My new mantra was The Mission Comes First, and I was beginning to embrace the concept. I’d actually enjoyed myself at the ball last night. Making my home permanently here in Licking Thicket was an attractive option. The people were friendly, the area was beautiful, the price was definitely right, and I could still have plenty of Nashville clients, which felt a lot like having my cake and eating it too.

After showering and dressing for the day, I stepped out of my room and almost body-slammed Levi sneaking out of Marissa’s room right across from mine. He wore pajama pants and an old Christianson Protective Services T-shirt.

“Good… morning?” I asked, wondering what the hell he was doing on this level of the house when his bedroom was on the main floor.

Levi’s face turned beet red, and he stammered out an excuse. “She… ah… she, um. Headache powder!”

I blinked at him. Headache powder? Were we back in the 1800s suddenly?

“Rissy had a lot to drink last night,” he continued. “So I brought her a headache powder for her hangover. My granny’s special trick.”

“Hmm. Where’s Trey?” I asked, crossing my arms in front of my chest as if I was a truant officer.

Levi’s jaw tightened, and a flash of anger crossed his face. “The asshole never showed. She cried the whole way home.”

“What the fuck? After promising to bring his dad’s classic car and everything? What was his problem?”

Now Levi was the one crossing his arms. “First, he called and said he had an important work thing, so he was running really late. Fine. Then, when the dance was over, Riss called him to make sure he was okay, and the asshole was home asleep. I don’t believe he had a work thing at all.”

Neither did I, but I wasn’t about to throw a wrench in the works of my largest wedding client right now.

“It’s more important whether Marissa believed him,” I suggested, raising my eyebrows.

Levi mumbled something under his breath and moved past me to the stairs. I followed him down, shooting daggers into his back with my eyes until he turned toward his bedroom, hopefully to shower, dress, and forget all about his childhood ladylove. This thing between Marissa and Levi was a problem that did not seem to be going away.

I walked into the kitchen, expecting it to be empty at this time on a Sunday, but Champ was already there, sitting at the long wooden table, nursing a cup of coffee.

Speaking of problems that weren’t going away…

Fuck. Well, I had to deal with him sometime, right?

“Quinn—” Champ’s voice was gravel-rough like he’d had as bad a night as I had, and my knees went weak.

“Busy! Breakfast time!” I called, and then I detoured hard left, into the walk-in pantry closet.

Yes, I had to deal with him sometime, but not right then.

Unsurprisingly, the sound of Champ’s familiar footsteps followed me into the small space. I bit out a curse under my breath when he closed the door behind him.

“I don’t want to talk about it,” I snapped, not taking my eyes off the canned tomatoes. They needed attention. What, with their… labels and… whatever.

His big body pressed against mine, pushing my chest into the edge of the shelves. “Good. I don’t want to talk either.” The low, sleepy rasp of his voice brought goose bumps up all over my skin. I closed my eyes and clenched my teeth.

I was strong enough to resist this man.

His hand moved around and slid under my shirt to the bare skin of my belly before moving down into my pants.

Okay, no, I was not strong enough to resist this man.

“We’re—” My voice cracked, and I cleared my throat. “We’re not doing this. We’re done. Over. We’re… mad at each other.”

Way to go, big boy. You told him.

“Mmm. More like mad about you.”

He didn’t stop moving his hands across my skin. His big, strong, warm hands, hands that had spent hours bringing me pleasure. My mind was a highlight reel of memories of that pleasure, enough to make my heart thunder and my lungs desperate for more oxygen.

I needed to elbow him in the gut. Turn around and shove him off me. Tell him how angry I was. And I was going to. In just a minute.

“No, see…” I began weakly before sucking in a breath when his finger grazed my cock. “Oh God.”

I tried to remember how I’d felt the night before. The pit in my stomach, the hole in my chest, how flat and joyless everything had seemed when he’d left me behind… but it was impossible to remember any of that when the ridge of his cock was lined up perfectly with the cleft of my ass, promising me so much pleasure.

And I deserved pleasure, dammit. Just because he was an unfeeling ass didn’t mean I couldn’t use him for my own sexual release. An orgasm would be just the thing to knock my headache out and loosen my limbs.

Tags: Lucy Lennox Licking Thicket - Horn of Glory Romance
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