Twirled Bond (Holly Woods Files, #5) (5 page)

I purse my lips and snatch the tub. “Oh, come on. We all know I’m not the best cook.”

“Noelle, you’re a great cook.”

“Fine. We all know I don’t like to cook.”

“You like to cook.”

“Oh my god! Do you have an answer for everything?” I snatch the tub and dump it on the counter behind me. “I’m a good cook. I like to cook. I just can’t be bothered to cook.”

“Lazy.” He kisses the corner of my mouth. “What did Nonna bring?”

“Lasagna and the prologue to what’s sure to be several fun discussions about us living in sin.”

“Oh boy,” he mutters, undoing the top buttons of his shirt. “And here I was hoping our living together would mean she’d give marriage a rest.”

I grimace and shake my head. That was a stupid idea. This is Nonna we’re talking about.

I grab my wine glass and sip before meeting his gaze. “I think it’s made her worse. It’s like she’s spent the last several months lulling us into a false sense of security, and now, that’s it. She’s gonna come at us full force.”

“One day,” he starts, shrugging his shirt off as he turns to the fridge, “I’m going to handcuff you to my side and whisk you away and marry you.”

“That’ll be the same day you lose your life.”

“Ooh, big threats from a little lady.”

He’s asking for it, isn’t he? He is. He so is.

He pulls a beer from the fridge, uncaps it with the bottle opener magnet, and shuts the fridge door. “Nothing to come back to that? I’m—oh, there it is. The death stare.”

I keep it up. Keep staring, staring, staring at him, injecting every ounce of annoyance humanly possible into my gaze.

I don’t even stop when he closes his mouth around the top of the bottle and swigs. Not as he sets it down on the table with a definitive clunk and walks toward me. Not as he boxes me in against the kitchen counter, his smile annoyingly sexy, and takes my wine glass to slide it away from me along the counter top.

Not even as he touches his lips to my neck and my skin tingles.

Okay. Maybe now. I’m not glaring at him anymore.

I’m definitely not glaring at him when he lifts me on top of the counter and slips between my legs, tightly gripping my thighs. Now, I’m swallowing. Hard. Especially because I can feel his cock hardening against me, and I just know that what he’s thinking is gonna burn the lasagna.

Shit though. I’m hungry... But he’s hot.

God damn it.

First world problems or what?

Drake’s lips travel up my neck to my jaw, and ultimately, he and his hotness win out. I find myself getting more and more distracted as his breath flutters across my skin, and he pulls me to the edge of the counter. I wrap my legs around his waist and touch his sides as he moves his hands up my body.

“Yep. Feels like you don’t wanna marry me,” he breathes into my ear, cupping the back of my head.

“I never said that.” My mouth is dry. This conversation escalated quickly. Really quickly.

He pulls his head back so our gazes meet. “You’ve frozen up again.”

I open my mouth, but nothing comes out. I have. I wish I hadn’t, but I have. It’s reflexive, and I can’t make it stop. Whenever marriage comes up, I just...get paralyzed. Especially when the words come out of Drake’s mouth.

“I’m not frozen.” It came out a whisper. “I’m just saying that I never said I didn’t want to marry you.”

“Noelle, I don’t think you’ve taken a real breath for the past two minutes.”

He thinks right.

“I just...” I start. “Why do we have to talk about this? We’ve only been together for a year and we’ve lived together for half of it. Do we need to move any faster?”

His lips tug to one side. “I’m not asking you
to
marry me, sweetheart. It’s not a fuckin’ proposal.”

“I know that.”
Freakin’ Nonna bringing this up.
“I’m telling you that I don’t want to not marry you.”

“So, you want to?”

“Can’t you go back to that neck-kissing stuff? I liked that. I don’t like this.”

He softly laughs. Then he brings his hands up and cups my face. “You’re adorable when you get flustered.”

“I’m not flustered!” I’m totally flustered.

And not just because this sudden reappearance of Nonna’s pressing me to get married doesn’t feel all that wrong. Because, after six months of living together, of Drake leaving the toilet seat up, of him complaining about bobby pins everywhere, of me moaning that I have to clean his shaved stubble out of the sink. Of him holding me close each night, of waking up to him each day, of seeing my socks pegged between his on the washing line...

I’ve gotten a taste. Of what it could be like. To be each other’s—forever.

Marrying Drake Nash doesn’t seem like such a crazy idea.

“Without sending yourself into a meltdown,” he says in a quiet voice, still touching my face, still staring into my eyes, “answer me this.”

I lick my lips, my fingers twitching at his waist. “What?”

“One day. Do you ever see yourself marrying me?”

I take a deep breath and look into his eyes. I’m still getting used to seeing nothing but love swimming in the enthralling, blue oceans that are his eyes. “Y-yes,” I whisper, inhaling deeply again. “One day. I’m pretty sure.”

He searches my eyes for a long moment before he lets go a soft laugh and dips his face to mine. I close my eyes and bask in the warmth of his kiss as tingles dance across my skin. God... I love this feeling. Always have, from the very first time.

“I’ll take it.” His low voice rumbles against my lips, and he’s smiling, and I’m biting the inside of my cheek. “I should probably do the shoe closet before I consider asking you though, right?”

I nod, my teeth still clamped down on the inside of my cheek as I return his smile. “You should definitely do the shoe closet.”

“Will I get future husband points?”

“You’ll get blow job points.”

He steps back, his gaze darting to the stove and the timer. “Reckon I’ve got enough time to get a shelf up right now?”

“You’re a cock.”

“No. No.” He touches one finger to my lips, leaning in. “I’m building you a shoe closet, and then you’re getting my cock. Okay?”

Shoe closet and sex?

Sign. Me. Up.

D
rake started my shoe closet.

I honestly feel like I need to whisper the words every time I say them because it’s the closest thing to a miracle I’ve ever come across.

Apart from the time my need to investigate got Brody shot and he didn’t die. But who wants to be reminded of that? Not me, that’s for sure. Especially since he now pulls out the “you got me shot” card when he wants me to do something I don’t want to do.

The last time? He wanted me to tell a girl that he didn’t want to date her. I threatened to shoot him on the other side of his waist.

Now, I’m sitting at my desk, wondering what to do with a free afternoon. These things are rare—mostly because my free time usually consists of procrastination—so actually having an empty afternoon is kinda disconcerting.

Like, what do you do with this crazy thing called time? Do I nap? Eat? Stare at the treadmill for an hour, going back and forth over getting on it before ultimately settling on going to buy a cupcake? Or do I just skip it all and buy the cupcake?

Ohhh, the cupcake sounds good...

“Are you free?”

My head snaps up at the sound of Gianna’s voice. I bite a groan back. I love Drake’s mom, but every time we’ve spoken alone in the last few months, it hasn’t gone...well. She thinks I’m like his voice of reason—which is ridiculous, because I’m not even my own voice of reason—and can convince him that dinner at her house has to happen soon.

Honestly, the more she brings it up, the more his theory of his dad being there has merit.

“Sure,” I say, wishing I weren’t. And that I’d gone to get that cupcake. “Come in.”

She sweeps into my office in her usual elegant fashion, like she is entering a ball in a glittering gown instead of my work space in skinny jeans and a light sweater. “Thank you. Grecia said she wasn’t sure if you were busy,” she says, referring to my assistant. “I’m not disturbing you, am I?”

“Of course not. What’s up?”

Gianna tucks her thick, brown hair behind her ear and takes a deep breath. “I tried calling Drake, but he keeps diverting my calls to his voicemail.”

That sounds accurate.

“I had breakfast with Malcolm this morning. There’s a reason I’ve been trying harder to get Drake to speak with him.” She swallows hard, and—oh god. She has tears in her eyes.

“Are you okay?” I ask after a moment of her not speaking. I offer her the box of tissues on my desktop.

She takes one, pats beneath her eyes, and crumples the tissue into her lap. She meets my eyes, her dark ones watery despite her just drying them. “Last month, he found a lump. Down there.” She waves toward her lap, her meaning obvious.

I should be creeped that she’s discussing my boyfriend’s father’s man-parts with me, but instead, my mouth is dry, and I think my heart just skipped a beat.

“He went to doctor and had a biopsy. He found out late yesterday afternoon that he has prostate cancer.”

Oh. Shit.
“I’m sorry,” I say honestly, my voice quiet. “How bad?”

“They think stage three. They won’t know for sure until they run more tests.”

Stage three. I don’t know much about cancer, but I do know there are four stages—and three isn’t good. “Okay. Apart from Drake not answering his phone, I don’t know why you’re telling me this.”

Gianna leans forward on my desk, burying her hands in her hair, and audibly inhales. She peers up at me through loose, dark-brown strands and meets my eyes. “
Cara,
I’m afraid Malcolm’s cancer might be further along than they think. Or that it’ll spread quickly. I’m afraid he might die before Drake realizes he should have listened to his reasons for leaving.”

Something I know she won’t tell me. There’s always half a story with Gianna—whether it’s hers to tell or not. Her half stories are the entire reason she was almost charged with murder last November.

“It’s really not information that should come from me. And I’m a little uncomfortable that you shared it with me first.” Honesty is the best policy and all that. “This is something he should know before me.”

“He listens to you more than me,
cara.
” Her eyes are pleading with me, but I’m not falling for it.

I’ve already kept her secrets before. This? This is more than a secret. This is serious.

“Jesus, Gi.” I stand up and run my fingers through my hair. I grip the edge of a shelf on my bookcase and pinch the bridge of my nose, my hair falling loosely around my face. “That’s not an excuse. You just don’t wanna tell him. It was one thing for me to hide that I was trying to find Wally’s murderer from him at your request. It’s another thing entirely to hide that his father has cancer! It’s not my job to tell him that.”

I turn back to face her, and—
oh no
.

I feel the blood drain from my face.

Drake’s standing in my office doorway, his eyes boring into the back of Gianna’s head. There’s no expression on his face. It’s completely blank, his eyes almost dead.

It’s chilling.

I know he heard every word I said.

“Drake,” I whisper. My heart clenches at the lack of emotion on his face.

“Oh.” Gianna turns, her hand to her chest. “Hon, I...”

She doesn’t get to finish her sentence, because Drake turns away and stalks toward the staircase. His head disappears from view as the sound of his footsteps on the exposed-wood steps echo through the air.

“Shit.” I grab my phone, throw it into my purse, and pause, looking at Gianna. “I’m gonna clean up your mess this time, but I expect you to be at our house at eight tomorrow morning to tell him everything.”

She just nods as I run through my office. Fuck, this would be easier if I weren’t in heels. Unfortunately, I’m used to running in these heels due to my scary amount of brushes with murderers the past twelve-ish months that usually involved running away and...well, shooting them.

Thankfully, this time, I’m running toward someone who doesn’t want to kill me—I hope—and I’m not shooting him.

I hope that too.

I don’t want to shoot him. I like him too much to shoot him.

If this weren’t such a serious situation, I’d be giggling over the fact that I like Drake Nash too much to shoot him.

I get outside in time to see him reverse his truck out of the lot. I make it to my car in enough time to be two car lengths behind him, and I follow him home. I try to call him a few times using the hands-free in my car, but he doesn’t pick up a single one.

“Ughhhh,” I whine, pulling into the driveway after him.

He slams the front door of the house shut. He’s always two steps ahead of me, so I rush to park, grab my things, and lock the car. In fact, as I dart into the house after him, I’m not even sure I did lock my car.

“Drake.” I call his name and dump my purse on the floor. My keys jingle inside, but I don’t care as I shove the door shut and walk toward the stairs.

A door slams upstairs.

I pull my heels off and run up the steps on my tiptoes. The shower is running, and I just know I’m going to find his clothes in a heap in the middle of the bedroom floor.