Finding Chris Evans: The 9-1-1 Edition (5 page)

She nodded and lifted a shoulder. “You just never know what might come up.”

He had an idea about what he wanted to come up—a lot of squeezing that had nothing to do with frosting. “So my job is basically not leave you alone, touch you a lot, do things for you and pretend I’m crazy about you.”

Was it his imagination or did she take a quick breath?

“Pretty much,” she finally said.

“I’m in.”

“Really?”

She was surprised. Which probably made sense. He wasn’t warm and fuzzy with her. Because he was pretty sure once he got warm with her, he wouldn’t ever cool off. But now, looking down into her big brown eyes, he hated that she was surprised that he would want to be with her. Now, given this opportunity, he was going to be as with her as she’d let him.

It was her injury. And her vulnerability. And the fact that she finally needed his help. All of that was making it tough to be his usual grouchy, ass-chewing self around her. And he realized—though it was hardly a shock—that being grouchy and getting on her all the time kept him from…getting on her all the time in much more fun ways.

“Really,” he said firmly. Then he tried to lighten up. This should be flirtatious. Or charming. Or something. “Whatever you need.” Nope that was still more firm than flirty. “No one’s going to doubt that we’re together.” Still not light and playful. But he didn’t really feel flirtatious. He suddenly felt…possessive. “No one’s going to doubt that you’re mine.”

Her eyes widened and this time he was sure she took a sharp breath.

Well, hell, he’d been bossy with her since they’d met and here they were, her asking him to be her boyfriend for the weekend. Maybe bossy was the way to go.

“You know, when we’re at the party, we’ll be on my turf,” she said. “You won’t be in charge.”

He cocked an eyebrow. “But you need me.”

“So you think you can boss me around?”

“I think you’ll have to do what I tell you.”

Her eyes widened slightly, but not with shock or annoyance. It looked like heat.

“But you won’t know what I need,” she said. “Won’t you have to wait for me to tell you?”

Suddenly the conversation didn’t feel like it was about the party. He stepped in closer to her. “I wouldn’t be so sure that I won’t know what you need, Britt.”

Yep, that was definitely heat in her eyes. “Well, don’t be so sure that I won’t tell you what I want from you anyway.”

And he was sure she could see the heat in his. “I’m absolutely positive that I can be okay with that.”

She gave him a small, but very sexy, smile. “This is going to be fun.”

# #

Chris Evans was hot in an apron.

He was hot in everything she’d ever seen him in. But there was something especially great about the apron. It didn’t matter that it was bright yellow and had little cupcakes all over it, he somehow looked completely badass in it. Maybe even because of it.

He wore a button down shirt under it, untucked, the sleeves rolled up to his elbows. He had jeans on, with a streak of flour on the ass that she couldn’t stop looking at. And he was padding around her kitchen in only his socks. It all felt very intimate. Like she wanted him in his socks in her kitchen all the time. And maybe in other rooms. In even less.

There were bowls and measuring cups and spoons, ingredients and empty packages all over the counter in front of him. And there was also a three layer chocolate cake just waiting to be frosted.

The whole picture was so strange, so completely opposite of anything Britt would have ever imagined, that it was almost ridiculous.

If it wasn’t so hot.

Her mother wasn’t the only one addicted to chocolate cake, and having a hot guy making that chocolate cake from scratch in her kitchen, looking like he completely belonged there and had been doing it for years, was just about the biggest turn-on Britt had ever experienced. She fidgeted on her seat.

“Okay, so, I frost the entire outside, right?” he asked.

“Yep.” She could have done a hell of a lot more than she had. But Chris had insisted that she was the brain and he was the brawn—or at least the hands—in this scenario. She instructed and he did her bidding.

He’d used those very words. Bidding. She wondered if he had even the tiniest inkling what she’d like to bid him to do. With the frosting.

She doubted it. He was concentrating way too hard on spreading the chocolate frosting over the cake. He was, as expected, a complete perfectionist, so it was taking forever.

Britt started to lift her coffee cup with her left hand, but gasped as pain stabbed her in the thumb. Dammit. How did she keep forgetting about that? Then Chris lifted a finger of frosting to his mouth and licked it clean, and she remembered how she kept forgetting. He was damned distracting. In the very best way.

She switched hands and managed a swallow of coffee before asking him, “Have you ever eaten cake for breakfast?”

He glanced over. “No.” He didn’t even have to think about it.

That didn’t surprise her. “Not ever? Not as a kid even?”

He shook his head. “Nope.”

She thought about that. It was true that Maggie’s eat-cake-every-day philosophy had blossomed since the cancer diagnosis, but it wasn’t brand new. She’d always been the type to enjoy life and indulge in pleasures. Fun had always been a regular part of Britt’s life. It was partly why she hated that the parties and time with her family and the Fun Zone had gotten to almost be a chore. Spontaneous seemed more special than having PARTY written on her calendar every week.

“I don’t think there’s anything wrong with cake for breakfast,” Britt told him. “I mean, it’s got flour and eggs and milk in it. It’s not that different from muffins really.”

Chris looked over, seemingly amused by something. “You have a point.” He straightened and turned. “I think breakfast food says a lot about a person.”

“Oh yeah?”

He nodded. “You drink your coffee with just a little cream, right?”

She wasn’t surprised he knew that. Everyone on the crew knew each other’s coffee preferences. They drank enough of it together that someone would have to actually try not to know. “Right.” And Chris drank straight-up espresso.

“And I thought that fit you at first. Then I got to know you and your coffee choice completely confused me. But now I know about the cake for breakfast and it all makes sense again.”

She blinked at him. “Um…what?”

He leaned back behind the counter behind him and crossed his arms, the frosting knife still in his right hand. “When I first met you, you came across as this serious, tough, feisty woman intent on proving herself and doing a physical job.”

Britt frowned. “I was—am—all of those things.”

He nodded. “But it only took two days and the straight-up simple coffee didn’t make sense anymore. You skidded in late for work, you seem to be juggling a million things, you’re often disheveled when you come in, and you have…”

He stopped and Britt found herself leaning onto the countertop. “I have what?” This was all interesting. Not because any of it was wrong, but because Chris had paid attention to so many details. Sure, he was her boss, and yeah, okay, all of those things were true—and common. But still, she felt as if he had noticed more about her than most.

“Nothing.” He turned back to the cake.

“Oh, no,” she protested. “You have to finish that and tell me why chocolate cake for breakfast makes sense.”

He swiped frosting on the remaining side of the cake and then sighed. “The glitter.”

Britt frowned and leaned in more. “What did you say?”

“The glitter,” he repeated louder, continuing to spread frosting.

Yeah, that’s what she’d thought he said. “What glitter?”

“You always have glitter in your hair.”

She did. She freaking had glitter everywhere. It didn’t matter how many times she bathed or washed her clothes or even if it had been a few days since she’d worked, there was glitter everywhere at the Fun Zone and it got in and on everything.

“I do,” she acknowledged.

“And you smell like caramel corn.”

She blinked. He’d noticed the glitter and how she smelled? Well, this was very interesting. Again she nodded. “I probably do.”

“You do,” he said. “And then there are the tattoos.”

Britt frowned at that. She had one tattoo on her right hip. “The dragonfly symbolizes transformation and adaptability and joy.”

Chris straightened and turned to her. “What?”

“My tattoo. It’s a dragonfly. I got it just before I started EMT training. It reminds me to be adaptable and that not only do I need to be open to evolving, I can also make the world around me, and every scene I’m at, better.”

Chris didn’t say anything for a moment. Then he put the knife down. “Where is the tattoo?”

“My right hip.” She frowned. “How did you know I have a tattoo?”

He came toward her, and Britt found herself straightening at the look in his eyes. It was almost predatory.

He stopped next to her chair and reached out, lifting the sleeve of her T-shirt. He frowned. Then he lifted his eyes to hers and reached for the neckline of her shirt. She made no move to stop him, just watched him watching her. He pulled the V-neck to the right and then looked down. And frowned again. He hadn’t exposed more than the upper curve of her breast, but frowning seemed inappropriate. Britt opened her mouth to respond, but he reached for the bottom hem of her shirt and lifted it, leaning to look at her back.

That brought him
really
close. His heat, the smell of his skin, the smell of the chocolate frosting all combined and Britt closed her eyes, taking a deep breath. Dang, a guy who smelled like chocolate frosting? That was pretty hard to resist.

Which was possibly why she turned her head and put her lips against his neck.

Or maybe she did it because she was always doing stuff like that. Spontaneity was one of her primary personality traits. As was pursuing pleasure for the sake of pleasure.

Chris’ reaction didn’t make her sorry. That was for sure. He took in a sharp breath, then let it out with a groan.

“Britt,” he said gruffly.

She didn’t move her lips. She leaned in a little and slid an arm around his waist. “Mmm?” she asked.

He drew in a long breath. “Where are the other tattoos?” he asked.

But he wasn’t moving away from her mouth.

“What tattoos?” she asked against his neck. That, of course, caused her lips to move over his skin. Kind of like a kiss.

She felt heat building low and deep. Her nipples tightened, and she really wanted to put more of her against more of him.

“I’ve seen—” He cleared his throat. “I’ve seen hints of ink.”

Ink? On her arms and neck and low…oh. She smiled. “Paint.”

“Paint?” he repeated.

He turned toward her more fully.

She tipped her head to look up at him. “Paint.”

He looked puzzled. Which of course he should be. What grown woman walked around with streaks of poster paint on her body? Unless she was a preschool teacher or something.

“I…work with kids a few times a week,” she said. “At my mom’s…work. We paint and sometimes they wave the brushes around or they’ll get it on their hands and then hug me or touch my arm.”

Chris seemed to ponder that. “Where does your mom work?” he asked.

Okay, well, he’d find out sooner or later. “She owns the Fun Zone.”

The Fun Zone was a huge building that housed an indoor obstacle course, and outdoor paint ball course, a rock wall, a trampoline room and a miniature golf course. It also had a huge concession stand, ball pit, arcade, art room and more.

Chris was clearly surprised. “The Zone? Really?”

Britt nodded. “Really. It’s her calling—according to her anyway. She opened it after the cancer. She wanted to bring fun to everyone.” That was even the business’s tag line.

“And you paint there a couple times a week?”

“I work there almost every day,” Britt said. “And yep, sometimes I’m in the art room.”

“That explains the glitter, doesn’t it?” he asked.

She smiled. “Yeah. The stuff’s impossible to get rid of.”

“And the wad of ones you always carry?”

“I sell balloons and glow sticks and candy bracelets and stuff. The parents give the kids a few dollars to spend and I end up with a wad of cash in my pocket.”

“So you’re not an exotic dancer,” he said with a half smile.

She felt her eyes widen. “You thought I was a stripper?”

He laughed softly. “Not really. But I couldn’t figure out how the glitter and the money and being late for work and never meeting up with the crew after shift all went to together.”

“You noticed all of that?” she asked. She’d had no idea he was giving her that much attention.

“And the caramel corn smell.” He leaned in—which was interesting considering they were already up against each other—and put his nose against her temple and breathing in.

“You like that smell?” she asked.

“It’s quickly becoming my very favorite,” he told her.

“That’s only fair,” she told him. “You smell like chocolate cake. Which is already my favorite.”

“Yeah?”

He lifted his hand and ran it over her hair. It was a sweet, intimate gesture, but it fired Britt’s blood.

“Yeah,” she said breathlessly.

He held up the hand that wasn’t touching her. His first two fingers were streaked with frosting. “So, when they’re painting, sometimes the kids touch you and get paint on you.”

She nodded, wondering what he’d do if she leaned in and licked the frosting off his fingers. And then sucked on his fingers. And then sucked on other things.

“I get the arm and maybe even your back if they were hugging you, but how did you get paint here?” he asked. He dipped those two fingers under the neckline of her shirt and dragged them over her skin slowly.

Britt didn’t have to look down to know she now had a smear of chocolate just above the cup of her bra. She wet her lips. “I leave work with glitter in my hair, cotton candy in my pockets, silly string stuck to my pants… I don’t really have an idea how any of that gets there except to say that the Fun Zone is a little like The Hunger Games. We go to work and are essentially stuck there for several hours at a time. They turn on bright multicolored lights, and fun music, and let a bunch of little kids with endless energy loose on us. And to keep it interesting, they give them sugar. Lots of sugar. We just do whatever it takes to make it out alive at the end,” she told him.