Cassidy chuckled and wiped the tears from her face. “You can try to make me think you’re hard-asses who think about nothing but the bottom line all you want, but I know the truth.”
“And what’s that?” Eagle asked.
“That deep down, you guys are all just marshmallows.”
Everyone laughed.
“You are,” she insisted.
“If you say so,” Bull said with a smirk.
“Yup. Marshmallows,” Eagle agreed, completely straight faced.
Gramps rolled his eyes, but wasn’t about to get into how unmarshmallowy they all were. She didn’t need the reminder.
“Welcome to the family, Cass,” Smoke said with a smile. He stood and held out his hand.
Cassidy got to her feet—with Gramps’s help, since she was draped over his lap—and shook Smoke’s hand. Bull and Eagle also stood, and she shook their hands too.
She turned to Gramps and gave him a grin as she held out her hand.
Gramps ignored it, and instead wrapped his arms around her waist and bent her backward. She squealed in surprise and grabbed hold of his biceps. “Wha—”
Gramps didn’t give her a chance to say anything else. His lips covered hers, and he kissed her as he’d longed to for over a week.
Ever since their little chat at the gym, things between them had been good. But strangely, now that she’d agreed they were officially dating, he still hadn’t felt a need to rush things between them physically. They’d cuddled as they’d watched TV, and they held hands all the time. She and Mario had spent the night at his house twice, but the other nights he made sure they were safely tucked into their apartment before he’d gone home, alone.
He had no idea what had come over him now—but there was no way he was sealing any kind of deal with a handshake. It was the perfect opening to kiss her again, and he wasn’t going to let the opportunity slip by.
She was everything he never knew he wanted in a woman.
Gramps vaguely heard the others leaving the safe room, but he didn’t stop kissing Cassidy. After a moment of surprised hesitation, she’d wrapped her arms around his neck and kissed him back as if she couldn’t get enough. And the feeling was definitely mutual.
He’d never gotten so hard just from kissing, but then again, he’d never kissed Cassidy quite like this either. As if he needed her to breathe. As if he’d die if he didn’t get closer.
He stood them upright, but that didn’t end their kiss. Gramps picked her up, then sat her on the table, and she tilted her head back, giving him all of her.
Cassidy’s hands snaked under his T-shirt, and he shivered at the sensation of her bare hands on his skin. He could feel her fingernails lightly digging into his flesh, and he immediately thought about how she’d react when he sank inside her for the first time.
Gramps pulled his mouth from hers and buried his face in her neck. He needed to get control of himself. Of the situation. He didn’t want to take her for the first time on top of the table in their safe room, but he felt as if he was ten seconds away from doing just that. He might’ve been patient for weeks, but he knew he was done with that. He needed Cassidy. Needed to be as close to her as a man could be with a woman.
“Leo?” she asked.
“Give me a second,” he managed to croak out. His cock felt as if it was going to burst out of his jeans. He was that hard. That close to exploding without her even having touched him.
Licking his lips, Gramps could taste her. It made him want to taste her all over. To lick her sweet juices and watch her come as they slid down his throat. He groaned.
Cassidy’s hands came out from under his shirt and lightly caressed his back. Up and down, soothing him, doing what she could to try to make him feel better even though she had no idea what he was thinking. His Cass was a nurturer, and how she’d remained so . . . untainted was a mystery.
He slowly picked up his head to meet her gaze. “For the record, that’s how you seal a deal with me. Not by shaking my hand.”
She grinned. “Noted. Are you all right?”
“Yeah, Cass. I just . . . you overwhelm me.”
She frowned.
“It’s not a bad thing,” he said quickly, reassuring her. “I just realized that I haven’t ever felt so . . . much . . . about someone in my entire life. I think I knew you’d do this to me even when I was eighteen years old, which was why I went out of my way to never go there with you.”
She swallowed hard but didn’t interrupt him.
“I knew if I had you back then, I’d never let you go. And you had shit you needed to do, and so did I. I was getting the hell out of El Paso, and I was going to see the world. I knew you’d ruin me for all other women, so I kept my distance. I regretted it all the time, but didn’t see any way to fix it. Then you got married . . . and that was that.”
“Leo,” she said softly.
“When I found out the American sending letters to the FBI begging for help was you, nothing could have kept me away,” he told her. “And it turns out, I was right.”
“About what?” she asked when he didn’t elaborate.
“You’ve ruined me for anyone else. Did you feel it?” he asked, knowing he wasn’t making himself clear, but not able to explain any better.
But he didn’t need to. Not with her. Cassidy nodded and licked her lips. “Feel the earth shift? Feel as if our souls clicked like two puzzle pieces fitting together? Yes.”
“Thank fuck,” Gramps said, then leaned down again.
This time their kiss was sweeter, but no less potent. They were both breathing hard by the time he pulled back once more.
She grinned up at him. “Making out in your supersecret safe room is kinda fun.”
Gramps chuckled. “Got to say, this is the most fun I’ve ever had in here.”
She took a deep breath, then said in a low, serious tone, “I want you, Leo. But Mario comes first.”
He nodded. “As he should,” he agreed.
“It’s always been the two of us against the world,” she went on. “I don’t know how or when we’ll get to—”
Gramps put his finger over her lips, stopping her words. “I’d never ask you to do anything that might confuse or worry Mario. Nothing changes between us. I’ll hang over at your apartment and go home at the end of the night. You guys can come over to my house, and we’ll make dinner, continue to work on decorating Mario’s room, and you can stay, or I’ll take you home.
“This is all new to me, but this isn’t a short-term fling. I want you, Cass. I want to make love to you so badly my cock is dripping right now just thinking about it. But I’m not a horny teenager anymore. I’ve got a hand; I can take care of myself. When we make love for the first time, it’s going to be because it’s the right time and place. Where we don’t have to worry about Mario or having to rush things. That might be tonight, or it might be two months from now, but it doesn’t change how I feel about you. Okay?”
She nodded, and Gramps could see the relief in her eyes. “I don’t want you to think I’m a tease.”
Gramps snorted. “No chance of that. You’re a grown adult with a child she needs to look out for. I respect you too much to take you in some closet when we have a ten-minute break or something. I’m not saying the time won’t come when we want to do that, but not right now. Not when we’re starting out. Ten minutes isn’t going to be enough time for me to do all the things I want to do to you.”