Honor Unraveled (25 page)

He slowly straightened, setting her feet back on Earth. He shook his head. “Not until we’re a couple.” He brushed a stray curl from her cheek. “Your body knows mine as its match. Your soul knows mine as its other half. But your mind is still resistant. I don’t want to rush things. We’ll talk about it when you have your birthday.”

“I’ll be away.”

“I’ll come down to see you.”

“What if I don’t have an answer for you then?”

“You won’t have an answer for me then. We’ll just begin talking about it.”

She rubbed her face against his chest, nuzzling him, stirring up his rich scent. Storing the feeling of being in his arms for the long, lonely days she’d spend away from him once she returned to school.

“Okay.” She held fistfuls of his T-shirt at his sides as she looked up at him. “But we can spend time together between now and then, right? We could get to know each other.”

“I’d like that.” He wrapped an arm around her and turned her to face her stepdad’s demolished living room. “Will you let me contact the builder to come chat with us about your options for this place? For all we know, the best thing might be to tear this wreck down, clear the lot, and sell it.”

Fee nodded. “Let’s talk to him.” A cold worry slipped around her as she thought into the future. “Kelan, what if…?” She looked up at him. “What if you help me with this, invest in it, and we don’t become a couple?”

“That’s two different problems. My helping with this project is nothing more than one friend helping another. I’d do it for any of the guys. I know the risks. Don’t infer from my help that I’m expecting you to claim me. Our bonding is much more important than the success of this or any project.”

“But what if I don’t—we don’t—bond?”

“Then I’ll continue to be the half that I am. And you’ll be free to search for the mate you’d prefer.”

“And you would be free to do that, too.”

“There is no one else for me, Fiona.”

Ivy sat in her office at the diner and stared at the computer screen’s page of profit and loss entries, trying to make it make sense. She was reviewing the month’s numbers, since this was the first time someone other than herself had handled the day-to-day data entry. Her new managers were capable; she’d made the right choices in the two people she’d selected. Everything appeared to be in order, which made it all the harder to focus on the task at hand and not the tall warrior standing guard outside her office.

His arms were crossed, his legs slightly spread as if he were braced for motion. He filled her peripheral vision and stole all of her concentration from the work she’d dragged him here so she could do.
 

“Kit, why don’t you go get a cup of coffee?”

“No.”

“Well, why don’t you make yourself useful? I’m going to be here awhile. I’m sure there are boxes that can be torn down in the storeroom.”

“You are my job, Iv. I’m doing what I need to do.”

Ivy sighed and started once again at the top of the screen looking over the numbers. She’d come here to make an unannounced visit to the diner, do a walk-through to be certain the staff were keeping up with her standards. She’d been pleased with their work. The place was neat and orderly, from the front counter to the kitchen to the restrooms and even down in the storeroom.
 

She could do the work she was doing at home, but she was going a little stir crazy there and wanted a break from the house. Unfortunately, doing anything in her office with Kit standing at attention was beyond nerve-racking.

He didn’t move. He didn’t speak. He didn’t shift his weight from foot to foot. He didn’t in any way interrupt her. But he was there, like a shadow. Guarding her. She felt safe and warm and important.

For the first time in her life.

The last time she’d been here in her little office behind the diner’s kitchen, Kit had scared the hell out of her when he brought Max and Greer over to wire her building.
“I eat people like you for breakfast,”
he’d warned her. For some inexplicable reason, the thought of his threat sent heat up her body and down her legs, pulsing out from her hips, the epicenter of the sensation.

She rolled her chair around so she faced the shadowy corridor outside her office.

“What?” Kit asked her.

She smiled.
Don’t ask it. Don’t do it
, she warned herself. “I was wondering, what
do
we taste like?” she asked, in complete disregard of her own warning. Didn’t help that she couldn’t quite pull the smile off her face.

“What?”

“People like me.” He frowned, not understanding the question. “You said you eat people like me for breakfast. What do we taste like?”

His eyes widened, then narrowed. His gaze moved down her body, from her face to her toes. He stared at the floor a minute, then heaved a sigh. When he spoke, he met her eyes again and shrugged.
 

“I don’t remember the others. You, I will never forget. Your taste isn’t so much a flavor. It’s more…an experience, like eating a rainbow. You fill me with joy and light and hope. When I taste you, anything seems possible.”

And just like that, her eyes watered, he wavered in her vision, and her breath became locked in her chest. How could a man like Kit, a warrior through and through, be able to say or feel something like that if it wasn’t true? And if it were true, then surely she wasn’t someone he could walk away from again.

She stood up and crossed the office. She had no idea what she’d intended, only that she had to be nearer to him. “Kit—”

Before she could say anything else, her newest manager came barreling into the back hallway. “We got a situation, Ivy. I need you out front.”

Kit pivoted, stepping in front of the guy before he could reach Ivy. “What’s the issue?”

The guy looked from him to Ivy, who was leaning to the side to see him. “There’s a bunch of bikers out there, taking the place over.”

“We’ll be right there. Keep things calm for a minute,” Kit ordered.

The kid nodded, looking about as confident in succeeding at that directive as he would be tearing his arm off and beating the bikers with it.

Ivy pushed forward around Kit, but he caught her. “Iv—if you see Max, remember he’s undercover,” he whispered into her ear. “You don’t know him. You feel toward him what you would toward any of the bikers.” She nodded. “And if I say get out of there, don’t go alone. Grab your staff and lock yourselves in your office, feel me?”

“Yes. Yes, Kit we have to go!”

Ivy hurried forward. At the entrance to the diner, Kit caught her around the waist, moving her behind him before they stepped into the dining room. The place was like a scene out of an old biker movie. Gang members in black leather and red skullcaps and bandannas were crowded about the room, sitting in various occupied booths, making men and children stand while the club members took the seats and crowded the women. Some had joined families and were sitting with their dusty boots propped up on the table.

“Wohoo! Lookee, Mad Dog. We got ourselves a de-fender,” the biker nearest the back hallway said, stepping in front of Kit.

Mad Dog was in the service area, tossing plates out in a line on the counter from a stack he held. He looked over and gave Kit a narrowed-eye glare. It was Max! How did Kit know he’d be there?

“Looks like a bad motherfucker. I wouldn’t mess with him, Pike,” Max warned as he finished tossing out the plates.

Pike’s head bent to the left, then to the right as he got up in Kit’s grille. “Yeah, but you know, there’s one of him and twenty of us.”

Ivy sent a look around the room, her anger deepening as she saw the fearful looks on the faces of her patrons, all of them frozen in place. None of them could leave either, because two bikers were posted on either side of the main entrance.

“That’s enough,” Ivy snapped as she went behind the counter and walked right up to Max. “You need to leave.”

“I don’t think so, honey. We’re hungry.”

“We don’t serve animals.” She hadn’t thought the taut silence could have gotten any deeper, but it did at that moment.

“Yeah. That’s what your little boy said.” Max came over to her, stepping into her space. He lifted his hand and brushed his knuckles over her cheek, down her chin and neck in a slow stroke to where her shirt was buttoned. “Tell me, do you serve men?”

The guy facing Kit started an ugly chuckle, which tripped Kit’s trigger. He head-butted the banger, put a fist in his nose, then had him facedown up against the counter with his left arm twisted up behind his back before Ivy could fully pull a breath of air.

“Let’s try that again. With a little more respect for the lady.” Kit looked out across the diner. “And her customers. You want to eat? You’ll be served, but you’ll wait your turn, like everyone else. And you’ll be respectful to the staff and customers.”

Max held up his arms like a conductor about to take a bow. “Fair enough!” he roared into the room. “That’s all we were after.” He glared at Kit. “A little respect.” He looked at Ivy. “And a little service.”

“You’ll receive food here. Nothing else,” she snapped.

Max shrugged. “One outta two ain’t bad. Saddle up, boys. Take the open seats here at the counter. The rest of you wait outside.” He met the eyes of every WKBer. “We didn’t come for trouble, so we ain’t gonna get into it. That clear?”

Bikers filled the seats up front as Max stepped out from behind the counter. Kit released the man whose face he’d mashed into the Formica, pushing him toward the door. The thug immediately caught himself and spun around to face Kit.
 

Max snagged him with a tight grip on his windpipe, halting his forward motion as he lifted him slightly. He pulled Pike up close to his face. For a minute, he merely stared at the man, then he snarled through clenched teeth. “I don’t like being disobeyed. I’ll be happy to make an example out of you. I said no trouble, and I meant it.”

“Fucker shoved me. And broke my goddamned nose.”

“Yeah. And if you cut loose now, you put the election in jeopardy. Slap a lid on your temper. For a few more days. Got it? What you do to him after that, I don’t give a shit. You aren’t gonna screw the whole club when you get yourself fucked.”

Pike nodded—as best he could with Max’s fist squeezing the center of this throat. Max released him, then sent Kit a venomous look.
 

A couple of patrons hurried out of the now-unguarded entrance. A few others left their half-finished food, paid their bills at the checkout, then hurried away. More bikers came in, taking the recently vacated seats, digging into the abandoned food left on the tables.
 

Max took a seat in the back corner, alone at one of the booths, facing into the diner. Ivy looked from him to Kit. “We need to stay here awhile.”

Kit sent a cold glare at the WKBers in the room. He nodded one time, then took up a position against the wall heading to the kitchen as Ivy and her manager began to bus the recently vacated tables.
 

* * *

Ivy didn’t deal well with having so much leisure time. After the run-in with the bikers at her diner, Kit was even more restrictive about letting her out of the house. She was having trouble finding ways to spend her time. The diner was operating far more smoothly than she expected now that her new managers were up and running. For the first time in years, she’d actually lazed about for a few days and did some reading. Which was totally fun, but not how she wanted to spend the rest of her life.
 

Not that her current circumstances were what the rest of her life would be like, she reminded herself. She needed something more mentally stimulating than a leisurely existence.
 

It occurred to her that there were several recipes she wanted to try but hadn’t had the time to test out. Maybe Kathy wouldn’t mind if she invaded the kitchen.
 

The room was empty when Ivy went there. “Kathy?” she called, but received no response. She checked the service rooms behind the kitchen—laundry room, storage room, pantry. The space was a ghost town. She went over to the sub-zero to take stock of meats, dairy, and fresh produce.
 

“Ivy! Are you hungry?” Kathy asked as she came in with a basket of flowers. “I could make up a quick snack.”

“Hi, Kathy. I’m not hungry. I’m bored. I was thinking of trying out a couple of recipes for the diner, if I wouldn’t be underfoot?”

“Oh! Not at all. Would you mind if I stayed around as a silent observer? Your diner is getting a lot of attention in the area. I’d love to say that I saw one of your dishes being created!”

Ivy laughed. “I’d love the company.”

“Oh, wonderful. I’ll just get these flowers in water.”

“Your bouquets are beautiful. I’ve been admiring them.”

“I’m glad you’re enjoying them. The winters are so long here that I can’t seem to get enough of summer. I like bringing the flowers in to spread the cheer. Dennis put in a new cutting garden for me. He’s had more time on his hands since Ty ended the ranching operation. I’m really enjoying it this summer!”

“That’s my problem, too. Too much time. I thought it would be the perfect opportunity to create some interesting and tasty salads to add to the menu. Get folks to eat more fresh foods.”