then,” she said brightly, stepping back to let him in. Which was when he noticed her outfit—or her lack of one. She was wearing some silky robe thing, and the skirt ended just above the knee. He’d been drooling over her fucking ankles for weeks. Now he stared at the inch of thigh just above her knees and decided he should’ve jacked off before he came over. Twice. Three times, even. His balls ached just looking at her. Was this normal? This couldn’t be normal.
She shoved the cat at him, turned in a dangerous whirl of short, silky skirt, and started off down the hall.
Red stared at the cat. The cat stared at him. If he were the kind of man who really understood animals, he might say this particular cat was sending him a telepathic message that went something like, Get your dirty pervert eyes off my mum.
“Sorry, mate,” he muttered, and shut the door, and made his way to the living room.
She was bending over by the TV, switching off all the plug sockets. The hem of her robe lifted for a split second and he caught a flash of bare, brown skin before he looked away. All his nerve endings sparked to life, even as he begged them to calm the hell down. Everything in him turned hot and liquid, except his dick, which was, of course, rock fucking hard. He sat down and held Smudge over his lap.
And, because God was having a great time taking the piss out of Red today, Chloe turned around and zeroed in on the sight with a smile. “I thought you didn’t like cats?”
“Yeah, well.” He cleared his throat. “Maybe I judged before I really got to know them. They’re not as snooty as they seem. My bad.”
He watched as surprise flickered across her face. “Oh.” She shot him a quick, shy smile and his heart burst like a firework. “Okay then. Um . . . I’m just going to get dressed. I’ll be five minutes.”
“Don’t rush. It doesn’t matter if we’re later than we planned.”
She gave him the same indulgent nod mothers gave their nonsense-babbling toddlers and hurried out of the room, probably intending to ignore him.
While she was gone, Red decided to occupy himself by listing the many, many reasons why he shouldn’t lust after Chloe anymore, even if he desperately wanted to, really enjoyed it, and wasn’t totally sure he could stop.
1. He’d come on to her and she had very firmly shut him down. No matter how much he thought about the taste of her skin, or the sound of her moans, it wasn’t happening. So he should stop torturing himself now.
2. If he didn’t stop, she might notice, and then she’d be uncomfortable. He was her superintendent, for Christ’s sake—which he probably should’ve thought about before he’d put his hands on her. He couldn’t make her uncomfortable. It just wasn’t right.
2.5 Vik would slaughter him. And then Alisha would beat his corpse with a hairbrush.