Filthy Scrooge

I laughed. “My sake. I can’t concentrate if you’re naked.”

“Oh.” She pressed her lips together, but a smile crept out. “Can’t have you burning our French toast.”

“Exactly.” I let her go. I didn’t want to focus on how much it killed me. I’d never been the kind of guy to need a woman in my space. Then again, no one was quite like Kandy Kane. I stopped at the threshold. “I like having you here, Kay.”

I left before I said something even more stupid. I took the stairs two at a time and lit the fire. It would take a little time for the logs to catch, but a wood fire trumped gas in all ways. By the time I pulled my griddle out of the pantry, Kay came down the stairs in the black knit pants with a pair of my socks. Her hair was piled up in a messy twist and the sweater had slid down one creamy shoulder.

I’d traced every one of the freckles on that shoulder, and I’d do so again today. I kept waiting to get tired of her smell and her touch, but it was impossible. It had to be something to do with her smelling like a damn cookie.

Even now my fingers itched to pull her in front of me and taste the nape of her neck. The way she purred out my name was addictive. I pulled out eggs, milk, and cinnamon instead. I grabbed a bread knife from the block and ripped the paper off the fresh bread I’d picked up.

She trailed her fingers along the granite countertop. “What can I do?”

“Check on the fire?”

“That I can definitely do.” She twirled on her toes and crossed into the living room, then dropped to her knees in front of the fire. Firelight and sunshine turned her hair burnished gold. The skies had cleared and the sun was blazing down on the snow. Too bad the sun didn’t trump twenty-degrees. It was cold as hell outside.

She stoked the fire with the poker and added two more logs. She warmed her hands in front of the fire before wandering to the bookcases that lined the room. Where my brother had classics and dry business volumes, my tastes ran to murder and mayhem.

She pulled down one of my favorites and flipped it over to read the back. Dean Koontz and Joe Hill were my go-tos for horror and psychology. She brought the book over to the couch. “You sure you don’t want help?”

“I’m good.”

She curled into the corner of the sofa closest to the flame and tucked a red throw around her legs. Instead of the front of the book, she read the last page. I grinned. Said a lot about a person who needed to know the ending before she bothered to start it at the beginning.

I liked the slow build—at least I used to.

Kay was the first woman to interest me beyond a glass of wine and a no-strings-attached evening in three years. Even worse, I hadn’t felt this level of possessiveness after two years of being with Sheridan. I curled my fingers into fists, but the anger I’d been hiding from simply wasn’t there.

I didn’t know how to shuffle around it. Living with it was easier than pushing through the emotions and dealing with what had happened. I wasn’t sure what to feel without it.

Kay drew up her knees under the sweater and wore the blanket like a shawl. Her fingers poked out from the overlong armholes enough to clutch the book. Readying the bacon—a hell yes for me as well—and French toast didn’t take me long, but by the time I looked up again, she was already a quarter way through the book.

“Do you read by osmosis or something?”

“Huh?” She blinked at me, her eyes huge and unfocused under the fringe of bangs. She looked down at the book then back to me. “I’m not quite a speed reader. My dad can read a five-hundred-page book in an hour though.”

I shifted a thick piece of French toast on her plate and dropped a pat of butter on the crunchy swirls of sugar and cinnamon. “If I promise to let you finish the book, will you come back in here for breakfast?”

“Do I get an extra piece of bacon?”

“Two.”

She shut the book and stood with her blanket around her shoulders. “Deal.”

I put her plate on the table in the small alcove off the kitchen. Before I could bring out the syrup, she was at the table, her feet tucked up under her on the bench seat as she peeled the crust back with long, elegant fingers.

“Would you like a fork?” I held one up, amusement dripping from each word.

She tore off a piece and blew on it. “Nope. I like it just like this. All hot and gooey. It’s more than sweet enough.” She made a distracting humming groan as she got to the center of the thick bread. She tilted her head back a little as she chewed with a blissed out face I knew far too well. “I’d marry you just for this bread.”

The pleasure seeped out of my chest. I set my plate down and backed up to the sink full of pans. My hand shook and I fisted it to cover up the tremor. She didn’t know what she was saying, but Christ, did it have to be today that she mentioned marriage?

“Linc? Your food is going to get cold.”

I cleared my throat. “It’s fine.”

“No, it’s not.” She rushed over to me as she licked off the sugar and butter from her fingertips. Even that couldn’t deflect the sudden mood shift.