Chapter Fourteen

 

 

 

 

“Geez, if I’d known that you were going to make me do manual labor when I came over here I would have met you at the gym,” Jennifer complained.

Tessa rolled her eyes as she grabbed the rest of the groceries out of the trunk. “Stop whining. Think of it as a warm-up workout. You can rest while I put away the cold stuff.”

“Fine but carrying your groceries inside wasn’t on my agenda today.”

Tessa ignored her friend’s complaints and headed towards the house with her bags. Jennifer was supposed to meet her here so that they could drive over to the gym together since she was a guest instead of a member of the club. Tessa hadn’t realized that she would be running late when she’d told the other woman to meet her here at five but her appointment in town had taken a little longer than expected. She’d been at the local clinic getting birth control and STD testing because she had no idea if Buck was clean or not. If wasn’t that she couldn’t ask him because she could, but she didn’t want to make things awkward. It was already awkward enough between them.

It had been three days since she’d woken up with him missing from her bed. She’d talked to him that night telling him that she wasn’t really interested in sleeping with him anymore. He’d raised a brow and said okay. That had been that. It had been a little disappointing really because she had expected more complaining or at the very least an argument. What she’d gotten instead had stung a bit because he hadn’t seemed to care one way or the other.

She opened the door kicking it wide, entering and heading to the kitchen with Jennifer trailing behind her. She tossed her bags onto the counter before grabbing the ones she’d handed to Jennifer and doing the same with them. She lifted out the milk and eggs, turned to the fridge and stopped dead, staring.

“Where the hell did this come from?” she demanded, looking at Jennifer.

Jennifer looked over Tessa’s shoulder frowning at her. “What? The fridge?” she asked, looking at Tessa like she’d lost her mind.

“Yes, that,” Tessa said, gesturing with the items in her hands.

“Umm, are you okay? Because I’m quite sure that comes with a house most of the time. Why are you freaking out? Is this one of those punked shows or something where you start acting crazy and then when I start calling the men in white coats you scream you’ve just been punked or something?” Jennifer looked a little too shocked for this to be something she’d planned. Tessa turned to look at the monstrous appliance that sat in her kitchen, still a little dumbfounded.

“Not with this house. At least not unless it’s one of those transformer things we watched in that movie the other night and I’m damned sure that’s not the case. How the hell did this get here?” Tessa asked again, still staring at the brand new stainless steel refrigerator that now graced her humble kitchen.

“Are you saying this isn’t the fridge you had when you left the house this morning?” Jennifer asked, still looking confused.

“Yep, that’s exactly what I’m saying.”

“Oh, well did you forget that a new one was being delivered?”

“No. First, I would have to order one and second, don’t you have to be home for them to deliver stuff?” Tessa demanded, now looking at Jennifer like she was the one who’d lost her mind.

“Okay then. Wait, did Buck know you needed a new one? Because if he did then that’s likely what happened. I mean men in the club have a certain way of doing things and if he knew you needed a new one…” She paused, her brow raised as her voice trailed off and she gestured in the air before shrugging, like Buck replacing her fridge was no big deal.

“Yes, but where did he get it from and how much did this monstrosity cost?” Tessa was feeling a knot forming in her stomach over the thought of how much the ones she’d looked at had cost and this one was much bigger than those were. Damn, that man.

“I wouldn’t worry about it,” Jennifer said shrugging again.

“Not worry about it?” Tessa demanded.

“Well if he put it here when he knew you weren’t home, it’s likely he wouldn’t allow you to pay for it anyway.”

“What? Of course I have to pay for it.”

“No, you don’t. I bet he was hoping you wouldn’t notice,” Jennifer said, sitting on one of the stool and looking at her with a little grin.

“How would I not notice? It’s fucking huge and new.” Tessa was staring at her open-mouthed, wondering how Jennifer thought Buck would think she wouldn’t notice this damned thing in her kitchen.

“Men don’t really notice shit like this unless a woman points it out. My aunt bought a new state-of-the-art stove and dishwasher and had them installed while Uncle Croc was on a run. He came back and was home for almost a month before he even noticed. It’s like they’re oblivious to things that don’t matter to them. Now if it was a new TV or couch, maybe he would have noticed right away but anything else and men are just oblivious. So yeah, he likely thought you just wouldn’t notice.” Laughing, Jennifer moved over to inspect the new appliance.

“I can’t believe Buck would think I’m that big of an idiot.”

“This is nice. It even has an icemaker in the door that isn’t mounted inside the fridge. Wow, and a separate drawer for the meats. You could fit a ton of food into this thing,” Jennifer cooed, looking like she’d fallen in love with the damned thing. Tessa refused to look because she was going to tell Buck to take this back to wherever he’d bought it because it was too expensive for her.

“Stop having orgasms over my fridge and explain how he thought I wouldn’t notice a brand new stainless steel appliance in my kitchen?” Tessa demanded, shoving the milk into the conveniently-sized shelf in the door and the eggs onto another shelf.

“I did. Men really don’t notice things unless they are pointed out and I can promise you if you try to bring this up he will just ignore you. That’s the way men in this club deal with anything they don’t like to hear. It’s best just to let them have their way and be done with it in these cases.” Jennifer grabbed the meats Tessa had bought at the store and stored them in the freezer.

Tessa just shook her head because she didn’t see how letting them get away with that would change their behavior. She wouldn’t be ignoring this or allowing Buck to decide that she needed him to buy her things.

“Besides he likely got it from someone the club had trouble with anyway.”

“Wait, what do you mean?” Tessa asked, feeling a little worried that her new fridge was stolen.

“Oh, well when someone crosses the club they typically start offering anything of value to them to get leniency. It never works, but the guys do take the shit they offer and just handle whatever needed to be handled afterwards.” Jennifer handed her the salad she’d purchased to put inside the nicely spaced crisper.

“I don’t even have the words. I will have to explain to that infuriating man that this monstrous thing has to go back wherever it came from,” Tessa grunted.

“Good luck with that, hun. I’ve been around this club since I was eight and my parents died. Things don’t change much,” Jennifer said, a laugh escaping her.

“Your parents died?” Tessa hadn’t known that and she felt bad that she hadn’t questioned why Jennifer lived with her aunt and uncle.

“Yeah, mom overdosed and dad killed himself because he couldn’t take it. Spent a year in foster care before they finally tracked Uncle Croc down and he took me in.” Jennifer didn’t seem upset about the story but Tessa felt sympathy tug at her heart.

“I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be. Uncle Croc took me in and him and Aunt Tilda didn’t have to. Now if I’d stayed a foster kid that’s when you should be sorry. In the year I was in the system, I had four foster homes. That’s a hard life for any kid and tragic because some of the places don’t feed or clothe the kids properly. My social worker kept telling me to stop reporting the bad things to my counselors. Seriously, they said that to a seven-year-old. Thankfully they found Croc and I was sent to live with him. I was a real terror but they straightened me up and now I wouldn’t have wanted any other life.” Jennifer smiled and shrugged.

Tessa didn’t know what to say to her young friend. She was so wise for a twenty-year-old; maybe it was the fact that she’d been raised around a harder sort of life that made her seem wiser than most of the young people she knew. Or maybe it was that the young people she knew didn’t know anything about the world because they lived behind reinforced fences.

“Wow, I just realized how terrible my story sounded, but I was lucky. I don’t want anyone to feel sorry for me because I turned out just fine. Now let’s get this show on the road. We need to work off all the carbs we’ve been eating at our girls’ night every week for the past month.” Jennifer shooed her into the bedroom to change into her workout clothes. Tessa allowed her to usher her into forgetting—at least for the moment—that she had a bone to pick with a certain male.

 

Tessa didn’t bother to turn on the light in the bedroom. Her eyes were adjusted to the dim light enough that she could stumble to the bed. She was exhausted. After a two hour workout with Jennifer and working her shift at the bar, she was beyond tired. She pulled the covers back tugging at them when they didn’t want to budge, frowning a little as she flopped down inside them, letting out a little sigh.

She was just starting to feel comfortable when a hard arm snaked out to curl around her waist, making her scream and slap at whoever was in her bed. She sat straight up in the bed wildly hitting the male who was trying to pull her closer. She yanked on the little chain on the nightstand lamp flooding the room with light, earning a male grunt when she elbowed him in the chest to manage the task. She glared at the last man she expected to see in her bed tonight, her mouth hanging open as she stared at him.

“Was the screaming necessary?” a gruff male voice asked as he looked up at her from the bed, running a hand over his closely cropped hair.

“Since I wasn’t expecting you to be in my bed. Yes, yes, the screaming was necessary,” Tessa growled, her eyes narrowed to slits as she glared at him. “What are you doing in my bed?”

“Duchess, I’m tired, can’t we do this in the morning?” Buck asked, his eyes watching her softly.

“No, Buck, we can’t. Now why the hell are you in my bed? Did yours get stolen or burned or, I don’t fucking know, bedbugs? Because I am pretty damned sure you should be in it instead of mine.” Tessa couldn’t believe the audacity of the man. How did he expect her to react to him breaking into her house and crawling into her bed?

“Duchess, we both know how this argument is going to end so let’s just skip to the end. You want me as much as I want you and I will likely end up in your bed often,” Buck muttered sleepily.

“Wha—were you not there for the conversation we had at the bar?”

“What conversation?” Buck asked, his look oblivious and innocent as he propped himself up in her bed’s fluffy comforter. Tessa decided right then and there that the man was impossible.

“The one where I said we weren’t sleeping together again because it wasn’t a good idea,” she said from between clenched teeth, her face hardening into a glare. Buck rolled his eyes; he actually rolled his eyes at her before he replied dryly.

“We both knew that was bullshit so I ignored it,” Buck explained, reaching across the bed to pull her back down onto it with him. She was so angry over his insane comment that she wasn’t prepared to fight him and ended up on her back beneath him.

“It wasn’t bullshit!” she screeched, her hands pushing against his chest trying to shove him off but he just let out a loud sigh before he leaned forward, his lips hovering above hers, leaving her slightly breathless.

“Yeah, duchess, it was,” Buck said before his mouth was taking hers in a deep kiss that made her moan and arch against him on the bed. She hadn’t meant to allow him entrance but he’d managed to coax her tongue out to play without much effort, allowing him to thrust his inside her waiting mouth, swirling around hers intoxicatingly. That intoxication had nothing to do with the flavor of bourbon on his tongue and everything to do with the man himself.

Tessa didn’t know why his touch sent her body into shivers of pleasure and total slutty abandon but it did. She could almost feel the passion rising inside her every time she got near him. It was unnerving.

Buck’s teeth caught her bottom lip and tugged gently before his mouth slipped down to her throat and he sighed. His mouth caressed the hollow of her throat. Tessa moaned and tried to catch her bearings enough to shove him off her.

She realized he’d been in the same spot for a long time when her desire began to cool slightly and her head cleared. That was when she realized his big body was suddenly heavy, pressing her into the bed in an almost suffocating manner. It was also when she realized that the big bastard had just fallen asleep while making love to her.