Page 205 of Smooth Sailing

Then she wandered off, seeming to have forgotten she was carrying a bottle of Champagne.

I looked up at Hugger. “What was that about?”

“She told me she has clients who have ‘connections.’ She then said if I hurt you, she’ll call on them to show me the error of my ways so I’ll wish I didn’t.”

This stunned me.

“What on earth?” I whispered, my gaze drifting to Annie.

“It was hilarious as fuck,” Hugger said, and I turned my attention to him. “And kinda cute. Though, I didn’t let on it was either.”

Annie had…

Wow.

When it hit me what just happened, I latched onto his arm, leaned all my weight into him and said, “I think she likes me. She really, really likes me.”

He smiled down at me. “Yeah, babe, she really likes you.”

Although I kinda knew that.

Still.

It felt great.

“I didn’t know any of our clients had ‘connections,’” I remarked.

“They probably don’t. She just made that shit up so I’d do you right, and she knows a little chick who always wears black with her hair rolled at her forehead like she’s Betty Grable is not gonna have me quaking in my boots when she lays a threat on me.”

“Gotta admit, Annie is the least threatening woman I know, outside my gram.”

“Your gram still laid your mom out yesterday,” he reminded me. Then he advised, “Never underestimate a woman. Most of them might not have the brute strength of men, but they find a way to get the job done. Like just now.”

I adored that he knew that.

So I shot him a beaming smile.

Hugger bent his head and kissed it off my face.

“You have enough room after our donuts to get some food?” I asked after he pulled away.

“Sure,” he replied.

We went into Annie’s house, which was located in Arcadia Lite and was decorated in All Annie (that being monochromatic in blacks, grays and whites, the perfect foil to showcase her Jeff Koons magenta balloon swan and her Ashley Longshore pop art portrait of Linda Carter as Wonder Woman that included the words Roll the Credits).

Along the way, I waved at people I knew and made note to introduce Hugger to them. Though, this was a bigger smash than Annie normally put on, and I wondered how she remembered all the people she met in order to invite them to her pad.

After having a donut earlier, I went directly to a mini quiche to balance the levels in my stomach of sweet pastries with a savory one.

Hugger grabbed a plate and nabbed a small stack of little pancakes, skewered with a long pick through a blackberry. It was a cool idea to lay them out like that, turning pancakes into finger food, and I made note should I ever create a brunch buffet.

He poured some syrup on them, and holding the plate under it as he went, he was raising the stick to shove them in his mouth when a woman standing close cried, “Don’t!”

Too late, he’d bitten down.

Then he turned to me.

At the expression on his face, I immediately dashed to a stack of paper napkins and gave one to him.

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