AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Can you remember an example in the last decade?”
I’m not sure how we end up so close, her elbow brushing my arm. The simple touch is enough to heighten all my senses. I should take a step back, if only to cool the blanket of heat swirling between us. Shit. I should do a whole lot of things, but Jade’s earlier words whisper like a naughty devil on my shoulder.You’re allowed to be happy again. Dropping my gaze to Aurora’s shiny lips against my better judgment, I can think of plenty of ways to put a smile onbothof our faces.
“Didn’t think so, Chief.”
“I’m not some old curmudgeon like the Crowley brothers.” I don’t know why I feel the need to defend myself. So what if I take life a little too seriously? I keep people safe that way.
“Only curmudgeons use the word curmudgeon.” Aurora’s unguarded laughter thaws a layer of ice I didn’t even realize existed around my hardened heart. The warmth is addictive. Like a drug I crave. Hours after she’s gone home, that beautiful smile will haunt my sleepless night. “And I don’t know why you’re so hard on those boys. Under those scowls, they’re big teddy bears.”
“That’s because by some freak circumstance they’re getting along right now. Wait until the feud starts back up.” My fingertips brush her shoulder of their own accord, the electricity zinging through me like a lightning strike. I blame the reaction on this damn cat and mouse game the two of us have been playing since the day we met. Attraction that might only be this strong because we’re both resisting it so much.
“Well in that case, I better learn how to make decent scrambled eggs, Chief. It might be the only thing that keeps those two happy.” Her dark eyes twinkle with mischief. My dick twitches, encouraging me to find out just how much trouble the two of us can get into. Promising me that I’ve been screwed since the moment I invited Aurora Gray into my house. The only question now is, can I keep my heart out of it?
CHAPTER7
Aurora
“They’re so fluffy!” I can hardly contain my excitement at the scrambled eggsImade. They look full and appetizing, just like Grandma Rose makes them. Now that they’re plated, I poke at them with a fork to prove their existence. “Mineneverlook like this.”
“You use milk?” Garrett guesses.
“Doesn’t everyone?” I ask. “Well, except you apparently. Water? Really?”
“You can’t tell me your grandma uses milk?”
Embarrassed that I don’t know the answer to this question, I duck my head and let my wavy hair curtain my cheeks, pretending to study the eggs closer. I don’t need Garrett Bradley getting a front row seat to another mortifying blush incident that’s heated my cheeks, neck, and chest.
“You don’t cook with her?” Garrett’s tone is surprised, but not condescending. I don’t know why that surprises me so much. Why it makes me feel like I can share a moment of vulnerability with the man who pretty much hates me. Or at least, Ithoughthe hated me until he asked his sister to bail me out of jail. And I’m pretty sure he’s kept my arrest a secret too.
“No one lets me near the kitchen, in case you haven’t noticed. They’re afraid I’ll burn the place down.”
“Have you asked?”
“No point.” I stab a piece of egg, amazed at how well it holds together on my fork. I hold it up to Garrett, hoping for a bit of praise. But the earlier smile has morphed right back into his signature chiseled frown. Don’t get me wrong. It’s a sexy look, capable of inducing incredibly inappropriate but delightfully naughty fantasies. But after catching a glimpse of that mega-watt smile, I’ll never be the same.
“You should ask, Aurora.”
It’s not fair that the sound of my name rolling off his tongue causes a quiver low in my belly. Especially when he’s being so damn pushy about things he has no knowledge about. No one thinks I’m capable of boiling water, much less learning how to scramble eggs. “It’ll be a lot more fun surprising everyone,” I say, pretending to miss his real point. I bat my eyelashes, summoning my innocent slash doesn’t-quite-get-it persona.
“You can cut it with the clueless shit,” Garrett says, his unfairly sexy voice low and deep as he leans a hand against the counter.
Well fuck. He can read me like a book.
I focus on his fingers curling around the edge of the farm sink because those stormy eyes are too much right now.
I feel naked.
And not the good kind of naked where we’d both be out of our clothes and tangled together in a hot, passionate encounter. The kind of naked that promises I can’t pretend with this man because he sees me for who I truly am. Damn the police chief and his people instincts. That has to be what it is.
“Brave enough to try a bite,Chief?” I practically purr the question in a last-ditch effort to distract him.
“Aurora.”
I hold the fork up to his lips in offering, hoping to coax away that scowl. Though I single handedly cooked and prepared these scrambled eggs, Garrett coached me through each step. And I’ve still been too chicken to try them.
I dare an upward glance, all the way up to his guarded, conflicted eyes and suddenly I don’t care about eggs or even cooking. I just want him to unclench that jaw and give in. Just once. “Please?”
After a heavy sigh, Garrett gives in and parts his lips. I shouldn’t fixate on his mouth around that fork. Never in my life have I found a man eating to be knee-weakeningly sexy. Part of me—a veryrecklesspart—wants to forget the food and jump the man. Maybe if we banged one out in his kitchen, we might calm this insane urgency between us. But the other part of me—the wiser one that’s learned some hard lessons—is begging me to behave. To keep focused on my goal and prove to Grandma Rose, and my sisters, that I’m more than capable of managing a diner when Grandma Rose decides to retire one day.
