Page 79 of Fast Fury

Kai set histutudown and carefully set her aside, his gaze on Abby. He stood there staring at her until her smile slipped, and a flicker of doubt entered her eyes.

Hiding a smile, Kai rushed her.

Her blue eyes, twice as vivid with the dark camo paint surrounding them, widened. She let out a squeak of alarm and whirled to flee, but she had no chance. He was on her in a heartbeat, grabbing her around the hips to hoist her over his shoulder. She laughed and grabbed the back of his shirt to hold on as he ran straight around the corner of the brick wall and into the master bedroom, where he kicked the door shut with one foot.

“Kai, are you serious? Yourtutujust flew for like, fourteen hours straight to get here. Put me down.”

“I’ll put you down when I’m good and ready to put you down,” he answered.

Without slowing, he went straight to the bed and tossed her onto it. She landed on her back with a little “oof” and scrambled up onto her elbows, pushing the helmet up so she could see him. Kai pounced, caging her beneath him.

Her delighted giggle made his heart turn over, and it turned into a soft shriek when he buried his face in her throat and blew a big raspberry against the sensitive skin there, grazing her with his stubble. “Kai!” she warned, weak with laughter, her hands pushing at his shoulders.

Raising his head, he peered down at her. “This is a new look for you.”

She waggled her camouflaged eyebrows. “Yeah. You like?”

“I do.” Grinning, he kissed her. “You missed a spot though,” he said, nibbling on first her lower lip, then her upper one. She tasted like her favorite red wine.

“I know. I didn’t want to spoil the taste of the wine with camo paint.”

He shook his head at her. She was so adorable. “Do you have any idea how much I love you?”

She frowned, considering it. “No. Remind me.”

He glowered playfully and smacked her hip with his palm, earning a yelp of outrage. She knew damn good and well that she meant the whole world to him. “What the heck did you guys get up to while we were gone?”

“Training.”

“Training?” he echoed. She was a hell of a lot more than tipsy. If it wasn’t for histutubeing here, he would have told the others to go the hell away now so he could enjoy Abby’s current state to the fullest. “What kind of training?”

She traced his mouth with a fingertip, her teeth dug into her plump lower lip. “CQB.”

He laughed. Close quarters combat? “Really. And who was teaching you?”

“Charlie. She’s badass.”

Colebrook’s sister, who was also Rodriguez’s other half. “Yeah, she is.” Came from a whole family of Marines, and she could handle herself. “So…I’m confused. Why were you guys practicing CQB in my loft?”

“So we’d be ready to ambush you. And we totally did. You weren’t expecting it atall.”

So damn cute. “No, I wasn’t.” He rubbed the tip of his nose against hers. “What else did you do?”

“We practiced room clearing.”

His eyebrows went up. “Did you? With my Nerf guns?”

“Well, not at first. At first we used those.” She gestured lazily to the floor beside her.

He glanced over, smothered a snort at the objects strewn across the rug. “Those are coat hangers.”

She shrugged. “I can do a perfect buttonhook now. Wait ‘til I show you.”

A slow grin curved his mouth at the pride in her voice. “Can’t wait to see that later.”

She leaned up to nip at his lower lip, stroked her tongue across it. “I got some other moves you haven’t seen yet either.”

He swallowed a groan at her suggestive tone, the way she snaked one hand down the length of his back to grip his ass and squeeze. Damn, he still had to go out there and play host, because it was his damn birthday and everyone was here to spend time with him. If he didn’t love them all so much, he’d be damned annoyed right now. “You did this to torture me,” he accused.

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