Surrendering Series Box Set

“See you,” he said, making the kiss linger and make me want to call both of us in as “sick”. Yeah, that wouldn’t be suspicious at all.

~*~*~

He was late. If there were two things I knew about Lucah Blaine, it was that first, he was an oral sex god, and second, he was never late.

I called his cell phone, but he didn’t answer. When he was ten minutes late, I was freaking out and I’d called and texted and was about ready to start using skywriters or smoke signals or Morse code.

Then I got a text back from him.

Almost there. Dealing with brother. Oh thank God. My mind had gone to worst-case scenario and I was about to start calling hospitals.

Need time off? He’d never asked for any before, but if he needed it, I’d get it for him, especially for this.

No. Be there soon. Need LOTS of coffee tonight.

I typed back a smiley face and put my phone down and counted the minutes until he walked in. I motioned for him to come in my office, and he did, closing the door.

“Is everything okay?” He didn’t say anything, but came around the desk and kissed me hard. Then he pulled back and rested his forehead on mine.

“I needed that.” He backed away and sat down.

“Yes, I’m fine.” I got a smile that wasn’t quite convincing, but I couldn’t ask him about it again or else I would risk making him mad, so I just smiled and told him to get his ass to his desk.

“Coffee. You and me. Later,” I said as he closed the door.

“Yes, Miss Clarke.”

~*~*~

I spent the rest of the day putting out fires, looking at expense reports and wondering when the hell I was going to meet this mysterious brother. I mean, part of me didn’t want to meet him, but part of me really did. But I sure as hell wasn’t going to ask Lucah about it and bring a sore subject up.

Chloe and Marisol had come over to have dinner with Sloane, so they were all there when I got home and they had clearly been talking about me because they froze when I walked in the door like three deer in a set of headlights.

“Well, don’t stop talking about me just because I walk in,” I said before one of them could recover and make up a story about what they’d been talking about.

“I told them,” Sloane said, not looking at me. “But to be fair, they figured it out. It’s your fault for having smart friends.” Yeah, that was exactly the problem. I guess I hadn’t been as stealthy as I thought.

“It was really obvious,” Marisol said.

“What she said,” Chloe echoed. Je-sus Christ.

I set my bag down and joined them on the couch with a huge sigh.

“So you knew? The whole time I’ve been pretending and you already knew?” What a waste of time lying had been. Oh God. If they hadn’t been fooled then maybe Lucah and I were really terrible liars. What if people at the office . . .

“What’s wrong with you? You look like you’re going to pass out,” Sloane said, coming and putting her hand on my forehead like I was a kid with a fever.

“Was I that bad at lying?”

“No, it wasn’t that. We just saw the chemistry between you two and we knew that it wouldn’t be over after just one night. And honestly? Telling us he wasn’t that great in bed? Huge red flag, woman,” Marisol said, rolling her eyes.

“Amen. Plus, I knew that you had to be somewhere at night and I knew it wasn’t at the office, so you had to be with a guy and what guy would you be with that you wouldn’t tell us about? Process of elimination, really,” Chloe said. Damn. I did have smart friends.

“Okay, well now that’s out in the open, I need some advice.” I gave them the rundown of Lucah and the brother situation and the developments from this morning.

“It’s such a sore subject right now, so I think I should avoid it, but he says that he wants to be with me, and if we’re going to be together, I think I should meet his brother, right? That’s how relationships should work.”

They all agreed, but then said that it was shaky ground and that maybe I should wait until the situation had settled before I asked about it. I agreed, and then it was time for them to treat me like a Barbie and dress me up to go see Lucah.