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ugh.
It would all be over soon and he’d have the answers we’d been waiting for.
We just had one stop to make first.
I pulled through the iron gates that led to the exclusive neighborhood where my half sister, Angela’s house was perched up on the Hollywood hillside. Allie perked in her seat as we neared Angela’s house and a smile tugged at the corner of my lips. Allie and Angela had hit it off from the beginning, and I knew no one was more thrilled about our new relationship than Angela herself. She’d nagged at me for years to find a nice woman and settle down, and although Allie and I had only been together a few months, Angela was already hinting around for the ‘settle down’ part.
Not that I was opposed to it. A year ago, her prodding had been nothing more than a mere annoyance, and the idea of spending the rest of my life with one woman had been completely ludicrous. But now…making Allie my wife and starting a real life with her was a thought that was never too far from my mind.
I parked in Angela’s driveway and cut the engine. “Ready?” I asked Allie.
She smiled and I was relieved to see the crease that had become embedded between her brows over the past few weeks, had faded slightly. I leaned across the center console and cupped my hand around the base of her neck, gently massaging the knot of tension away, before pulling her gently towards me and pressing my lips to hers. At the touch of her soft lips, my body sprung to life, every sense heightened. The smell of her perfume was sweeter, the taste of her kiss more intoxicating, and the warmth of her skin more tempting. I couldn’t help but deepen the kiss until I heard the soft, vibrating purr at the back of her throat. It was a sound of pure desire. Allie’s back arched as I ran my fingers down her neck, over her shoulders that were bare except for the thin strap of her rose colored tank top, and then down her side, lingering over every soft curve. Her breasts pressed against my chest as she leaned over, hungry for each new kiss, and I had to break away with a guttural groan. “Remind me, why did we schedule this lunch with Angela right before the meeting?”
I tugged a free strand of Allie’s auburn hair loose from her ponytail and stroked it between my thumb and fingers. When I’d first met her, she’d had her hair dyed black, but after a special pampering day at the salon, she’d surprised me by coming to the office with deep, auburn locks. She was sexy as hell either way, but I had to admit, somehow her personality had intensified with her red hair, catapulting her from firecracker to full on bombshell, and the added sass had led to some mind-blowing sex.
Allie narrowed her eyes at me but couldn’t stop the smile twitching her lips. “First of all, we didn’t schedule this lunch, I did, because I miss Angela. And secondly, she’s on the porch right now, so we need to go.”
I laughed and kissed her right on the scrunched up bridge of her nose. “Seems like some sweaty afternoon fun would have been a better idea. That’s all I’m saying,” I joked, mentally kicking myself for not thinking to whisk Allie away to some luxury hotel suite for the day. A good fuck would help clear both our minds…
Allie giggled and pulled out of my arms, out the door and up the walk before I could blink. Angela and Allie were locked in a tight embrace as I got out of the SUV and joined them on the porch. I stopped walking and drank in the sight of them, letting every emotion wash over me, savoring the moment.
“You coming?” Angela called to me, not waiting for my reply before turning and ushering Allie into her huge house. I smiled to myself and followed the trail of their happy chattering. A couple of month prior, I wasn’t sure I’d have Angela in my life after her cancer fight had taken a scary turn, so the fact that not only had she survived, but was energetic and full of life and joy, hit a particular soft spot in my chest. Watching her and Allie become such fast friends had been the frosting on the cake.
I found the two women of my life in Angela’s kitchen. Allie was admiring the view from the floor to ceiling windows while Angela fussed over the coffee machine. “—I keep telling him, but you know how he is…” Allie said, casting a glance back over her shoulder. She smiled proudly as she caught my eye, knowing I’d walked in at the tail end of her rant.
“How am I?” I asked, challenging her with a sparkle of mischief in my eyes.
“Stubborn as a mule,” Allie replied automatically, returning my playful glare.
Angela turned and looked between us, offering her own eye roll to the conversation.
I laughed and walked over to join Allie by the window. “It must be serious if you’re busting out your country vocabulary,” I tossed back to Allie, before wrapping her in my arms, letting my hands slide down the easy curve of her hips.
She smacked my shoulder. “He’s impossible, you know,” she said, peeking past me to gather Angela into her persuasion. “He thinks just because I’m from Kansas, I was raised on a farm or something.”
Angela laughed. “He doesn’t get out much. Too busy stuck in his little concrete tower.”
Allie joined in her easy laughter and I opened my mouth to protest, but decided against it and let them have their fun. I had ways of getting Allie back later…when I could get her all to myself…
“So, tell me, what am I being stubborn about now?” I asked. I palmed Allie’s ass cheek before releasing her and went to get a cup of the steaming hot coffee Angela set out on the large, quartz island.
Allie joined me and I poured her a cup. “I was just telling Angela that if I’m going to give into your relentless requests that I abandon my apartment and move in with you, we need to get something like this,” she explained, waving her hand in the air at the large kitchen. “I don’t want to trade one box for another.”
I barked a laugh. “A box? Really? I hardly think the penthouse suite is a box.”
Angela stifled a giggle into her coffee cup.
“I’m just saying, Cooper, I want some space, room to roam. And with a view like this.” She stared longingly out the window.
Since we’d started our relationship, I’d insisted on her moving to my place. But, so far, she’d resisted every attempt, no matter what lengths I’d gone to in order to sweeten the pot and convince her. As it was, she ended up spending nearly every night at my penthouse and had moved so much stuff in— it was becoming hard to imagine she had anything left at her small, one bedroom apartment.
“That’s what the lake house is for,” I countered, thinking of the house I’d purchased on the lake a few years back. It was a sprawling craftsman style mansion in the woods with no one around for at least a mile.
Allie sighed. “When was the last time we were there?”
She had a point. With everything going on, our schedule was too packed to escape the city for a getaway. I made a mental note to remedy that once things settled down. I wrapped an arm over her shoulders, pulled her in close, and pressed a kiss to the side of her temple. She smiled and looked up at me with her big blue eyes. “Soon,” I promised. “After the trial.”
Her face fell slightly but she did her best to keep her smile frozen before she dropped her attention back to the steam rolling off the top of her coffee.
