In the chapel, I found Cam sitting in his seat, head bowed, eyes closed. He looked asleep, but I knew better. Pres liked to meditate over bad news and shitty situations, and I wasn’t about to disturb him.
I moved to the kitchen and surveyed the meal half prepared. Unlike our esteemed leader, I wasn’t much of a cook, but if I paid attention, I could finish the mashed potatoes to go with the meat sauce in the slow cooker.
The big pot was under the sink. I hauled it out, filled it with water, and slung it on the stove.
I was poking at simmering spuds when Embry appeared behind me.
The kitchen was a small space. I felt his body heat, and it made my dick pulse, my old jeans uncomfortably tight, but thick enough to hide my predicament.
There was no masking my instinctive and goofy fucking smile, though. I loved being alone with him, even in a shitty cramped kitchen while our brothers assembled in the next room. “All right, mate?”
Embry peered over my shoulder, hip digging into my thigh. “Will be when you give me a plate of that. What is it?”
I lifted the lid on the slow cooker. “That mince thing he makes with the bacon and onions.”
“Did he put chilli in it?”
“No idea.”
Embry opened a cupboard by my head and plucked a tub of chilli powder from the shelf.
My brows shot up. Seriously? He’d barely been hungry in months, let alone for spicy shit. He’d lost half a fucking stone and gained brutal shadows beneath his sparkly eyes. “You really want that?”
Embry shrugged, holding my stare. Not quite smiling, but gaze brimming with something that made me feel lighter than air.
Fuck it.
I took the tub and doctored Cam’s cooking. He’d be growly as shit that we’d messed with his family recipe, but if it made Embry happy, I’d take it. “What’s going on with the Russians?”
Embry’s faint humour faded. “It’s complicated. You need the whole story.”
“We going to war?” Conflicting feelings raged in me. I liked fighting. I was better at it than I was at anything else, and it distracted me from other forms of pain. But seeing my brothers, seeingEmbry, get hurt... fuck. I’d seen enough of that to last me a lifetime.
Embry was still close enough that we were pressed together. He didn’t answer my question, which made my stomach churn, but his neck called to me. Keeping an eye on the door, I brushed my lips over the hollow behind his ear.
He shivered.
I did it again. Then I kissed it for real, tasting his sweet skin, filling my lungs with his scent. Essential oils, incense, and the petrol-laced sweat from being on the road all day.
Fuck. Me.
I wanted to bite him.
To eat him fucking whole.
I wanted to bottle his snatched, quiet moan and play it on repeat in my brainforever.
“Em.” It came out as a whisper. A plea. But I didn’t know what I was asking for. To kiss him again on the roof? To takehisshirt off this time?
More?
I didn’t know what more meant. If it even existed. He’d fucked other men... right? But when? In prison? Or was the boyfriend he’d had when he’d beaten a man to death at a horse fair the last one?
Stop thinking about it. You’ve told him a thousand times it doesn’t matter.
And I’d meant it. Butfuck. If putting my lips to his skin did this to me, anything else would burn me alive.
I kissed his neck a second longer. Then pulled back in time for Decoy to step into the kitchen.
