Page 47 of Rebel

I deadpanned back, “Yeah, we’ve had a good run of it the last few days.”

She nodded enthusiastically, “I just wish the rest of our lives could be just like this.” Glancing around at her now clean office she amended, “You know, except the whole breaking in thing. I could do without any more of that.”

I cupped her face in my hands and assured her, “The rest of our life can be whatever we decide to make it. And once we catch whoever broke into the office, I’ll make sure he’s in no condition to do it a second time.”

Her eyebrows flew up and she shook my hands away. I let my hands to drop. She leaned forward slightly, “Or we could just have them arrested.”

My expression went blank as I tried to sound casual. “Yeah, or that. I mean, anything’s possible, right?”

She frowned, alerting me that my response had not been quite as smooth as I had hoped. “You’re not a very good liar.”

“Yeah,” I agreed gamely. “My poker face sucks.”

Her hand came up to caress my cheek and then she yanked my ear slightly harder than I thought was necessary under the circumstances. “Lucky for you, I like that you’re a terrible liar. It means you haven’t had much experience with deception.”

I jerked my head to the side to make her let go of my ear. “Damn woman, no ear pulling. You ain’t my momma.”

“Lucky for you. If I were, you might end up getting spanked for trying to lie.” She had a naughty little smirk on her face, so I was pretty sure she was making a sexually suggestive comment to the man who had just given her four orgasms in the last twenty-four hours.

I jerked back and stared at her for a minute. “Did you have a no flirting in the workplace rule at one time? I guess a couple of turns on my glorious cock can be life altering but I didn’t know it would get you to violate your own rules.”

She swatted my shoulder. “I’m never gonna be able to win with you, am I?” Before I could answer, she gestured towards the door. “Amscray. I’ve got work to do. I’ll call in the pizza order to our usual place and it should be ready by the time you get there.”

“Tetchy when I mention how much you like my cock, aren’t you?”

Truth be told, I knew I was being annoying and that I should stop while I was ahead, so I got to my feet. “Sorry about slipping back into bad habits. Don’t know what got into me.”

Her expression turned from annoyed to indulgent again. “I’ll be the first to admit that old habits are hard to break.”

I leaned down with one hand on each arm of her chair and told her, “You’re worth changing for, you know that, don’t you?”

She shot back, “Maybe I don’t want you to change? It could be that I love you just the way you are, with all your quirks and idiosyncrasies.”

“Doubtful, but a man can hope.” I gave her a quick kiss and then headed for the door. “I’ll be back with food shortly.”

“I’ll bring in some chairs and we can all eat in my office,” she called out as I was walking out the door.

***

I made short work of picking up pizza, chips, and drinks. When I got back, Eric was waiting for me at the curb and helped me carry in the ridiculous bounty I’d procured. I’d had my eye on Eric for a while. He was the one prospect who always went the extra mile. I made a mental note to talk to Storm about patching him in. It was time that all his hard work paid off for him.

I found that Lacey was as good as her word. She had pulled in enough chairs for everyone and arranged around her desk. The two less-motivated prospects were sitting around, shooting the breeze with her. That was fine. I was sure she’d invited them because it seemed unlikely that the prospects would have both invited themselves. She opened the pizza boxes and handed out the paper plates and napkins the pizza place had sent with the pizza. I made sure everyone had a cold beer and even Lacey popped one open. Everyone was in good spirits, and we all got back to work afterward.

Lacey and I talked for a while longer and I invited her to spend the night with me again. I was gratified at how quickly she agreed. My life was getting better by the second and I felt like she was as into me as I was her.

Chapter 17

Lacey

After another night in Rebel’s bed, I was all-in with building this relationship with him. So was he. I could tell because this morning he talked me into staying at his place while my parents were gone. I agreed almost before he got the words out of his mouth because not only was I shamelessly eager to spend more time with him, I wasn’t wild about spending so much time all alone in their huge house. It made me feel lonely, to tell the truth.

Since I hadn’t picked up a change of clothing after work yesterday, we went to my parents’ house to pack an overnight bag. On the way there in my car, he told me, “I was thinking that maybe you should just pack a suitcase or two rather than continue trying to stuff everything into an overnight bag.”

“My folks are only supposed to be gone for three or four days.”

“Well, they don’t need to be gone for you to want to spend some time with me.”

Without taking my hands off the wheel, I shot him a side glance. “And sleeping together is a great way to get to know each other better, right?”

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