He grinned back.

Her grin died.

So his did too.

“It should have made me happy that my big brother, who’s so awesome and so loving and so protective, had that back and he was out and real and himself and happy, and at least the weight he’d been carrying for years had been lifted. But it just made me feel lonely.”

“You felt that way because you were going through some big shit,” he explained.

“I was feeling that way because I was going through some big shit and I thought I was Superwoman. I could do it all. I could do it all by myself. Take care of everybody. Get justice for Diane and Paul and Amy and bring down the bad guys. Take D’s back and give him support while he decided to keep the family that was good for him and scrape off the one that made him feel like dirt. I meet you, and you have your brothers with you. You talk about your dad and your sister. You’ve worked through not having your mom.”

“I still miss her,” he admitted.

“But you have people.”

“You have people too, honey.”

“I do.” She shrugged. “I just didn’t let them have me.”

He leaned into his elbows on the counter toward her. “You learn your lesson about that?”

“Not to let it all overwhelm me and then melt down in front of you again, and thus eventually make you get shot of me because you think I’m a psycho?” she asked back.

He just smiled at her.

“Yeah, I learned my lesson.”

His smile faded before he said, “Valenzuela.”

She waved her hand in front of her face like she was shooing a fly, and he started to get ticked at that casual response.

Then she spoke.

“I was having a moment of temporary insanity. After dinner, if you have a computer, we can type out my resignation letter together.”

This gave him great relief.

But after dinner, he was going to have his hand up the skirt of that dress and his tongue down her throat, so maybe after he tired her out and she was unconscious, he’d get up and type it out for her himself.

He didn’t share that.

“Don’t think I’m crazy, but I’m gonna miss the cast and crew. They’re good people. It’s not as skeevy as you might think,” she told him.

“I don’t think that’s crazy.” He reached his hand out and caught hers. “Sweetheart, you live with a screaming hippie who shares Woodstock orgy stories within two minutes of meeting someone. Your brother has committed his life to a man and a woman and you went balls to the wall so he could have it, at least emotionally, free and clear. And you’re dating a biker. I’m not sure you have it in you to judge, unless a person is an asshole.”

Something beautiful—gratitude, relief, and something else that was deeper and even more meaningful, shone from her eyes before she said, “True that.”

He squeezed her hand. “And you don’t have to lose them. Get numbers. Throw parties. They’ll be welcome at Chaos hog roasts.”

“Chaos hog roasts?”

“Chaos is not immune to get-togethers. And if someone has it in them to think ahead, we roast a hog.”

“Sweet,” she whispered.

He was glad she thought that.

“And they’d be welcome?” she asked.

He shrugged. “Sure.”

She squeezed his hand back. “Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

More relief, gratitude and that something more beautiful came at him before he pulled her hand to his lips, touched them to her fingers, and let her go.

He went back to the stove to flip the burgers.

“Can I do something to help?” she asked.

So she wasn’t one of those women who sat around thinking a man had to earn his hand up her skirt and wait on her to earn a place in her heart.

Which meant the man he was would go all out to earn his hand up her skirt and a place in her heart.

“I got you,” he muttered.

“I can slice tomatoes or something.”

Shit.

He turned his head to her. “I didn’t buy tomatoes.”

“Good, ’cause I hate tomatoes. But if you liked them, I’d slice them for you,” she declared before sucking back more beer.

And more promise.

“I have pickle slices,” he told her.

“Awesome,” she said, hopping off her stool. “I’ll get them out. Condiments?”

“Fridge, babe.”

She got the shit from the fridge, including the potato salad, and wandered around him, opening drawers until she found a spoon she could shove into the salad after she busted off the top.

She also tore open two bags of the chips, got down the plates and opened the bag of sesame buns.

“Do you toast?” she asked, standing in his kitchen close to him in that killer, sexy-as-all-fuck outfit with all that hair, holding two big hamburger buns up and out to her sides.

Rush took her in.

No.

He was wrong.

Not promise.

Not keeping her for a while.

Hell no.

She just might be a keeper.

Full stop.

“Am I making dinner, or are you?” he asked.

She shot him a playful smile and asked back, “Am I cramping your style, stud?”

He dropped his eyes before he lifted them again. “Is my hand gonna be up that skirt later?”

“If you let me toast buns.”

He started laughing, saying, “Toast away, baby. No way I’m gonna stop you.”

She smiled to herself as she headed toward the stove.

He caught her on her way, pulled her into his arms, and took her mouth.

He made it wet and deep and long, and when he ended it, she followed his mouth for an inch, showing she didn’t want it to end.

He was there with her.

But first, she’d mentioned she was hungry.

And he bought potato chips for her.

So he had to feed his girl.

“More later,” he murmured, staring into her soft, gorgeous face.

“Tease.”

“Toast, woman.”

Her lips curved up, she pressed into him for a beat then she pulled out of his arms.

“Before hanky-panky, I want a tour of your sweet crib,” she declared as she hiked a dial on his oven.

Yeah.

His Superwoman.

He had a feeling she was gonna be a keeper.

Cock Blocker

Rush

“And we’re back in the living room.”

Dinner was over.

He’d given Rebel a tour of his place.

And it was proved she had shit jacking with her head when she arrived, because she was far from disinterested and hid just how interested she was by giving him shit about his interior decorating abilities from practically the beginning.

“That couch is very queer eye,” she declared, standing in front of it and staring at it.

“Babe, you do know you don’t have to like ass to pick a decent couch,” he retorted.

She gave him dancing eyes. “You don’t like ass?”

“Rephrase.”

She busted out laughing.

Rush caught her waist, sat his own ass in his couch with its soft, supple black leather seats, so wide they were almost beds, and cushions so yielding, he barely had to stretch out on it before he was taking a nap.

A phone rang somewhere, not his, but he ignored it because he was pulling her into his lap as he went down.

It was Rebel who adjusted while he was doing that so she was straddling it.

Sweet.

“Someone’s ready to get busy,” he teased, gliding his hands inside the cardigan and up the silky material of her dress at her sides, his head tipping back to catch her eyes.

She put her hands light on either side of his neck and dipped her chin to look into his.

“Thanks for not freaking out about my meltdown, baby,” she whispered.

“Not a problem,” he whispered back, rubbing his thumbs across her ribs.

“I don’t make that a habit.”

Right.

Instinct was shouting at him that he needed to nip this shit in the bud right away.

So he set about doing that.

“Sweetheart, this is important, so listen. I want you to just be you with me. The part I didn’t like was when you held it inside. Truth. I didn’t mind at all when it came out.”