“Yeah. She’ll leave us be for a bit. Let’s just stay here for that bit.” Hunter’s breath ghosted against me.
“We should help. You invited them. To your mum’s house. Without even asking her. I don’t know if this is a modern custom or not, but we should at least help cook.”
“We shopped,” Hunter protested.
“Make a salad. Fetch some bread. Something?” I sat up and turned toward him, still unable to stop touching him. “I want to make a good impression.”
He flinched and grabbed my hands. “Isn’t it a little late for that.” His lips twitched.
“Not for your mum. We’ve put a lot on her today. My history, Archie, the reality of our world, not to mention us being…us. It’s a lot to process. And I want her to like me.”
“She likes you because I like you.”
Our conversation was halted by the sound of the back door slamming and Marjorie talking to Archie. Or rather cooing at Archie.
Hunter grinned at me. “We better get down there before you lose your familiar. Because if Archie takes bribes, you’re done for.”
“You’re getting up? What happened to just staying a bit?”
“Come on,” he said. “Get washed up and dressed. We’re getting bread. There’s a bakery down the block.”
Two loaves of the bakery’s rosemary olive in the back seat, Hunter pulled up to the curb outside his mother’s house. The bakery down the block had been closed, so we’d had to drive across town to get the super special rosemary olive bread that he wanted.
“You invited Izzy and Theo to dinner for a reason, didn’t you?” I asked.
He turned off the ignition and looked at me.
“You’re not the only one who wants to make a good impression.”
I lunged across the center console, seeking his mouth. He oofed in surprise before kissing me. All too soon, he pushed me back to my seat. “We should go in.”
This lovely, sweet man had found me, had taken care of me in this vast and complicated modern world. In my relatively short life of twenty-five years, I’d been in lots of danger, usually of my own making, but sometimes not. Years of narrow escapes, close calls and fights, and only three times that I could remember, had someone shown up for me. Petey and his brother in the livery stable, Theo and Izzy, when Locke took me. And Bruce Hunter, time after time.
“Bruce,” I said quietly.
“Mm?” Hunter’s hand was on the car door.
“Bruce,” I said again.
He looked at me. “Are you okay?”
“Stay a second.”
He faced me in time to meet my lips again. This kiss escalated even faster than the first one, and I went with it, pushing him against his seat as I leaned in. We parted, breathing the other’s air, staring into each other’s eyes. Feeling one another’s heartbeat.
“Put your seat back,” I whispered.
“What?”
I pecked him on the lips, smiling. “The seat reclines, yeah? Put your bloody seat back.”
His dark brows edging higher, Hunter hit the seat button, reclining all the way down. I followed him, climbing over to straddle his hips, skimming my hands under his shirt. It was a tight squeeze, but he was hot under me. I rucked the cotton up under his arms, unable to get enough of the smooth skin over taut muscle. Lowering my head, I bit and then licked his collarbone. His yelp made me smile, and I rose just enough to slip a hand between us, fumbling at his fly. Under the denim, he was hard. Almost as much as I was. I shifted to ease the tightness.
A sudden rap on the window sent me backward into the steering wheel, laying on the horn. I jerked forward into Hunter and then back again, the horn sounding again. I collapsed against him, fumbling for the button on the side of the seat. Hunter stared at the man outside the car. “Theo?”
I looked. Sure enough, Theo North frowned at us, his eyebrow quirking over his missing eye—glamoured to appear perfectly normal.
As I scrambled over the console, Hunter yanked his shirt down, tugging at it to cover his open jeans. Levering his seat back up to vertical, he opened the window.
