Security System
RAVEN
I looked at my clock. It was fifteen minutes before they were supposed to arrive. I'd ruthlessly twisted my hair into a braid to make it manageable today. I hadn't heard anything from them after we'd confirmed the time yesterday.
A wave of insecurities washed over me. What if they didn't show up? What if they actually had to work and just didn't tell me that our plans had changed?
My doorbell rang. In a half second, I was sprinting for the door to yank it open.
And there they were. Orion Wolfe and Quinton were like a sexy strippergram times two. So my mouth went faster than my brain.
"Oh my god, you smell so good." Then I slapped a hand over my mouth. What on Earth had possessed me?
"You smell pretty good, too." They exchanged a look that I didn't understand.
"Come on, sweetheart. Let's get a security system."
Instead of a firetruck, they had a big, shiny black F350 sitting in my driveway. I didn't know why I hadn't heard it when they showed up, but I was having a lot of fun in the middle of the two of them. My thighs were touching them. They didn't seem to mind.
In a few minutes, we were pulling into the Best Buy near my house. When they headed for the doors, I felt cold and bereft as their warm thighs were pulled away from mine. I blushed a little, thinking about what they might say if they knew what I was thinking.
In another minute, the three of us were waving to the friendly guy near the door and heading to the middle of the store. I could see that they knew where they were going. And then we were surrounded by dozens of cameras. I could see one on a display case that was showing the video feed with our faces.
I was so much shorter than the two of them. I barely came up to their shoulders. They were hotly debating one kind of camera versus another. I just stood around, looking at all the cameras. There were fake plastic cameras that were meant to look like security cameras but didn't have any actual technology inside of them. Wild, but I guessed that people bought them.
After the argument stopped, we headed to the cash register with a box. I fumbled with my purse to pull out my wallet, but Orion put a hand on my wrist.
"We're paying to keep you safe.”
I shook my head and pulled away from him. "I don't need your charity. Yeah, I just lost my bakery, but..."
He shook his head and grabbed my wrist again. "I said we're paying."
I didn't know if I liked his high-handed approach. "I can pay for my own household appliances." You could have made ice with the coldness in my voice.
Instead of being mad at me, Orion just smiled and motioned for me to step up to the register. I got the impression that he liked how feisty I was.
The cashier rang me up. She sighed as I swiped my credit card.
"Long day?" I asked.
"Just the end of my shift. Gotta get home to my little boy and pick him up from my mom's, that's all."
She shifted her weight the way that I would after wearing high heels for a few hours.
"Feet hurt?" I asked.
"Just a little." She gave me a pageant queen smile, the kind that moved your mouth but didn't impact your eyes. I could tell that she was being brave. Today was probably not the first day that she had to stand on her feet for an extended period of time to work.
They didn't have a tip jar, but they did have a tiny take a penny dish. I fished around in my purse for a twenty or two. I dropped two twenties in the dish. She was putting the security system into a bag for me to take. Her eyes went wide when she saw the twenty-dollar bills.
I winked at her. "Buy your son some ice cream or pay a babysitter to take care of him for a girl's night."
"Thank you," she said. And this time, her smile was real. She was a beautiful woman. A smile could do things that all the fancy cosmetics in the world could not.
I couldn't do much, and the rational part of me knew that I had to save everything I had until I heard about the insurance settlement. But the other half of me wanted to help a woman who was just trying to provide for her son and keep her head above water. There wasn't much I could do, but I could put just a drop in the bucket. I hoped that she had a better day with a very small act of kindness.
I waved goodbye to her. Orion and Quinton walked out of the store with me. Quinton snagged the bag from me.
"I can carry my own things."
"What kind of Southern gentleman would I be if you had to carry your own things?" Quinton gave me a smile with deep dimples that made my panties melt a little.
"The enlightened kind." I tried to grab it, but he held it over his head. Because he was over a foot taller than me, unless I could suddenly levitate a few feet in the air, I wouldn't be able to grab it back.
When we got back to the truck, Quinton gave me a little boost into the truck. My feet never touched the running board. I just went from the ground to the seat. I decided that there were some advantages to Quinton's bone-deep chivalry. He put the bag between his feet when he buckled his seatbelt.
In another minute, all of us were buckled in and the truck was roaring to life. I felt a little twinge of sadness deep inside of me at the thought of never seeing them again.
In a few minutes, we were back at my house. I grabbed the bag from the floor.
"I guess this is goodbye..." I swallowed hard, tears pricking my eyes. I barely knew these guys. I was getting emotional just because I wasn't going to get to spend any more time with them.
"We're installing it," Orion said as if it were fact. Like I'd already agreed to it.
"You are?" I turned to Quinton, who was already sliding out of the truck with the bag in his hand. I hadn’t noticed when he took it out of my hand. It was as if they'd settled it without me. I didn't know how I felt about that, but I followed Quinton. His big hands caught my waist as I got out of the truck. He lowered me with incredible ease to the ground. But he didn't let go of me. My face was tilted up so that I could look into his eyes. The bag was around his wrist. His hands were so warm that they felt like they were melting me. He was holding me against the solid warmth of his big body. I could feel the firmness of his body. I could smell his scent, a masculine musk nicer than anything I'd ever smelled before.
"Your cologne is amazing." My voice was a little more breathy than it usually was.
"I don't wear cologne." His eyes were azure. I could feel my heartbeat speeding up. It felt too good to stand here like this, his hands on my waist, his face only inches away from mine.
The sound of a car door slamming shut made me jump and broke the spell. I pulled away from Quinton as Orion came around.
"Let's get started," Orion said. He stole the bag from Quinton. I noticed that he had a toolbox in his hand.
The next half hour was spent hooking up the security system, which was connected to the Internet for free video backups of the security footage. I just tried to stay out of their way as they put everything together.
"Where's your ladder?" Orion wiped his hands on his jeans. I tried not to notice how muscular his legs were, even under the denim.
"In the garage." I opened the door and began to lug it into the house, accidentally knocking the top into a box and making a sound that I didn't want to hear. It was aluminum and not very heavy, but it was tall and hard to handle.
The ladder was plucked out of my hand as if it were the size and weight of a single feather. Quinton carried it back into the house. My jaw was on the floor. He was so strong. Yeah, he was a firefighter, but he acted like it was nothing to handle a ladder.
I went back into the house and watched as they put everything in place. I was glad that they were there.
"I'd never be able to do what you've done."
The whir of the drill stopped. "We're glad to help." Quinton gave me a lopsided grin that made my heart start beating faster. I noticed the flex of his forearm when he started the drill again. There was just something about watching them work on my house that turned me on. I wasn't the kind of girl who normally had handyman fantasies, but I definitely was having them now, thinking about their skillful hands on my body.
They were done already. Orion and Quinton were packing the toolbox up. Quinton put the ladder back in the garage. I envied how easily they handled everything. I just never learned how to fix things or set things up like that.
"Would you like to stay for lunch?" I blurted out. "I have some cold Heineken and I can make bacon and egg casserole pretty quickly. But no pressure. I'm sure you guys are busy..." My voice was so uncertain that I sounded like a thirteen-year-old girl asking her crush to the Sadie Hawkins dance. I wished that I were more confident. I normally was, but they were making me a little shy.
"We'd love to." Orion gave me a slow smile. "Would you like any help in the kitchen?"
"You're sweet to offer, but it's pretty simple. Just sit back and enjoy."
"Sounds good." Quinton headed to my couch and picked up a remote. I pulled two bottles of beer out of the fridge and put them on coasters.
"Fancy." Orion sat on the other couch.
"Just sit down and relax. I'll whip up something quickly and we can have a nice lunch." I could feel their gazes on my back as I walked back into the kitchen.
I got all the ingredients out. The real key to bacon and egg casserole was the amount of cheese in it. You couldn't overwhelm the dish with it. Cheese was sort of a condiment, but it was visually appealing to see a bunch of bubbly cheese on top. I preheated the oven and mixed most of the ingredients together before pouring them into a casserole dish. When the oven beeped at me to tell me that it was hot enough, I slid it in. I'd need to be careful that the cheese didn't burn, which had totally happened to me before and led to a very unpleasant burnt smell lingering in my kitchen. I did have firefighters on hand, though, which was a plus.
I sat down on the same couch as Orion. He settled an arm around my shoulders, as naturally as if he'd done it every day of his life. I didn't know how I felt about the weight of his arm around me, but he smelled really good.
They were watching ESPN 2. It was some kind of rerun of a college basketball game. They didn't seem particularly invested in what was happening.
"You guys play ball?" I asked.
Orion and Quinton looked at each other.
"Sometimes," Orion answered. I got the impression that there was something they weren't saying.