Prayers for the Prickly

His scent had gone back to normal over the course of the conversation, which meant that there was no longer the undercurrent of sexual tension soaking into every word that was said between us. As easy as it would have been to finally end the long drought I’d been in, and give in to the desire and all the pheromones, Aunty Clara had brought up some fundamental issues that we’d need to address before one of us plunged headlong into heat or rut. Judging from the hot and heavy scents that still lingered on his leather jacket, it was going to be him.

Yeah. I really needed to get conversation and some bonding out of the way before he decided that dragging me back to the beach and pinning me to the sand would be a much better option than breakfast.

“All right, you two, I’ve picked on you enough, what would you like to eat this morning?”

“August informed me that you make a trio of new breakfast sandwiches each morning and I can’t think of a better introduction to the food here than to get one of each, as well as a strawberry cream cheese Danish and whichever of the long list of iced coffees going up the wall that you think would go best with all of that.”

“Oh, honey, these aren’t small sandwiches,” Aunty replied.

“And I am not a small man,” he replied, grinning and gesturing down to his slightly rounded middle.

He was thick and imposing, fierce in a way that sent a shiver down my spine.

“I assure you that anything I can’t finish now will be resting in my belly before lunch time, so please hit me with the thickest, juiciest creations you’ve got.”

I slapped a hand over my eyes because damn, now that the seriousness was out of the way, the man was right back to the innuendos, and what the hell? Was that a little smirk, too? He still looked intense and lowkey terrifying, but seeing this playful, sexy side of him so eager to come out and play gave me a sense of power.

I’d already asked around about him. I already knew what others said. Growly, grumpy, not a man to be trifled with. Snarky as hell and twice as mean had been the way one man described him while a friend of my sister’s had out and out called him a rude bastard and borderline mean. Knowing her, though, something told me she’d had it coming so I hadn’t put too much stock in her words.

All of them had painted the picture of a proud, grumpy man who ran around looking perpetually pissed off, and yet every time he looked at me, all he did was smile a little brighter, like I was the only one he was capable of doing that for.

Damn did that make me feel like the most powerful hedgehog in the world.