Page 49 of The Carver

“Until you stop being a judgmental prick, I’m not going to like you.”

Instead of snapping at the insult, his eyes narrowed—and he gave a slight smile.

“I wouldn’t be here, stuck looking at your asshole face, if Bastien didn’t mean so much to me.”

The smirk remained, like my insults were comical rather than threatening. “And how much does he mean to you?”

I shouldn’t answer the question, not when I’d only come down here to have breakfast, not face an interrogation. “He means so much to me that I’ve forsaken all my principles and my fears and my sanity because I can’t walk away from him. I’m not ready for a relationship when I’m not even divorced, but I’m in one because I’d rather heal with him than lose him. I’m terrified of his world and the danger in the shadows, but I’m far more afraid of a safe existence without him. You say he’s put all his chips in, but he’s not the one who has anything to lose. I’m the one betting my life savings. And I’m betting it all because he’s the most exceptional man I’ve ever met. I’ve known him for such a brief amount of time, but I somehow believe every word out of his mouth, every promise he’s ever made to me—even though I’ve already heard those promises in the past and watched them shatter at my feet.”

His smile was long gone, and he just listened, his attention at its highest level.

“And Jesus Christ, he’s fucking hot.”

He smiled again, but this time, it was genuine, like I’d actually pierced his stone outline and hit him somewhere underneath. He grabbed his mug and took another drink, letting my words slowly dissolve and disappear into the quiet until they were gone.

Bastien finished up with the waiter and slid into the booth next to me. His arm immediately dropped over the back, touching my neck as he picked up the menu that held the specials. “What are you thinking, sweetheart?”

My eyes were still on Luca. “The sweet stack.”

“Good choice.” He set the menu down and looked at Luca across from him. “You?”

“I’m gonna try the special.”

“I’ll do the same. Are you going to eat all those pancakes?” He directed the question to me.

“Yes,” I said. “Get your own.”

When Bastien smirked, he was even more handsome, as if he needed any help in the looks department. “I respect that.”

“I do too,” Luca said before he took a drink of his coffee.

Bastien seemed to pick up on the tension between us because his eyes shifted back and forth. “I left you alone for two minutes, and you already got into it?”

“Yep,” Luca said, his hand still on his mug. “But it was a productive two minutes…because I kinda like her.”

Bastien turned his stare on me, affection in his eyes. “Yeah? What did you say?”

“Well, she said I have an asshole face, whatever that means, and called me a judgmental prick.”

“That’s all true, to be fair,” Bastien said.

Luca smirked. “Fuck you, man.”

“My woman says how it is,” Bastien said with a shrug.

“And everything else she said…” He shifted his stare to me and raised his mug. “We’ll keep that between us.”

We returned to his apartment after breakfast, and Bastien clearly already had plans for what he wanted to do because he threw me on the bed the second we walked in the door. Instead of asking me to do the things he wanted, he moved on top of me and did all the work, fucking me savagely like it’d been too long since his last release.

Then he just left me on the bed and walked into the bathroom to shower without saying a word.

I listened to the water fall as I lay there for a while, the sunlight coming through the windows because the curtains were parted. The clouds passed, and the light flooded the bedroom for a few moments, bringing a warmth that nearly pulled me into the clouds of dreams.

I joined him in the bathroom, a six-foot-something god standing in the shower rubbing a bar of soap all over his body. When the water streaked down the rivers between the muscles of his abs, chest, and arms, it shone, making his muscled mass more distinct. His ink glistened too, and I was reminded just how hot he was…like I’d somehow forgotten.

His eyes moved to me through the glass as he continued to wash himself. “Come on.” He nodded for me to join him behind the glass, a shower with two showerheads.

I undressed and left my clothes on the counter around the bathtub then joined him under the water. My eyes closed as I tilted my head back and let the warmth stream down my body.

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