“You don’t want to eat first?”
She grinned. “I intend to bring her down to eat with us. Worth a try, right?”
Hell yeah. I pointed out the stairs, and explained which room to head for, and then I joined Ice in the dining room. The pizzas were still boxed in the centre of the table, and he was leaning against it with his arms folded.
“She didn’t touch me, man.”
He laughed, shaking his head at me. “She knows the rules… she’d just have to make it up to me.”
Jesus. I glanced over my shoulder, hoping they hadn’t appeared yet.
“I know that predatory crap might work for you guys, but if Glory hears you talking like that, she’ll be shit scared of you.”
Ice sobered, straightening up from the table’s edge. Thank god. I really didn’t want his ass on my table anyway.
“Fuck. I’ll watch it, brother, sorry. The fucker who did this. We’re dealing with that, right?”
I nodded, then shrugged. It wasn’t my place to decide that, was it?
“Club justice, man. He hurt someone connected to our club, he fucking suffers. Anyway. While Lissa works her magic, why don’t you show me around this swanky pad of yours?”
I backed into the kitchen again, scratching my jaw as I watched him peruse the place, his eyes not missing a fucking detail. Like, for example, the wall where the hidden door was. He grinned, resting his palm against it as if he fucking knew already. Smug bastard.
“Yeah, see, I like houses like this. Old Edwardian, but with some serious modifications, like that high tech security system, and the coded locks. Another interesting fact about Edwardian houses…” he glanced at the wall again, his palm stroking the wood panelling, “yeah, often they have little hidden treats, like, say… basements or cellars.”
Fucking hell. I groaned as he smirked at me, patting the wall lightly.
“Yeah, from the blueprints, I know you have one, you jammy bastard, but what I don’t get is… there should be a door over here somewhere. So, with all your fancy high tech shit… it’s a hidden door, right?”Blueprints?! What the fuck?
I opened my mouth, but he raised a palm.
“No no. Let me figure it out. There’s a latch or some kind of seam we can’t see.” He started fingering the wood panelling, and I sighed.
“You’re going to leave marks on it, man. My cleaner doesn’t like that shit.”
“Ha. Cleaner. You snooty bastard. Nope… it’s here somewhere, I know it.”
I groaned and reached over before he could molest the whole damn wall, and pushed the hidden latch as he backed up with a groan.
“I was going there next, dammit.”
“Yeah, after you fingered every bloody inch of it!”
“Lissa never complains.”
He gestured to the secret door, which was no longer a secret, and currently sat ajar.
“Can I?”
“It’s just a… a man-cave, Ice. There’s nothing to see.”
He smirked again. “My searches tell me you have a firearms licence, man. Your guns down here?” Jesus fuck!
“Is there anything you don’t know?”
He shrugged, stroking the edge of the door, but for all his jerking me around, he wasn’t even opening it unless I said so, and I appreciated that respect, even after all this.
“Probably. I mean, I couldn’t find the door latch first off like I thought I would.”
