The night Brewer had run across my house to “catch” me jerking off, something had shifted. While we hadn’t had any kind of formal discussion about our… well, whatever you wanted to call it, neither one of us was trying to maintain any kind of professional distance anymore. And with every day that passed, with every stolen kiss and slow, eye-crinkling smile, it was harder to remember why the fuck I’d want to.
I’d started feeling something suspiciously, dangerously, like happiness… and I really, really hoped Brewer was feeling it, too.
If you’d told me two months ago—twoweeksago—that I could feel this way, I’d have called you a dirty liar. But it turned out when a person stopped clinging to the precipice of their old life and fully embraced the unknown, he discovered all sorts of things he’d been missing out on.
Take, for example, jam cupboards.
Heat swept through me so suddenly I nearly stumbled on a crack in the sidewalk as I remembered last night. One minute, I’d been standing in the kitchen peering into the jam cupboard, admiring the way Brewer had cleaned and oiled all the wooden shelves and added trim pieces around the opening. The next, Brewer’s big hands had yanked me into the cedar-scented space, and I’d found myself backed against the shelves with six-plus feet of very hot, very hard man caging me in.
“I’ve wanted to try something since we uncovered this spot,” he’d murmured.
“Oh?” I’d managed to ask, my voice already embarrassingly breathy. “What?”
“To see exactly how much you can fit in here.”
“Don’t you… don’t you need a measuring tape for that?” I’d stammered as his tongue and teeth worked their way up my neck.
“Nah. For a project like this, I prefer to measure in Delaneys.” Brewer had spread my arms wide like he was checking my wing span. He’d wrapped my left hand around the edge of a shelf and my right around the trim work he’d just installed.
“Perfect fit,” he’d growled.
Then his mouth on mine had been hot and demanding, and his hands—God, those hands—had made quick work of my belt, sliding my pants and underwear to my knees. Brewer had dropped to his knees, too, right there in the half-hidden cupboard, and used his tongue to draw a moan from me that might’ve startled the loons on Copper Lake.
He’d swallowed me down in one smooth motion, his hand cupping and rolling my balls in a way that had my eyes crossing. And then I’d felt his finger pressing, circling, teasing my rim, not quite pushing in but promising more.
I’d come embarrassingly fast, my body racked with shudders as Brewer swallowed every drop. Then he’d tucked me back in, kissed me softly with a mouth that tasted like me, set his perfect,perfectjaw, and gone right back to the trim work like he hadn’t just performed the hottest sex act of my life.
Jam cupboards were the best thingever.
In fact, I was pretty sure—ninety-fivepercent sure, as I said—that I never wanted to be without a jam cupboard again.
But it was ridiculous to consider changing your life for a jam cupboard.
Irresponsible, really.
Wasn’t it?
I was still considering that question when I stepped into the warm, fragrant interior of Fanaille and spotted Tam at a corner table, a steaming mug in front of her and a croissant already half-demolished.
“Finally,” she said, pushing a second mug toward me as I sat down. “Your coffee’s getting cold.”
“Sorry,” I said automatically, though my mind was still half back at the house. “Traffic.”
She snorted. “In O’Leary? You mean three cars at the four-way stop?”
I took a sip of coffee and refocused on my sister. She looked good—her caramel-colored hair was pulled back in a ponytail, her cheeks had a healthy glow, and for the first time in weeks, the purple shadows under her eyes had faded.
“No Li’l T?” I asked.
Tam grinned. “Nope. She’s with her daddy. Lucas and I figured out this amazing system where I get two hours a day, three times a week, to be by myself. Just Tam. Which makes itsomuch more fun when I get to go home and be Mama again.” She sighed happily.
“Good,” I said sincerely. “Because I like ‘just Tam.’”
“That’s also why I’m joining book club,” she went on, taking another bite of croissant. “Oh, speaking of! I’ve been reading the kraken book, and oh myGod. It’s likeWar and Peacebut with tentacles and love!”
I nodded absently, but my thoughts had already drifted back to Brewer.
To the way his voice dipped low when he said my name
