The Imperfections

“Is this where you do murder?” I ask.

Solemnly, he nods his head. “This is where I do murder.”

My eyes widen and I look over at him. “Really?”

His lips tug up a little. “Kinda. I murder trees.”

“Huh?”

His smile widens. “This is my workshop. I do woodworking—it’s my hobby.” He walks over to the murder table, and I look around at the sharp instruments he has neatly organized on slotted shelves hung up along the workshop wall.

“What a convenient cover,” I tell him, looking around. “‘No, officer, I don’t have a murder room. I make tables.’” I cross the room and grab a particularly dastardly-looking tool with a wooden handle from the rack it’s hanging on. “You could definitely kill someone with this.”

“I’m not a serial killer,” he says, mildly amused.

“So you say,” I tease before hanging the tool/weapon back on the wall. “I’m not convinced.”

“You don’t seem very scared of a man you think has a murder workshop.”

I shrug. “Hey, I’m not on the murder list anymore, what’s it to me?” I pick up another tool and hold it up. “What’s this for? Torturing fools?”

“It’s a chisel,” he explains. “While I suppose it could be used to torture fools, I mainly use it to clean up joints when my saw doesn’t leave them as neat as I want ’em.”

I nod slowly. “If the police ever ask me, that’s exactly what I’ll tell them. I got your back.”

He grins, shaking his head. “You’re crazy, you know that?”

Lifting my eyebrows pointedly as I replace the tool on the wall, I toss back, “Says the man with a murder workshop.”

When I turn around, I gasp, because he somehow snuck soundlessly across the room and he’s standing right in front of me.

Putting his hands on my hips, he backs me up against the counter. “It’s not very good manners to put your hands all over a man’s tools without an invitation.”

“No?” I murmur, my heart racing a little faster at his proximity. Bringing my hands up to rest on his broad shoulders, I look up at him beneath my eyelashes. “What’s the punishment? Chiseling my joints?”

Brant laughs, leaning his head forward and kissing the side of my face. “Crazy,” he says again.

His hands slide down my hips and dip around until he has both hands under my ass, then he lifts me and puts me up on his counter. It’s impossible to sit like a lady up here with him already between my legs, but he moves closer, not giving me much time to worry about it. “You sure look good in my workshop, though.”

“Need an assistant?” I offer, spreading my legs a little wider as my skirt rides up. His hard body comes flush against my pussy, covered only by the thin barrier of my panties. One large, calloused hand comes to rest on my bare thigh and I lick my lips, looking up at him.

Kiss me, dammit.

“You can’t help me out here,” he tells me.

“Why? Because I don’t know what a chisel’s for?”

“Well, no. That kind of thing can be taught, but you can’t help me right now”—his other hand comes to rest on my bare tummy—“because you’re pregnant.”

“Oh. Because I might breathe in sawdust and stuff?”

“Plenty of stuff out here I wouldn’t want you breathing in. Sometimes I work with resin, too, and I doubt that’d be safe for the baby.”

I look down, stricken by a swell of sadness I don’t even understand. I like the feel of his hand tenderly resting on my stomach like that. No one’s ever done that before aside from me, and it definitely feels nicer when the hand belongs to a man.

Or maybe it’s because the hand belongs to this man. The idea of Theo’s hand there now just makes me want to swat it away, but I like Brant touching the spot where my baby’s growing.

The surge of lust I felt a moment ago dies down, replaced by something tender. It’s a bold move, but I let one of my hands fall from his shoulder and come to rest on the one he has pressed to my stomach, pushing it even more firmly against my skin.

He doesn’t say anything, just looks at me. His other hand moves from my thigh, and he tucks a chunk of blonde hair back behind my ear.

We stay there like that for a minute, just being quiet together. I don’t know what he’s thinking, but I’m so lost in my feelings I wish I did.

“You okay?” he asks me after a minute.

I was, but him asking makes me want to cry, and I don’t really know why. I feel an embarrassing sting behind my eyes, and I try to blink it away as I nod my head. “Yeah, I’m fine.”

He still has his hand pressed to my stomach, but when I let go of it, he pulls it away, and I’m overcome with a sudden, overwhelming sense of loss.