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I had to fist my hands to keep from reaching for him.
“Try… try it?” I asked stupidly, because I’d completely forgotten what we were talking about.
Gage’s left arm came up to rest against the wall next to my head. I nearly groaned at how his sleeve pulled tight over his bicep. God, the things this man could do to me. I almost always pursued guys who were smaller than me, but there was just something about the idea of being with someone who matched me in size and strength, maybe even outmatched me, that caused my dick to weep with joy.
What would it be like to not have to think? To have someone hold me down and take what my body so eagerly wanted to give? Would I even be able to get to a point where I could allow someone that kind of control?
Again.
“When was the last time you weren’t on, Nash?” Gage asked. His free hand came up and I couldn’t help but shiver when his finger swept a path to my cheek. Then his thumb… God, his thumb brushed my lower lip once, twice, three times.
“On what?” I managed to ask, though I barely recognized my own voice.
“On duty, on point, on… edge.”
He might as well have dumped ice water on me. I shoved him hard to get him away from me, his words hitting just too damn close to home. My job revolved around my ability to keep my cool and I worked hard at it. He couldn’t know that there were days where it was all one big fucking lie.
No, he was fishing. He was trying to get into my head.
To mess with it.
For what, I had no clue. But it didn’t matter. He was dangerous.
“I’ve seen enough,” I snapped. I hadn’t, but I’d check out the upstairs later when I could do it on my own.
Coward.
I told my inner voice to fuck off and turned to head back downstairs. I didn’t wait to see if Gage followed me or not. I returned to the kitchen and came to a stop at the sight of Everett standing at the kitchen table wearing an apron and elbow-deep in a pot of tomatoes. I felt a punch to the gut when he looked up at me and smiled.
A real smile.
“Nash, Vieni, unisciti a noi,” he said brightly. Charlie was standing on a chair next to him, her own spindly arms buried in a pot full of tomatoes, crushing them.
“That means come join us,” Charlie said with a big grin.
It did something to me.
The knowledge that Everett had settled in with these people so quickly.
For the moment, he was comfortable and relaxed, while I, on the other hand, was a mess. I wanted to put my fist through a wall and he was crushing tomatoes like it was the best job he’d ever had.
Everett’s expression fell when I failed to respond, and I saw him shift his eyes to the right of me.
I didn’t need to look to know what – no, who – he was looking at. When he looked back at me, I could see the question he was about to ask, but I cut him off. It wasn’t like I could tell him what was wrong with me, since I didn’t fucking know myself.
“I’m going outside to check the perimeter,” I said. “I’ll wait for you out front when you’re ready to return to the other house.”
“Phillipe has invited us to join them for dinner—” Everett began.
“Fine,” I cut in. “Take as long as you need.”
He may have called my name, but I wasn’t sure. I was too busy running.
From him and his pitying looks.
And from the too-perceptive, good-looking Gage, who’d managed to do in the space of an hour what I hadn’t been able to in nearly a month.
Let Everett just be Everett.
Chapter 9
Gage
“Night, sweetheart,” I murmured as I pressed a kiss to my daughter’s neck just seconds before I blew a loud raspberry against it. She giggled and jerked back.
“Daddy!” she admonished. Her hair was damp from her bath and was hanging straight down her back. The bright pink nightgown she was wearing nearly went to her ankles.
“What?” I asked, feigning innocence.
She shook her head at me and then leaned in to give Everett a hug. Unlike the first night when she’d done it, Everett was ready for it and he quickly returned the embrace. “Sleep well, Charlie,” he said. “We’re on to the zucchinis tomorrow, right?”
“Right,” Charlie said with a nod of her head. “For zucchini bread.”
Everett chuckled. “Right, among other things.”
In the three days since Everett and Nash had arrived, Everett had taken it upon himself to tackle our gardens after asking for permission to clean them up. Since the garden had been my mother’s domain and had been steadily ignored since her death, other than picking the occasional vegetables, my father and I had readily agreed to hand the task over to Everett. It had been a bit odd at first, to think of the former president of the United States working in our garden, but it had become clear that it was the kind of work that Everett thrived on and that helped ease his nerves about Reese being discharged in less than a week’s time. Charlie had soon become involved in the gargantuan task of harvesting the vegetables from the garden before they spoiled, and Everett had used the combination of her hatred of most vegetables and her innate curiosity about things to turn the whole thing into a teaching moment. By having Charlie find recipes for each of the vegetables and then putting her to work in harvesting and then preparing them, my daughter had overlooked her supposed distaste of said vegetables.
