“Good to know,” I said, putting my empty plate down on the counter. “’Cause I’m notblond.”
“No. You’re…” She looked at my hair. “Dark.”
I drank myjuice.
“Hawaiian, Brazilian… English andSwedish.”
Good memory. Couldn’t even remember telling her all that, but I must’ve, at somepoint.
“So is Piper,” I said. “Think there’s some Norwegian in there,too.”
“And you look it. All of it.” She stared at me. “He does, too, kind of. Just…differently.”
“Uh-huh.”
She seemed to be about to say something else, but turned away to put her plate in the sink instead. Then she turned back to me, suddenly, like she’d just gotten the nerve to say what she wanted to blurt out. “Do you want me at the dinnertonight?”
I stared at her.Huh?
“I mean, Jessa invited me, but I know it’s a traditional thing you guys do, and… I don’t have to come.Really.”
I knew Jessa invited her, and I’d just assumed she wascoming.
“Yeah,” I said. “I want youthere.”
“Oh.” She seemed to relax a bit, but still looked kinda on-edge. “Okay.” She turnedaway.
Then she turned right backagain.
“Is that… like… a weird thing for you? That… your brother’s blond? And you’re…not?”
“Well. It wasn’tnotweird when I was a kid, tell you that.” I finished the rest of my juice and looked ather.
“Oh,” she said. “But. I mean… obviously, you know you’re gorgeous,right?”
Right. I knew that like she knew I wanted her to come to thisdinner.
“Knowing isn’t the same as feeling,darlin’.”
Her brow scrunched up a bit. “I guess…” She picked up our juice glasses, slowly, as she thought thatthrough.
“Put the glassesdown.”
She put them in thesink.
I took hold of her hips and turned her to face me, smashing my mouth down over hers and giving her a long, steaming-hot kiss. And I was patient as fuck about it. I kissed her and kissed her until she let the rod drop out of her ass and she relaxed back into her curvy, confident self in my arms. I could feel the shift, the way she suctioned her body up against mine and kissed meback.
When I finally broke away, I told her, “That’s how much I want you at the dinnertonight.”
“Okay,” she said, her voice all throaty with lust; way moreconvincing.
“I’ll be there around three,” I told her, releasingher.
“Oh. We’re not… goingtogether?”
“I’ve gotta head out to Piper’s first. He’s deep frying the turkey. Told him I’d give him a hand with the deep fryer. Bringin’ it over in histruck.”
“Oh.Right.”
