Chapter Ten

Deacon stared out his office window. He’d lost it this morning, happily. Jesus, that mouth. Just when he thought he had things between him and Alex under control, she went and turned the tables on him.

The phone on his desk started ringing, and he snatched it up. “What is it, Jessica?”

“I have an Alex on the phone for you, sir. Sorry, she won’t give me her last name. She said it’s important.”

He didn’t need a mirror to know a stupid grin had spread across his face. “Put her through.”

He put the phone on speaker and sat back in his chair. “This is a surprise.”

“Yeah, hey. Um…sorry to hassle you at work.”

Jesus, he loved the sound of her voice—it had a low, husky quality that made him hard just hearing it. But he also hadn’t missed the underlying hesitation in her tone. Even though he was sure it was nothing, he found himself gripping the edge of his desk, anxiety chasing away the shot of lust like a dunk in the Arctic Ocean. “Don’t apologize. You can call me anytime you want. Hearing your voice has improved an otherwise shitty day.”

Alex was silent for several seconds, and he cringed. Too much? The woman was driving him insane. She was like a skittish foal—get too close and she’d dance right out of reach.

“I have to cancel our plans for tonight.”

He sat forward in his seat. “No.” The word left his lips before he could stop himself.

“What do you mean, ‘no’?”

“I won’t let you cancel, Alex. We have an agreement.” Not after the small step forward he’d made with her, the way she’d come after him, taken him into her mouth, the teasing, the way she’d looked at him. His chest squeezed. He’d barely resisted telling her how he felt, those three words so close to spilling from his lips when she’d sat back, still on her knees at his feet, and smiled up at him.

No. He wouldn’t let her try to put distance between them again.

“What’s so important, Deke? Do you really need me to sit there with you while you drone on to some old stiff about stuff I don’t understand? Really?”

He clenched his fists. “I thought we could stay in tonight. Just you and me.”

Silence. “Right. So it’s nothing important then?”

“Jesus.” Did she really feel that way? Was spending time alone with him so god-awful?

The phone crackled, the sound muffled, and then he heard her tell someone she wouldn’t be long. One of his sisters, no doubt. “Look, it’s crazy busy here at the garage. I don’t have time for a drawn-out discussion. How much?”

“Pardon?” he said carefully.

“This whole thing’s about money, right? You want to sell our building to make more money. That’s why you have me at your beck and call. So how much for a night off? I have savings. Name your price.”

He cursed under his breath, struggling and failing to keep it together. “Are you purposely trying to piss me off?” Because by fuck, it was working.

“Nah, that would require a certain amount of give a shit, and I don’t.”

Whoa. Where the hell had that come from? “You’re angry. Why?”

“Are you serious?”

This was a battle he couldn’t win, not without Alex thinking he was an even bigger asshole than she already did. So he gave in. “What’s so important that you need to break our plans?”

“If you must know, I’m having a girls’ night out with Rusty and Piper. We made plans before you blackmailed me into being your human sex toy. I’ve been so busy obeying your every command, I forgot to tell you.”

He blew out a frustrated breath. She was purposely being obnoxious, definitely trying to push his buttons. “Where are you going?”

“Just a couple clubs.”

Like hell.

He’d seen the way they dressed to go out to the clubs. The shit they got up to together. No way was she going without him. But he’d keep that part a surprise. “Fine. Have fun.”

More silence. He’d shocked her. Good.

“You know I will.” Then she hung up without so much as a good-bye.

What are you playing at, my little viper?

Alex was acting differently. She’d changed the moment they’d walked out of the bathroom, after she’d sucked him off so expertly he’d had to hang onto the wall so his legs didn’t give out. He’d been desperate for her, hadn’t had the strength to stop it. The woman was on a mission. As if she believed that once they had sex it would prove this thing between them was nothing but physical, that there was nothing else.

He’d resisted. Just. At first he’d thought having sex right away would give her the excuse she needed to keep that distance between them, to keep that protective wall up, but she was doing a good job of that anyway.

Ultimately, he was a businessman—if something wasn’t working, you changed the way you approached it. You adapted.

It was time to give Alex what she wanted.

The music blaring from his granny’s mauve and lemon cottage still seemed wrong even though she’d been gone for ten years. He still expected to see her come walking out the front door and welcome him whenever he stopped by.

Deacon climbed out of his car, strode across the yard and up onto the porch. Anticipation drove him forward. He knew his sisters would be happy to see him. They hadn’t spent a lot of time together lately, which was entirely his fault. But coming to the garage brought back a lot of memories—arguments, pain, and frustration. Things said in the heat of the moment that could never be taken back.

Things he’d rather forget.

He lifted his hand to knock and noticed the door had been left ajar. He’d told them repeatedly to be more careful. Piper usually was; Rusty, on the other hand, had been driving him insane with worry since she was a fearless three-year-old. The women in this cottage meant everything to him, were his whole damn world, and he’d do whatever he had to do to protect them, even from themselves.

He pushed the door open. It led straight into the small living room, and he smiled at the sight of his sisters dancing, drinks in hand, singing their tone-deaf heads off. Pair of goofs. Both were gorgeous, Piper in a more subtle way than Rusty. But since Rusty was a walking, talking canvas, with all those bright tattoos and her vibrant red hair, she didn’t exactly blend in with the crowd. He’d spent a good deal of their teenage years warning his friends away from the pair of them.

“Deke!” Piper shrieked and ran at him. He caught her in his arms. “You’re here.” She beamed at him, and guilt over his recent absence gnawed in his stomach.

“Hey, sis.” He smacked a kiss on her cheek. “Why wasn’t that door shut and locked?”

She frowned. “Wasn’t it?”

“Nope.”

“Rusty must have left it open when she got back from getting drinks.” She waved her glass in front of his face.

Tomorrow he’d call his friend Cole Black. The guy had recently left the police force and now managed one of Deacon’s businesses, West Security. The girls could argue all they wanted, but his mind was made up. He was getting a state-of-the-art security system installed.

“So what’s going on here? You having a party and forget my invitation?”

Rusty joined them, slinging an arm around his waist. “It’s girls’ night, bro.”

He looked toward the kitchen in time to see Alex strut out and had to stifle a groan.

Goddammit.

Her skirt barely covered her ass, and the scrap of fabric masquerading as a top was so thin he could see her piercing through it. That was not a girls’ night outfit.

“Alex,” he ground out.

Her dark, exotic, catlike eyes bored into him. “Deke. This is a surprise.”

“A good one, I hope.” He knew by the way she pursed those sexy lips, she didn’t agree. Yeah, well, tough shit.

Piper wrapped her arms tighter around his neck. “Of course it is.”