Chapter 41
Perhaps he should have taken her to a different grocery store? he thought with something close to terror as the manager that he’d promised that he was coming back rolled the carriage filled with all the stuff that he’d picked out yesterday to a stop in front of him with a huge smile.
“I saved your carriage for you, sir,” he said, stepping back and gesturing to the carriage as though he’d somehow just done him a huge favor.
He really hadn’t, Reese thought, praying that wasn’t a blush creeping up his neck as Kasey, smiling hugely like it was Christmas morning and Santa had brought her everything she’d asked for and more, joined him.
“What do we have here, Yummy?” she asked, as she reached into the carriage and absently sorted through everything he’d picked out to make last night perfect.
“Nothing,” he bit out with a glare at the manager, who’d just given the devious woman something to torment him with.
“It doesn’t look like nothing,” she said with that sexy smile that told him just how much she was enjoying this.
“It is,” he said, grabbing the carriage and pushing it towards the produce aisle, but unfortunately for him, he hadn’t moved fast enough.
“Is this the mega pack, Yummy?” the devious woman asked with a shit-eating grin as she held up the box of condoms that he’d planned on using last night.
The box of condoms that they should have used, he thought with a curse.
“I’m clean,” she reassured him with a sigh as she tossed the large box back into the carriage.
“Me, too,” he promised.
“Never would have let you touch me otherwise, Yummy,” she said with a playful wink as she reached into the carriage, grabbed the pastries that he’d picked out last night and returned them to the table.
“Which leaves…” he trailed off, not really sure that the grocery store was the right place for this conversation.
“They didn’t help me last time,” she said with a small smile as she added a large bag of apples to the carriage.
“Mikey hadn’t been planned?” he asked, kind of shocked, because he’d assumed that she had been.
“I was fifteen,” she said with a chuckle as she grabbed a bag of gold potatoes and put them in the carriage.
“You were in love with him,” he said, unable to help but hate the poor kid simply because he hated the idea of anyone else touching her.
“Again,” she said, licking her lips before she stressed with a chuckle, “I was fifteen.”
“What happened?” he asked, adding a bag of russet potatoes to the carriage.
“Well, apparently condoms are only ninety-eight percent effective,” she said with a wink as they strolled through the quiet produce department.
“Smart ass,” he said with a chuckle as he grabbed some barely ripe bananas and put them into the carriage the same time that she grabbed a bunch of over-ripe bananas.
At his questioning look, she said, “Banana bread.” Nodding, because he wasn’t one to turn down banana bread, and he was damn well getting some of that banana bread, he followed her down the next aisle.
“So, Mikey was a surprise,” he mused, seriously wondering how a fifteen-year-old had managed to handle the news, because he probably would have lost it.
She smiled fondly as she picked through the peach display. “You could definitely say that,” she said with a heavy sigh before adding, “it probably shouldn’t have come as a surprise considering everything that I was doing, but…”
“But…” he prompted when she trailed off.
She shrugged as she absently picked through the peaches and added them to the plastic produce bag that he’d grabbed for her. “Before I met Michael, it wouldn’t have thrown me like it had. Even then I was being careful. I was young and stupid, but I knew better than to take risks. If it had happened then I would have understood it, but when I met Michael things changed.”
“How so?” he asked softly, looking around to make sure that they were still alone, knowing that she would hate for anyone else to hear this.
“I don’t know. I really can’t explain it. Before, I didn’t care what happened to me, didn’t expect much and then when I met Michael suddenly everything changed. I started to care what was going to happen to me and I stopped taking chances, stopped doing stupid things, and I’d thought that I’d made better choices,” she said, giving him a self-deprecating smile. “Clearly, I was wrong.”
“It depends on how you look at it,” he murmured as his gaze dropped to her ass simply because he couldn’t help himself.
“Because Mikey probably made me grow up and stopped me from making excuses?” she asked, sounding amused as she pointedly gave her ass a little wiggle that had him groaning. “That was my take on things as well.”
“Something like that,” he said, wondering how quickly they could get this done so that he could take her back home and put that box of condoms to good use.
Maybe he should grab another box? he amended a second later when she bent over to pick something up and he decided that once he got her home, they were never leaving that bed again.
*-*-*-*
“I need more eggs!” she said, shoving money into Jason’s hands as she pushed him out the door. “And sugar and flour!” she added, deciding that she should see how the second double oven handled baking cookies.
“I’m not your bitch!” Jason snapped in disgust as he stumbled back.
“I am,” Trevor said with a shrug as he shoved another cheesecake brownie in his mouth and plucked the money out of Jason’s hands on his way to his truck. “Text me if you need anything else.”
“Wait!” Jason said with something close to panic as he chased after his cousin. “I was negotiating, you bastard!”
Trevor simply shrugged as he jumped in his truck and tried to drive away only to have Jason jump in the back, determined to do whatever it took to help so that the procession of baked goods, casseroles and stews didn’t stop. She watched them for a few more seconds before releasing another satisfied sigh and returned to her brand new kitchen.
She still couldn’t believe it.
Reese had taken a seriously outdated kitchen on the verge of falling down around her and turned it into…this.
She glanced over her shoulder at the intricate wood floor that Reese had created in her living room, the built-in shelves he’d installed, the floor to ceiling entertainment center that she was going to fill with all the pictures of Mikey that she’d been storing in her closet over the years, and the large closet that he’d created for all of Mikey’s baseball gear before shifting her attention to her dream kitchen.
It was beautiful, absolutely beautiful, she thought with a sigh as she ignored the sulking man sitting at the beautiful handmade dining room table that he’d created for her to the dark tiled floor, the large kitchen cabinets, pantry cabinets, double ovens, oversized fridge, huge bay windows that now overlooked the beach until her gaze landed on the most amazing kitchen island that she’d ever seen.
It was oversized, had more than enough shelves, cabinets, drawers, power sources, cooled storage drawers for her vegetables, hidden drawers for Mikey’s baseballs, an elevated spot for her computer, one for her iPad and a locking system for her mini tripod so that she could make videos without having to use her large tripods and taking up most of the kitchen floor.
He’d given her everything he’d promised her and more.
It was so much more than she could have hoped for, she thought as she glanced at him to find him watching her with a predatory gaze that sent a tremor down her spine as she realized that he was more than she could have ever asked for.
Deciding that she’d make that lasagna later, she toed off her shoes while she undid her pants and turned around, heading towards her bedroom as she pulled off her top, tossed it aside with her bra quickly following. By the time she reached her room her panties were off and Reese was sweeping her off her feet with a growl as he kicked the door shut behind them.
After that…
Things got a little more interesting.