Page 43 of The Woman

“No, you can finish cleaning the juice first before it gets sticky.”

I gently push her down to her knees and ignore the fire in her eyes when she looks up at me.

Needing to get Mario’s eyes off her and keep my cool, I turn to him and ask, “How’s the business going?”

Unlike Edison and myself, Mario and Leonard don’t work for family. Mario started his own exporting company a couple of years ago. After a slow start, he finally started making some good money in the last nine months.

He looks away from Avery over to me as I intended, and I indicate for him to follow me back to the table. Thankfully, he does.

I try to pay attention to him as he starts telling me about his latest client, but I’m hyper-aware of the woman in my kitchen, and my mind is fixated on every little sound coming from there. I catch her movements every now and then from behind Edison’s head, but the kitchen island blocks most of her.

“I gotta say, it’s kind of weird seeing her here in your home,” Edison admits once the conversation dies down.

“Yeah, what’s it really like having a woman living with you?” Leonard asks. “I mean, besides the fucking whenever you like. She does everything for you, right? Food, laundry, cleaning? What’s it like sleeping next to her?”

A loud clattering noise comes from the kitchen, and I’m sure she’s listening to us, but the guys pay no attention to it. I give a slight shrug, unsure of how to answer since every other time, it’s been apparently obvious I wasn’t truthful.

Although she has been doing my laundry despite me telling her not to, and besides last night when I cooked for her – which I enjoyed a great deal – she has been making me food, even when I’ve been avoiding her and staying out. And everything is always kept clean as well.

As far as the other things go . . . well, I haven’t been sleeping next to her or fucking her.

Just thinking about it.

“It’s wonderful,” I answer, then quickly add, “Whose turn to shuffle?”

“Don’t hold back on us. I wouldn’t mind knowing about the sex.” That comes from Mario as he casts a quick glance over to her before picking up the cards to shuffle. “I’ve got a long wait before I’ll find out for myself. Unless you’re interested in loaning her out?”

Edison tilts his head and quirks a brow at me in amusement, waiting for my reply. But to his credit, he says nothing of the fact I so freely gave her over to him, only to go storming in and take her back again.

“I don’t think I want to know what the sex is like when I have to wait to enjoy it,” Leonard responds before I can.

“Phoenix isn’t one to rub in that sort of thing anyway,” Edison adds, with a wink to me the others don’t see. After his comments on the phone yesterday, I’m not sure what he thinks is going on between us. “Will you hurry up with those cards,” he then tells Mario.

Mario starts dealing out and turns to Edison. “How long do you have to wait for yours, you think?”

“Hopefully, only eight more months. But you can bet I won’t be kind enough to spare you the talk of how many times a day I’m having sex and how good it feels,” he replies with his trademark smirk.

There’s another sound from the kitchen, and then Avery walks over with a bowl of chips in one hand and a tray with veggies and dip in the other. Everyone watches as she places them on a clear part of the table.

“Those are nice, too,” Mario says, hitching his thumb in the direction of Avery’s chest.

I grind down on my molars, trying not to react by throwing him to the ground while simultaneously throwing a blanket over Avery. I’m generally not a violent person. I’ve never needed to be. But she brings out this side of me that can’t stand other people looking at her like she’s an object for their imagination.

My eyes snap to Edison then because as much as I hate thinking about it, he has seen Avery’s perfect chest, and I expect him to comment as much. But after a quick look my way, all he does is pick up his cards, reminding me why I like him.

Avery acts as if she heard nothing, her face remaining blank as she walks back to the kitchen to continue with whatever else she’s making.

With a grumbling stomach, I reach over to grab a head of broccoli but then notice how she put all the different types together according to size and color. Through my irritation, something warm grows in my chest, knowing that that is a part of her personality. I can’t say that I bothered to notice anything like that before when she prepared food for me.

Not two seconds later, Mario’s hand destroys the patterns when he takes a handful of the veggies without even looking. It probably wouldn’t mean anything to him even if he had seen it.

Edison leans forward on the table. “You know what I heard recently? They’re really cracking down on WOUNs lately. Apparently, there has been an increased amount of them, and they’re getting sneaky.”

My hand freezes mid-air on its way to placing a card down, but I force it to continue on.

“Really?” Leonard asks.

Edison nods while stuffing a few carrots in his mouth. “I don’t know how true it is, but it’s what I heard.”

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