I didn’t want to bethat. Icouldn’tbe that. If Iturned into the kind of client who was prone to bursting into tears in themiddle of a coffee shop, Gray would drop me.
And I needed him too much torisk that.
A deep gouge in the tablesuddenly became the most fascinating thing in the world to me. I ran mythumbnail along it, feeling out the shape, digging it into the surprisinglysoft wood underneath. It’d gone right through the varnish, and it felt likesomeone had tried to fill it with wax at some point.
I remembered my fatherrubbing a stick of it into a scratch I’d made in our dining table, polishing thefinished product with a tiny smile on his face.
It’s good that thishappened.You’llknow how to deal with it next time.
Was it good that myapartment had been broken into? Would it be easier to deal with next time?
Dad had always wanted thereto be a lesson in everything, but I couldn’t figure out what thelesson in this was. I didn’t know what I’d done wrong.
I didn’t know how tofix it, either.
A plate appeared in front ofme with a slice of something that seemed to be made mostly of chocolate.
“It’s salted chocolatemousse pie,” Gray explained as he passed a cup of black coffee over and satdown opposite me.
With a bottle of water?
I hoped he wasn’t a health nut,though even as I had the thought I realized how stupid it was. People didn’tget to be built like he was by living on coffee and forgetting to eat one dayin three.
What I was really afraid ofwasjudgment, but he was the one who’d just passed me the pie,so…
Maybe I was safe.
“I have a friend…” hecontinued. “He’s my best friend, actually, though I haven’t seen him in awhile. Whenever something bad happened, he’d always find chocolate somewhere. Ifigured… I dunno. Always helped me.”
I picked up the fork that’d come with thepie. Chocolate sounded good right about now.
“Army buddy?” I asked,cutting a bite off with my fork.
A tiny, happy noise caughtin the back of my throat as the flavor hit my tongue, rich dark chocolate with justthe right amount of background bitterness, enriched by the salt and thesurprise layer of caramel between the crust and the filling.
For a moment, all my worrieswere gone. Gray’s friend was clearly a smart man.
“Yeah,” Gray responded. “Thatobvious, huh?”
“You’re a bodyguard,” Ishrugged. “So either ex-military or ex-cop. And you’re clearly not an ex-cop.”
“There are other branches ofthe military,” Gray pointed out.
I looked up at him, takingmy attention away from the pie that had briefly become the center of myuniverse. “I’dactually forgotten,” I admitted. “I don’t really know much about… any of that.I’m more of a lover than a fighter.”
Gray smirked. “I like to thinkI’m a little of both,” he said, and right on cue my brain reminded me of whatit’d felt like to swirl my tongue around his cock as I licked my fork.
“You should try this.” Ioffered him the next bite of pie, desperate to change the subject. “It’s reallygood, and it’s not like you’ve had an easy morning, either. Here.”
Gray hesitated as I held thefork out to him. Eventually he came to a decision, letting me slide the forkinto his mouth as he licked the bite off it, and I realized what a mistake I’d made.
The back of my neck flushedhot as his tongue curled around the fork, then darted out to lick his lipsclean. A happy little moan rumbled in his ridiculously broad chest.
I washand feedinghim.Like this was our three-month anniversary date and we were still in the middleof a long honeymoon period that involved a lot of sex against walls and in theshower and over the back of the couch.
The fork nearly fell from myfingers as I saw what I was doing.
Gray barely reacted, crackingopen his bottle of water and sipping from it, watching the rest of the peoplesitting around us. People oblivious to what an idiot I was making of myself.
