AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“No. As to what I want? The simple answer is you. I want to spend time with you. Most especially if we’re having sex, but also, even when we’re not. I want to know the things you like, the things you don’t like, what makes you laugh, and what makes you cry.”
Him. He was going to make her cry any second now.
“I want us to be together. As a couple.”
She swallowed hard. “Exclusively?”
“One hundred percent exclusively.” His tone dropped considerably. “I do not share.”
The rough possessiveness in his voice sent a little thrill down her spine. The thought of him wanting her to be his—and only his—spoke to her heart on a soul-deep level.
“What do you want?” he suddenly asked.
She tilted her head the slightest bit and saw a hint of uncertainty in his eyes. Knowing he wasn’t so cocksure about her reply brought a happy smile t
o her lips. It meant her answer mattered to him.
“I want the same.”
After a split-second flash of relief, he grinned back. “Good.” He grasped her shoulders for a quick kiss, then set her back a step. “Now, go open your damn door, witch, and let me get back to work.”
She narrowed her eyes and shook her head at the witch part. If she hadn’t still been smiling when she left, she might have convinced him she was annoyed. But the truth was, she kind of enjoyed the teasing, especially since it was their own secret joke.
Darcy arrived to start her shift at ten, and the blond part-timer wholeheartedly approved of the new accountant in the back room. “Holy hotness,” she whispered as she joined Roxanna over at the coffee station with Honor and Mae.
Mae pointed her stir-stick at Roxanna. “I told you it was Loyal.”
I know! her heart squealed with joy.
“It’s way too early to even say that,” she warned them and her already lost-cause heart.
They all chatted a few more minutes, and with a promise to bring wine at dinner on Saturday, Roxanna went back to work as a customer stepped up to the register.
Her first reading in the afternoon went from bad to worse when she couldn’t shake memories of her and Loyal horizontal on the chaise lounge the night before. She fibbed she wasn’t feeling well, and sent the woman away with apologies and a free booking for the next week.
She managed to get through the rest of the afternoon by putting her chair on the side of the table where her back faced the chaise lounge. Even then, concentrating was exhausting, and when Darcy clocked out after her final reading, she leaned against the register counter, wishing it was six o’clock instead of five. Thinking of another whole hour before she could go take a bath and then a nap, she uttered a soft groan.
“What’s the matter?”
She jumped slightly, then gave her dark, tall-drink-of-water accountant the side-eye. “Someone kept me up late last night. And after last night in my reading room, it’s been a little hard to concentrate on work in there today.”
“I’d say I’m sorry, but I’m not.” True to his word, his grin held not one smidgeon of remorse.
“Me neither,” she agreed with a reluctant smile as she noticed he held papers in his hand at his side. She hadn’t had a chance to check in with him since they’d come back from lunch. She was kind of afraid to ask, but did anyway. “How’s it going back there?”
His grin morphed into a grimace as he lifted the papers. “I have questions.”
“Okay.”
“I’ve come across a number of withdrawals and a few deposits I don’t see any paperwork for.”
“I might not have any, but let’s see if I can figure them out.”
He gave her a funny look as he stepped up to the counter to spread the papers out. Most of them she was able to tell him right off the top of her head what they were. He made notes, but his frown deepened with each figure they reviewed.
“How come you have invoices for some of these but not others?” He indicated a supplier she’d been using for the past four years, who sent regular shipments every month.
“I should have them all. They’re probably filed already.”
