Page 65 of The Grump

“Was I too rough earlier when we were against the wall?”

“Oh, you were rough,” she said with a frown. Then she grinned again. “And I loved it so freaking much.”

“Nothing hurts?” I double-checked.

“Maybe ask me tomorrow. I might have worked up some muscle aches, but I don’t mind at all. I haven’t had a proper workout since the Christmas season started.”

“You count this as a workout?” I asked with a laugh.

“No, but I think it might end up being that.” She pushed herself up on her elbows, looking me up and down and then laughing.

“What’s so funny?”

“I think you might be too big for my bed.”

I frowned. “What are you talking about?”

“I bought the biggest one I could find, and now I have a mountain of a man on it.”

Was she implying that I was the first man in her bed? Because the primal side of me fucking liked that.

“Oh,thismountain of a man will find a place,” I replied.

I shifted us on the bed, but it wasn’t as big as I first thought.

“All right, you have a point. But I have an idea.” I pulled her on top of me. “See? This works perfectly.”

“For what?” she asked, wriggling her eyebrows. “Surely not for sleeping.”

“For that, too, later on. For now, I have other things in mind.”

Chapter Eighteen

Xander

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“Hey, Xander,” Lydia greeted me when I arrived at the office on Monday morning. “You’re a bit late.”

“Still on time for the first meeting,” I replied. I hadn’t left Bailey’s house until this morning, going home to change before coming to the office.

“Yes, of course, of course. Listen, I’ve forwarded you some Christmas invitations you got today.”

I raised a brow. “I received more than one in the same day?”

She nodded. “You know how people are. They like to invite anyone who’s anyone to those sorts of events.”

“You can RSVP that I’m not going.”

“Don’t you even want to look at them?”

“No, not necessary.”

The Christmas events were the bane of my existence. I knew for a fact that most companies had the end of the financial year on the thirty-first. Who had time for all these things? Some of them weren’t even corporate parties.

I hadn’t attended one in years. The first few years in business, my brothers and I had gone to most of them because we’d been eager to let everyone in New Orleans know that we’d taken over the Orleans Conglomerate. It had been necessary for the town to see the transition. But on the fourth year, I pulled back. There were plenty of us LeBlancs, so we didn’t all have to attend.

Some of my brothers were more than happy to keep going. Zachary was a perennial favorite at the parties, as were Anthony and Beckett. Julian had attended many of them, too, before hestarted spending more and more time behind the counter at his bars. He said he got his socializing fix from there and didn’t need the parties, though he attended many events during Carnival season.

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