I’m standing in the kitchen in nothing but a towel, putting a frozen pizza in the oven. I’m not in the mood to go all out and cook, but I don’t exactly feel like getting take-out either. What I want is a quiet night, maybe catch a rerun of an NHL game or something.
The front door flies open, followed by Reese’s squeak. “Oh God! Why are you only wearing a towel?”
I glance over my shoulder, and despite my not-so-sunny disposition, the sight of Reese with her hand over her eyes, Eli strapped to her chest, and a casserole dish in her free hand has me smiling.
“Just got out the shower.” I go back to setting the oven timer.
“It’s freezing outside,” she points out, peaking between her fingers. I face her, not bothering at all to hide anything. It’s cold as shit outside, but inside it’s warm and toasty, hence the towel. “I don’t plan on going outside. Needed to get dinner going before I changed.”
“I brought you dinner,” she blurts out, holding the casserole dish out. “Mya’s homemade lasagne with jalapeños.”
I walk around the counter, and grab it from her, and when I catch a whiff, my stomach grumbles. Way better than pizza. “You can stop hiding behind your fingers, all the important parts are covered, Reese.”
She slowly drops her hand, and I watch her swallow. Her eyes fly up to mine, and the effort on her part to not look anywhere but my face is not only obvious, but also comical. She’s dressed in grey sweats, UGG boots, and an oversized hoodie, her hair a glorious mass of waves around her shoulders, and her face completely free of make-up. She blinks, and blinks, and then clears her throat. “We made too much food, so I, uh, thought you’d like some.” She sucks her bottom lip into her mouth, and regardless of how tense we’ve been around each other lately, my body responds. My dick stirs, and if I were to sport wood at this exact moment, the towel will do a pitiful job of hiding it. But do I care? Not so much. Do I want her to feel uncomfortable right now? Yes. Yes I do.
“Thanks,” I grumble, moving over to switch the oven off. I watch Reese squirm, and shuffle on her feet. Eli watches me, stuffing his tiny fist into his mouth. It’s my night with him, but I usually fetch him from Reese’s place. We’ve been doing a fanfuckingtastic job of avoiding each other lately, and it hasn’t bothered me much. We have our routine with Eli—he’s with me three nights a week—and we haven’t deviated from that, it’s the only thing we agree on at this point.
“Do you think you can go and change into some actual clothes?” She asks, her voice tight. “I think we, uh, need to talk about this afternoon, and I can’t do that when you’re dressed like,” she waves her hand in my general vicinity, “in nothing but a towel.”
I lean against the kitchen island, my hands on the edge. “I’m quite comfortable like this,” I tell her, gauging every reaction displayed back at me in her eyes, her posture. “You uncomfortable?”
“No,” she lies, diverting her gaze from my biceps. She looks at my hands instead, and then looks up. I smirk. God, it’s so easy to get a reaction out of her, and before now, I never thought of doing it just for the entertainment value. Admittedly, her reaction to seeing me like this does something to me too. I want her eyes on me, I want her cheeks flushed like they are now. Yeah, whatever’s going on between the two of us is fucking with my head, but I’m still a red-blooded male, and she’s not exactly sore on the eyes. “You said you wanted to talk, so talk.” As long as she keeps looking at me that way, I’m not getting dressed.
“Well, I wanted to a-apologize for what Mya sprung on you today.” Her tone hardens with conviction. She’s so damn determined to keep eye contact, it’s laughable. So to make it worse, I fold my arms across my chest, and cross one ankle over the other. I’m aware that the towel has loosened with my movements, but I don’t do anything to rectify it. If it falls, it falls. Not my problem. I’m not ashamed of my body, never have been. “You don’t have to—”
“I’ll do it.” After my conversation with Alex, I found myself agreeing with Mya—I’d be stupid to walk away from an opportunity like this. Alex made it all about the money, but he knows I’m doing it for other reasons, reasons which will not be discussed since she’s standing right in front of me. “Alex is having the contracts couriered over, and I’ll sign them.”
“You will?” Reese sounds surprised, and judging by how her blue eyes widen, its not at all what she was expecting. Maybe she was expecting a fight, and I’d be lying if I said I didn’t want to provoke her into an argument. After my night with the guys, that godawful flashback, and her reaction to me when I found her in the barn, I’ve been itching to confront her, egg her on until she couldn’t take it anymore, just to get her to open up to me. Even if there’s yelling involved, we need to clear the air. But, I see little chance of that happening any time soon, especially if we’re going to be working together for a while. Doesn’t mean we’re going to be besties, or anything. She walks into the room and everything inside me just gets twisted until I can’t tell my ass from my goddamn elbow. I’m mad at her, but I’m not. I want to yell at her for what she did all those years ago, but I also want to leave it alone. I want to fight with her until I have all the damn answers, but I know nothing good can come of it. I can’t afford that kind of risk, either. We’re co-parenting, which means I have to behave. We’re both relegated to being civil, even if the expression she’s currently wearing screams anything but civil. Looks like she wants to bite me, and not because she’s mad. I clear my throat when I catch her gaze lingering on my abs, and the ‘v’ that leads to my dick. Her cheeks flush a deeper shade of pink.
“Thanks, I think.” Her brows furrow. “I mean, you can still say no, if you really don’t want to do it, I don’t want you to feel like you have to or anything.”
“I said I’d do it.” My tone is harder than I intend for it to be, but this woman drives me fucking crazy. Had I known being around her would be this damn difficult, I might have opted to move in with the guys. But, that would make things really difficult with Eli, too. See? Rock and a fucking a hard place. We stare at each other for a moment, and then she blurts out, “I’m sorry about last night. I didn’t mean to be rude.”
“I think you did.” She opens her mouth, most likely to argue, but I cut her off. “Reese, it’s fine.”
“It’s just,” she hesitates, “Mya asked me to do a video with Eli, and talking about Ryan, and Mel upset me, and then I started thinking about the past, and then you showed up, and everything with you and me…” She’s rambling again, and part of me wants her to finish that sentence.
“You and me, what?” I take a step closer, searching her eyes for fuck knows what. A sign, maybe? That everything in my head is somehow messing with hers too?
“I just,” her throat works with a swallow, “I just remembered so much, and I couldn’t deal with it.”
I glance down at Eli, who’s blissfully unaware of the air that crackles between me and Reese, and then look back at Reese. “You know, at some point, we’re going to have to talk.”
“I don’t think there’s anything to talk about, Thorin.”
I lean closer, until we’re almost nose-to-nose, and if Eli moved his mouth just a smidge, he’d catch my nip. “Like hell there is, Reese Pie.” I use her nickname, the one I gave her in second grade, on purpose. “And you know it.”
“Just another thing we disagree on,” she mumbles, hiding whatever she’s really feeling. And that’s another thing that I’ve discovered pisses me off—my inability to read her like I used to. She unclips Eli, and gives him a kiss before handing him over to me. Little guy gets comfortable in the crook of my arm. He’s become used to being tucked into my side like a football, and I think he likes it. Might have something to do with hearing my heartbeat, since he’s tucked into my left arm. He’s fallen asleep on my chest countless times, ear pressed to my chest. I’d like to think it’s more than my heartbeat though, and that maybe he knows there’s a part of his dad in me, a part he feels. God knows I feel more of my brother when Eli’s with me, too.
“Enjoy your dinner.” Reese is about to leave when I remember, “We’re turning the old barn into a recording studio.” She stops, and faces me, hands intertwined at her waist. It’s stupid, but I want her to like the idea of me being here on a more permanent basis.
“Okay?”
“I spoke to the guys last night, actually. Decided to make this my home base since we have Eli now.” I want to add that it’s also because she’s here, but I keep that little nugget to myself. How I feel about Reese is confusing enough as is. No need to be adding to the clusterfuck of shit going on in my head.
“Oh. What about your other houses?”
“Selling the place in London,” I tell her. “But I’ll keep the place in New York. Told Alex to have it ready for when you’re ready to go. Mya still needs to let me know when we’re leaving.”
“Day after tomorrow, I think, but I can stay in a hotel with Mya.” Her expression does something funny, looks like she’s chewing a lemon.
I shake my head. “Don’t be stubborn, Reese. I have a penthouse in the city. We’ll stay there.”
Reese purses her lips, and what in the ever loving hell is wrong with her face?
“I’m not sure I want that.”
“Doesn’t matter what you want.” Now I’m being full of shit. “Pen is having a nursery set up already, and it’ll be easier if we just travel together. Mya’s more than welcome to stay in a hotel if she wants, but it’ll be easier for you to stay with me.” It’ll make no difference where she stays, actually, but for some asinine reason, I want her and Eli, in my house.
There’s a new subtlety to Reese’s anger, and I know it’s because of Eli. Her jaw ticks, her shoulders straighten, but where she would previously raise her voice, she now keeps it calm, and level. “I’m not staying with you, Thorin. And Eli will be just as comfortable in a hotel room.”
I cock my chin out. “Yeah, we’ll see about that.” I move towards the fridge to grab a bottle for Eli, and give Reese my back. “Tell Mya I said thanks for dinner.”
The door shuts shortly after, and then its just me and Eli.
“You’re not allowed to date until you’re forty,” I tell him. “In fact, just stay away from women altogether, okay? They’re batshit crazy.”
He looks at me like I’m the crazy one, and I can’t say I disagree.
It’s what I call the ‘Reese effect’.
The only person who looks confused by what I just said is Carson. Benji quietly sips his coffee, and makes notes on what needs to be done to the barn to turn it into a fully functioning sound studio—he’s meeting with the contractors, and liaising with Alex while I travel to New York—and Fletch is pulling faces at Eli. For someone who swears he’ll never have kids, he’s actually pretty good with my nephew.
“So, let me get this straight,” Carson sits upright, “you’re flying to New York to model clothes for Reese’s fitness thingy?”
I give him a look. “It’s not a fitness ‘thingy’. She’s got a legit business online, and Mya thought it would be a good idea to include training material, and fitness apparel for men.” At the mention of Mya, Fletch looks up. “What about Mya?”
“You’re so not going there,” I tell him, my glare hard. She’s only been here a few days, and somehow they’ve hit it off. Unfortunately for her, Fletch doesn’t do anything but short-term flings, and she strikes me as the kind of girl who wants long-term, marriage and babies included. But I digress. I look back at Carson. “Mya showed me the plan, and Alex sent over a contract. I leave tomorrow.”
“Ookay, but, why? We’re about to start construction on your sound studio, and now you want to play ‘model’?”
I sigh, completely exasperated. Some days, the lights are on in Carson’s head, and someone’s home, but other times, not so much. Guy can play a bass guitar unlink anyone I know, but he’s not always the sharpest tool in the shed. Explaining this to him would be like trying to fit a square peg into a round hole, so I stick to the basics. “I like the idea,” I admit honestly. “Alex also think it’s a good chance to do something different, something that’s mine.”
“And Reese asked you?” I try not to be offended by that, because realistically, I’m the fitness junkie between the four of us. Sure, the guys work out—when they’re not nursing hangovers—but my training is regimented. “She didn’t, actually. Mya did. And I said yes.”
“Again, why?”
“Because he wants to help Reese,” Benji answers without looking up from the blueprint in front of him. I might be scowling at him because he’s right, I do want to help her, but what he won’t say in front of Fletch and Carson is that I want something that’s kind of mine. Not that I want an escape from music, it’s in my blood, but I wouldn’t mind trying something else while we’re taking a recording break. And if it happens to help Reese, it’s just a bonus. That’s what I tell myself, at least. I made the fatal mistake of checking out her social media after I put Eli to bed last night, and stumbled across her last Youtube video, the one she was so upset about when I found her in the stables. I realized two things. Reese has had as hard a time losing Ryan and Mel as I have, and two, she’s worked damn hard to get her business to where it is. But she also helps people, people who have struggled with their self-confidence, or body image issues, and I find that admirable. That she could turn it into a successful career—which, shamefully, I had no clue about—is downright impressive. It was then that Mya’s idea made sense. And why having me doing it was the perfect choice. Seeing Reese’s selflessness in helping others is what sealed the deal for me. Unfortunately, I also watched some of the workout videos she posted. Now I know what she looks likes underneath some pretty deceiving clothes, and the sight of her in waist-high, ass-hugging leggings and a sports bra will forever be etched into my brain. Her body? It’s insane. And almost impossible to reconcile it with how she looked in high school. I always thought she was beautiful, but fuck me sideways, she’s downright sexy now. I clear my throat, trying to rid my mind of just how curvy she is, and focus on the discussion at hand.
“But clothes?” Carson continues, still looking like he doesn’t know whether to scratch his watch or check his ass. Dumbass.
“Fitness apparel,” I correct him. “Now can we talk about what y’all are going to do while I’m gone? Mya said we shouldn’t be gone longer than a few days.”
“Meeting with the contractors day after tomorrow,” Benji tells me, looking up. “Fletch is going to L.A to check out the sound equipment we need, and Carson here,” he slaps Carson on the back, “is staying with me.”
Carson looks put out, and I know he would have preferred to go to L.A with Fletch, but I need both him and Benji here while I’m gone. Carson is, after all, good with his hands, and Benji has decided we won’t have all the work contracted out. We like getting our own hands dirty, too. In fact, if I remember correctly, it was me, Dad and Ryan who built the original barn, and the thought of revamping it for something I love excites me.
“So, Thorin,” Fletch stands, holding Eli in his arms, “is Mya going with y’all, or…”
I roll my eyes, and pour myself another cup of coffee. I’m about to tell him to stay the fuck away from her—she’s Reese’s best friend, and something between the two of them just spells d-r-a-m-a—when the front door opens, and Mya herself walks in. Raven hair braided to one side, dressed in jeans, boots and a sweater, she shifts her glasses up her nose. “Boys.” She smiles, glancing briefly at Fletch, who immediately has googley eyes, and then looks at me. “There’s been a slight change of plans, Thor.”
Ugh. Ever since she overheard Fletch call me that, she’s taken upon herself to do the same. It irritates me, and I’m willing to bet on my new truck that she’s well aware of how it gets under my skin. Don’t get me wrong, I like Mya, she’s obviously been a good friend to Reese, and has a brain for business, but her dark brown eyes are always glistening with mischief. Which is probably why Fletch is suddenly so taken by her.
“What do you mean a change of plans?”
“Alex hasn’t told you yet?”
My brows furrow. “No.” I check my phone, noting that there’s been no calls or texts from Alex.
“Well,” Mya slaps her hands together, “turns out the building where your penthouse is has a mold problem, which means you’ll be staying at the hotel with me and Reese.” Her smile changes from sweet to roguish, and with it, my gut falls out my ass because I know what’s coming. “And you’ll have to share with Reese.”
Well, fuck.