Page 59 of Trusting Liam (Taking Chances 2)

Unlocking the door, I pushed it open and followed Kira inside. A few steps in, she turned to look at me with wide eyes.

“Smells good in here,” I mumbled.

“It does,” she agreed, and turned toward the living room.

It wasn’t uncommon for the condo to smell alarmingly good. Rhys had nothing to do all day, and was still on paid leave for another month from the department to regroup from his time undercover, so we often came home to a clean house. Once he explained how he’d been living for four years, and how, now that he was away from that life, he felt like nothing was ever clean enough, I’d stopped asking him not to clean, and let him do what he wanted.

“Wow,” Kira said in amazement when she rounded the corner to look into the kitchen. “What is all this?”

“Oh, wow!” I echoed when I looked into the kitchen. There were plates and bowls filled with amazing-looking food, and Rhys was standing in front of the sink rinsing off what looked like the last of the dishes he’d been using. “Where did this come from?”

“I made it,” he answered with a nonchalant shrug. “I went to the store today and bought enough food to stock up the pantry and fridge.”

I glanced over at Kira, who was looking in the pantry, then looked back at Rhys in awe. “Really? You didn’t have to do that. It must have cost so much.”

“I don’t think I’ve ever seen this so full,” Kira whispered from where she was now standing in front of the refrigerator.

“You didn’t let me help pay any of the bills from last month. I had to do something.”

“Because you sleep on the couch and clean all the time!”

Rhys smiled. “Kennedy, that does not come close to equaling out.”

“Wait,” I said, and held up a hand. “How did you get to the store to buy all of this?”

Kira turned to Rhys for his response, but quickly moved her eyes away and looked down at the food.

“Uh, I went and bought a truck today.”

“You bought a truck?” Kira asked, her voice and face showing her excitement.

“How?” I asked again.

Rhys’s smile turned sarcastic. “Well, I picked it out, signed the papers, and drove it back here. But if you’re asking how I could afford it, you have to remember I came back to four years of back pay with absolutely nothing that I needed to pay for except my ticket here.”

“Huh, well, that’s fun—wait! How did you get to the dealership?”

Both Kira and Rhys laughed, and after a quick look back at Kira, Rhys’s eyes were on me. “They have these cars called taxis now. You call the number, they pick you up, you pay them to drive you somewhere. They’re pretty cool.”

“Shut up,” I said on a laugh, and rolled my eyes. “You could’ve just said you called a cab, jerk.”

“But then you might have asked, ‘How?’ ”

This time I was laughing with them, but my laugh died and I blurted, “Wait! How did you call a cab?”

“Rhys asked if he could use my phone today, I left it with him when we went to work.”

For a second, I wondered why he’d asked Kira instead of me, but figured he probably didn’t feel comfortable asking me seeing as I was always either at work or at the beach, and if I was home, I was locked in my bedroom. And he and Kira had become friends over the last month, so I just nodded. “Okay, I swear I’m done with the hows.”

“Good,” Rhys said with a wink. “You girls hungry? I just finished getting everything ready about a minute before you walked in.”

“Yes!” Kira and I said in unison, and helped him carry all the dishes over to the table.

“THAT WAS SO good.” I placed a hand on my too-full stomach, and groaned. “I can’t remember the last time I ate that much.”

“Or had a home-cooked meal,” Kira added, and I agreed.

“Very true.” I looked over at Rhys and nudged him. “Did you cook while you were undercover? Or were you just still good at it when you came back?”

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