“Make it a freebie.”
The rapid come back startled a smile from him. He sat down on the rock wall, so his legs dangled over the edge. Not remotely tempted but cured of any tetchiness. Guess he’d proved one thing to himself in this. He felt committed. And he did like to fuck out-of-doors once in a while. “What’s up, Lilli, can’t you find anyone else to treat you rough? I can’t believe you’ve been hankering after my arse all this time.”
“None of them bite hard enough.” She sighed. “And it ain’t your arse I’m after. If you want fingering up the jacksie you can get some bugger else to do it. I’m not wrecking my nails.”
Kit laughed.
“Truce.” She climbed up to sit beside him and offered a hand.
Kit warily accepted.
“So, you really are screwing Rolf Harris and Emu?”
“I thought you and Evie were friends.”
“We are. That’s why I’m allowed to be bitchy. I didn’t think she was your type though. Guess it proves what I know.”
“Nothing,” he drawled.
“Fancy a cupper?”
Kit nodded, and accepted her jacket as a windshield again. “Matter of fact, I do. Thought I might head over to Doris’s.”
“Doris!” Lillianna’s nails tapped briefly against his thigh like a drum roll. “Jeez! You’re going to crash their knitting circle dressed like that!” She sniffed suspiciously at him and her eyes widened into two hazel pools. “Maybe we should stop by my place on the way and give you a hose down in the shower first.”
Kit laughed and shook his head. He couldn’t fault her for trying, but he wasn’t setting foot in her place. He wasn’t sure he’d get out again alive. Beside, the fact that he reeked of three sets of pheromones just added outlandish eccentricity to the appeal of visiting the old biddies. He was sure they’d forgive his oversight in the dress code department and his obvious post-coital scent. He certainly wasn’t heading home to either Rose Cottage or Ross and Evie’s place to wash it off until he was absolutely sure he was welcome.
Beside him Lillianna cackled with glee. Her pale face creased into laughter lines and her watering eyes threatening the integrity of her inch-thick mascara. “This is going to be brilliant. I amsocoming too. I can just picture their faces.”
Chapter Twelve
The jury remained out on whether the visit was actually brilliant as Kit wound his way home in the moonlight. It’d certainly been fun and novel to be ogled by six octogenarians. Laura, Doris’s granddaughter, had nearly wet herself when she’d nipped over to deliver more teabags and found him posed half-naked on a pouffe in the middle of the knitting circle. The exchange between himself and Doris about how long the willy warmer she intended to knit him should be, rapidly sent the poor girl running for home.
He had the promised woollen pouch, navy with a bright red K emblazoned on the end, clasped within his hand when he bounded up the back steps to Ross and Evie’s place and let himself in.
The only downside of the visit was that there were almost certainly rumours circulating the village that he was banging Lillianna by now, a few of them probably started by her in the hope of them actually coming true.
“And where have you been, lover boy?” Ross asked. He stood poised by the sink, dressed in a striped butcher’s apron, brandishing a whisk, which he waved menacingly in Kit’s direction.
“Tea?” asked Kit, hoping the theatrics related to something culinary and not some sort of exotic vengeance.
Ross broke into a lopsided smile, which caused intriguing little crow’s feet to appear at the very corners of his eyes. “Nah, we went over to the pub to eat. If you’re hungry you’ll have to fend for yourself.”
“I meant that’s where I’ve been.” Kit unconsciously patted his stomach, while he grinned back at Ross, aware that the sugar from the five…or maybe six cakes he’d had forced upon him was busy zinging around his body lending an extra bounce to his stride. “I went over to Doris’s to catch up with her and the girls.”
Ross dropped the whisk, which landed in the sink with an ungodly clatter, and brought Evie running into the room.
“You went for afternoon tea dressed like that!”
“He’s been where? Where’ve you been?” Evie asked while her eyebrows furrowed in an expression much like Ross’s.
Kit regarded them both with a shrug, and observing no unnatural tension between any of them, turned primly on the spot. “Is there something wrong with my outfit?” He looked over his shoulder at them and fluttered his eyelashes.
“Uh, you forgot half of it,” said Ross.
Evie chucked him a T-shirt off the radiator, one of Ross’s, which Kit shook out but didn’t put on. Instead, he laid it upon the table.
“I think you should lose half of yours too. Chuck the bottoms, but keep the apron,” he said to Ross. Not finished, he turned to Evie and sidled up to her wearing a smile. “Truth or dare?” Time they got this party started before any awkwardness developed.
