I GLANCED DOWN at the cards I held in my hand. I needed one more seven to give me a four of a kind. From across the table, Miles met my eyes briefly and then picked up the card that was moving clockwise around the coffee table. After a few seconds of consideration, he placed it facedown beside him and Suzanne picked it up. On it went until it got to me, and wouldn’t you know it—a seven.

After switching out my cards, I waited until the attention was off me, and then I quietly reached for one of the spoons lined up in the middle of the table. The move didn’t escape Miles, who’d been watching me out of the corner of his eye, and as he grabbed one of the spoons, utter chaos broke out, everyone screeching and fighting over the remaining cutlery.

I laid down my four of a kind and chuckled as Suzanne and Rick fought over the last spoon.

“I’m your mother, you should let me have it,” Suzanne said, yanking on one end.

Rick jerked the spoon toward him. “I’m not letting you have anything. I grabbed it first.”

“Did not.”

“Did too.”

Beth reached over and tickled Rick’s ribs, and as he yelped, he lost his grip on the spoon, and Suzanne held it high over her head in victory.

“That’s cheating,” Rick cried.

“Oh, don’t be a sore loser, honey. You’ve won several times already.”

“If we’re gonna be technical about it, Aid—Sean won this round,” Miles said, gathering up the cards from everyone and giving them a good shuffle.

My lips tipped up. “Thank you, Miles.” He didn’t hold my gaze for long, just as he hadn’t since we’d been alone in his car together yesterday. We were both behaving, both putting on an act for the benefit of Beth and his family, but it was one of the hardest things I’d done in my life.

With his wavy brown hair casually mussed from running his fingers through it, and wearing worn jeans and a white T-shirt with a red-and-blue plaid shirt unbuttoned over it, Miles was mouth-watering as hell. Seeing him in his parents’ home, relaxed and joking around, only added to his appeal, and what was more, he seemed to have no idea how attractive he was. And it wasn’t only his looks. It was his agreeable nature—well, now that he wasn’t out to attack me anymore—and the easy way he laughed. From what I’d seen, he had a close-knit relationship with his siblings and parents, one I envied. It’d been so long since I’d seen my own family that I’d forgotten what it was like to be around people who cared about you, no matter what.

A furry body rubbed itself against my arm, and I looked down to see Lucifer pacing back and forth beside me. They’d all warned me that there was a demon cat that lived with them, and that he hated visitors and only came out when he was hungry, but I hadn’t found that to be the case at all. Lucifer pawed at my lap, and I reached down to give him a head-to-tail rub, as Jack looked on in amazement.

“Seems like you’ve got the magic touch,” he said, shaking his head. “Usually he scares off our guests.”

“Hey, come here, little asshole,” Rick said, reaching down to pet Lucifer, but when the cat hissed, baring his fangs, Rick jumped back. “Little asshole is right.”

I laughed and scratched the spot behind Lucifer’s ears, and as he began to purr, Miles’s brows shot up.

“What did you do? Drug him with catnip?” he said.

I chuckled and continued to stroke Lucifer’s soft hair. “Maybe I do just have the right touch?”

Miles smirked, and his eyes dropped to my hand, and I’d never wanted to read minds more than I did right then, because clearly he was right on track with my own thoughts. How would it feel if I was allowed to run my hands all over him?

“Sean? Babe?” Beth said, and when I looked her way, she grinned in a way that told me she hadn’t missed what had just passed between myself and her younger brother. But she was doing her best to try and prevent the rest of the family from seeing too much. “Would you mind helping Miles get the dessert? I have a sudden craving for something sweet.”

You and me both, I thought as Miles jumped to his feet, and I wondered if it was smart for me to go into a separate room with him right now, considering the thoughts running through my head.

I was busy trying to think of a good excuse to stay, when Miles shocked the hell out of me by saying, “Yeah, that’d be great if you don’t mind. I mean, unless you want to stay here and stroke the cat…”

I wasn’t sure if I was imagining the twinkle in his eye, but hell if I wasn’t about to take him up on the offer he seemed to be issuing. As I got to my feet, I gave Lucifer a final pet and said, “Try not to claw Rick’s face off,” and then I followed Miles into the kitchen.

He went straight to the freezer, opening it up to get out a tub of ice cream, and I glanced over my shoulder to make sure everyone in the living room was occupied before standing beside the fridge.

“What’s for dessert?” I asked.

Miles’s eyes found mine, and he grinned. “I have no idea. But I couldn’t stand sitting across from you any longer without looking at you the way I really want to, so this seemed like a good way to get you alone.”

I chuckled as he stood with the freezer door open, blocking our faces in case anyone walked in on us. “To get me alone, huh? Technically, your entire family is sitting in the other room.”

“Yeah. But at least no one’s here watching my every move.”

Oh, I liked the sound of that. “So…how do you want to look at me, Miles?”

Miles took in a shaky breath, and as he ran his eyes down over me, he bit his bottom lip and—

“Okay, you need to stop looking at me like you want to.”

Miles laughed as he shut the freezer door, and then walked to the kitchen island. As I sidled up beside him, he said, “Can you get out the spoons and bowls? Do you remember where they are?”

I nodded and grabbed them for him, and when I came back, Miles opened up the ice cream and grabbed the scooper.

As he began piling scoops into each bowl, Miles said under his breath, “You smell really good, by the way. Do you know that? Like, I want to crawl in your lap good.”

“Jesus, Miles,” I said, as I kept my eyes on the family laughing around the coffee table in the next room. “What happened to your rule about behaving ourselves until the weekend was over?”

Miles stopped scooping and looked at me, and his mischievous grin was downright adorable. “I’m behaving. I’m not touching you, am I?”

“If you were touching me, we’d be in a lot of trouble.”

The curious spark that lit his eyes told me that was the exact wrong thing to say, and when he lowered his voice and said, “What kind of trouble?” I couldn’t stop the rumble of laughter that left my throat.

“If we weren’t surrounded by your entire family what would be the first thing you’d want me to do to you?”

Miles froze, and his hand tightened around the handle of the scoop.

“So are we playing charades?” I said. “Want me to guess what that handle is representing?”

Miles picked up the scoop and ran his tongue along the back of the metal, and I had to grip the island to stop myself from taking hold of him and taking his now extra-sweet lips with mine.

“Are you trying to drive me crazy?” I said, shaking my head.

Miles gave a flirty shrug. “Maybe. You kind of deserve it, don’t you think?”

Ahh, so that was what this was about. Miles had decided to give a little payback for my surprise arrival. “If this is your way of punishing me, I’m a fan. But you still didn’t answer me. What’s the first thing you’d want me to do to you?”

Miles ran his eyes down to my fingers on the granite counter, and then reached out to trace the back of my hand. My cock reacted to the touch as though his fingers had just stroked it, and standing as close as we were, I could see his blue eyes darken. Then he swallowed, and I braced myself for whatever was about to come out of his delectable mouth.

“I’d want you to put your hand—”

There was a crash and a screech. “Lucifer!”

Suzanne’s shout jolted me out of the fantasy I was having of putting my hands anywhere on Miles, and before I could comprehend what was going on, a flash of black wrapped in gold streaked across the kitchen floor and bounded up onto the counter—a trail of tinsel and glitter in his wake.

“You get down off the counter right now, you little hellion!” Miles’s mom shouted as she raced in after the cat.

Miles blinked once, twice, and then turned around just in time to see Lucifer land a front paw in the tub of ice cream as he scrambled across the counter.

“Lucifer, get down!” Miles shouted as he swatted at him, which only made the cat more frantic. As Lucifer’s paw sank into the ice cream like a foot in quicksand, he grabbed for whatever he could nearby to try and pull himself free—which just so happened to be the bowls we’d been filling.

One by one, the bowls went flying, smashing to smithereens on the slate floor, and as the entire McAllister family chased after the cat, Lucifer took a flying leap for freedom off the end of the counter, the tinsel twisting around the tub and flinging it across the space, where it smashed into the stainless-steel fridge.

Each family member took a side, running around the island trying to capture the beast before he got ice cream and glitter all over the house, but every time someone got close, the little furball managed to dodge them and make a break for it.

“You little shithead,” Jack said as he closed in on the cat, who was now shaking his paw, trying to get the ice cream off, but as Jack reached down to grab him, Lucifer hissed and sidestepped with a quick pounce to the left.

The mayhem went on for a good ten minutes. How many humans did it take to wrangle a demon cat? Apparently a few more than the McAllisters had up their sleeves, but then, finally, little Lucifer came to a stop by my feet.

I looked down at the furball who was currently matted with the sticky cream, and as he glanced up at me, the look in his eyes was yeah, just try it, pal. But then, as if the mess on his paw sidetracked him, he shook it again and brought it up to his mouth. He licked at it once, twice and then…oh yeah, that seemed like a great idea.

“Wait,” I said to everyone who was still in a mad rush. “Stop for a second.”

As they all froze, I looked at Beth, who was standing by the sink.

“Very slowly, pass me the dishtowel.”

Beth inched her hand over to one, keeping her eyes on the still-licking Lucifer, and once she handed it over, I spread the towel wide and knelt beside the cat. He stopped licking long enough to look up at me and let out a loud meow.

“I know, buddy. Tastes good, huh?” When he meowed again, I kept my hands steady and wrapped him up in the towel. To my surprise, he didn’t put up a fight and let me pick him up. “There we go. Let’s get you unraveled and then we’ll see about getting the ice cream off.”

As Lucifer went back to licking his paws, I looked up to see the entire McAllister family gaping at us.

“I think you should take him home with you. Consider it an early Christmas present,” Jack said, but Suzanne playfully smacked him in the stomach.

“That was my mother’s cat, and whether we like it or not, we’re his forever home.”

Jack groaned. “But he hates us. He loves Sean.”

“I’m not listening,” Suzanne said, plugging her ears as she headed to the sink to wash off the spewed ice cream.

“Well, since Sean’s got this under control, I’m gonna head out,” Rick said, grabbing his keys.

“Where are you off to so late?” Suzanne asked.

“Oh, I thought I told you. I’m meeting the guys out for pool.”

“Pool. That sounds fun,” Beth said, raising an eyebrow. “Can we come too?”

Rick scratched the back of his neck. “Uh, no. Guys’ night and all.”

“Mhmm. Right.” Beth went back to wiping up the splatters of ice cream littering what seemed like every surface of the kitchen as Rick headed out, and I gently untangled the tinsel from Lucifer’s body.

“Seems like you really do have the magic touch with pussy…cats,” Miles said in a low voice only I could hear as he sidled up beside me. “Should I be worried about that?”

I snorted out a laugh, startling Lucifer. “Jealous?”

“Maybe a little. Lucifer’s seen more action than I have the past couple of days.”

Glancing up to see where the rest of the McAllisters were, I said under my breath, “We can remedy that whenever you like.”

“Oh yeah? I may have a handle you can squeeze—”

“Miles!”

We both jumped, a guilty expression on Miles’s face, as Suzanne stood a few feet away, her hands on her hips.

He cleared his throat. “Uh, yes, Mom?”

She narrowed her eyes and looked between the two of us, and my stomach dropped. Shit, had she heard us? This was not good—

“Are you going to help clean up, or are you going to antagonize Lucifer while Sean’s trying to keep him calm?” she said.

Miles glanced at me, his creased forehead smoothing out, and then he backed away and took the broom Beth held out to him.

Flirting with Miles had taken an interesting turn tonight, and it thrilled something deep inside that had lain dormant for far too long. When had I last been this enamored with anyone? Miles was a breath of fresh air, one I craved more with every minute I spent with him. I knew we were supposed to behave this weekend, until the contract was over, but how was I supposed to go that long without getting my hands on him?

Truth? I didn’t think I could.