Page 86 of Heat Clinic

“What’d you have in mind?” Sam selects the game from the options on the console and then gets up and grabs the controllers from their charging stand.

“Hmm… How about… Loser has to say yes to everything the winner asks of them for an entire day?”

Sam licks his lips and grins wider. “Deal.”

“Can I play Yoshi?” Emily asks, taking one of the controllers.

“Of course, baby.” Sam drops a kiss into her hair and chooses his character. I pick mine, and then we select a track.

After five rounds, you’d think I wouldn’t be surprised when Emily comes out of nowhere, her green dinosaur character tossing a turtle shell at me and knocking my cart over before flying past and nailing a boost that sends her way out in front of Sam.

“How the bloody hell are you so good at this?” I ask, a little baffled and slightly aroused.

She retakes first place in the final lap and drives over the finish line before Sam can catch up to her. I’m still spinning in the back when the screen cuts to our final score. She shrugs. “It’s all about the way you drift. Does this mean youbothhave to say yes to everything I tell you to do for an entire day?”

“I’m home!” Marcus calls from the doorway.

“In the living room!” we shout in unison.

“You’re food’s in the toaster. I already timed it. Just hit start,” I tell him.

He stands in the doorway and loosens his tie, flexing his neck from side to side as he tugs it down. “Thanks, babe. You guys look like you’re having fun. Let me just set this down and grab my food and then I’ll join you.

Marcus picks his briefcase back up and disappears. He’s only gone for a minute or two before he returns without the briefcase or his jacket or tie. The top button of his shirt is undone, a hint of chest hair peeking out. “Why is there a plant in my mini bar globe?” He undoes the buttons on his sleeves and rolls them up, baring his muscled forearms.

Sam hits the control to select our next track. Rainbow Road. Everyone’s favorite. I can’t wait to get slaughtered on it.

“Because it looks good there,” Emily says, glancing up from the screen.

Marcus frowns and opens his mouth to say something, then shuts it again without speaking.Smart man.He makes a noncommittal noise, then turns around and heads into the kitchen.

Emily and I share a loaded glance and growing smiles. She snuggles deeper into my side until she’s half laying on me. Not to feel left out, Sam picks her feet up from the seat and sets them in his lap, rubbing the sole of one.

“You guys ready to lose again?” she asks.

ChapterTwenty-Two

EMILY

It’s coming,it’s coming, it’s coming! I glance at the Nested app for the hundredth time as I watch the green dot make slow progress around the city.

“There it is!” Sam calls from the window.

“What?” The app says they’re still blocks away. And then it refreshes, and the dot moves at an impossible diagonal through buildings and stops on our street. I run to the window and look out, following Sam’s pointing finger. There it is. Nested’s delivery truck.

The truck pulls up to the unloading area and idles. Two big alphas jump out and tug the back open, and then they pull the plastic-wrapped nest out in pieces. Even the pieces are huge.

Oh, shit. How are they going to get it up here in the tiny elevator?

I call down to the lobby and ask the front desk person to let Bobbie know we’re expecting a delivery, and then I pace. Twenty minutes later, there’s a heavy knock on the front door and Sam throws it open.

“We got a delivery,” the alpha says. “Where do you want it?”

“Upstairs.”

If the delivery men are mad about having to bring the heavy nest pieces up a flight of stairs, they don’t show it. They lift the furniture pieces up like it’s nothing and Sam and I hug the wall upstairs as they set the parts down one by one and go back and forth for the rest.

They take less than an hour to haul everything in, unwrap it, and put it together. He does a final inspection to check for damage, then hands me a tablet to sign for receipt of delivery. Sam shows them out while I pet the nest with reverent strokes.

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