“Is it going to involve another bikini?”
“Oh, absolutely, because that apparently worked significantly better than I thought! Just trust me, okay?”
“Okay, I think.”
“I’m not so sure,” Leona interjected, crossing her arms and looking skeptical.
“Well then, it’s a good thing I don’t require your trust, Lee, because then we’d never get anywhere. Now, shall we go get food? Because if I have to be up this early on my day off, then I deserve magic muffins that are straight out of the pan.”
Kyle had checked pretty much all the places he could usually find Drea in the morning. She hadn’t answered her door, she wasn’t on the beach where she normally ran, and the gym was empty. That only left either Leona’s office or the kitchen. Please let her be in Leona’s office, please let her be in Leona’s office, he pleaded in his head. At least in there they could be alone; Leona would excuse herself and give them the privacy they needed. In the kitchen, they’d have to deal with the staff, or worse, her family. He wasn’t ready to face them, not after last night. He needed to talk to Drea first, needed to see where her head was at. He knew he was an idiot for running out the way he did, and he knew that she had to be all kinds of pissed at him. She had every right to be—it was a dick move on his part.
He just needed time to think. He certainly hadn’t been thinking when he pulled her into his lap last night while they were revealing their green-eyed monsters, or when he allowed himself to lean all the way into her lips or when his hands had taken a field trip up her tank, exploring all those beautiful, soft curves she’d been unknowingly taunting him with all day. Even now, he was getting hard just reliving the memory of her slowly moving her core against him. If it had felt that good with clothes on, man, the real thing would be out of this world. But he needed her to know he wasn’t just after her for sex, that it was her that he wanted. Her kindness, her giggles, her knowledge of sailing and the islands, her sense of adventure.
Leaving last night the way he had might have just been one of the biggest mistakes he’d ever made. He’d realized that before he was even halfway back to the staff dorms. He’d heard Grayson’s advice loud and clear on that walk back. “At some point, consequences be damned, you just gotta go for it.” This was that point. He just hoped Drea was still on the same page.
Making his way around the front desk and down the little back hallway that led to Leona’s office, he was feeling pretty confident. He was just about to the office door when it flew open and Dalton walked out with his arm around Drea.
Kyle stopped dead in his tracks, his hackles coming up. What the fuck was this? He knew he screwed up in leaving last night, but had she really run to Dalton? That was low—so, so low.
“Morning, dude,” Dalton said, removing his arm from Drea.
“What the fuck are you doing here? You’re never up this early, much less on a day off.”
“Kyle, we were just—” Drea started.
“Just what?” He crossed his arms and stared at them both.
Leona came bounding out of her office, bumping right into Drea and Dalton. “I thought we agreed on food. Why aren’t you moving? Oh, hey, Kyle.”
“They were just about to explain to me why they were coming out of your office all snuggled up together.”
“Dude, moody much?” Dalton said.
“It’s my fault. Somehow word got out about Dalton's little cleaning arrangement with Carmella and someone else asked me if they could have the same arrangement and so I had to remind Dalton it’s against policy so he needs to shut his trap about it, since we don’t want the uncles finding out, and I asked Drea to be here as a witness so Is are dotted and Ts are crossed, all that,” she spat out.
He didn’t believe her, but had to give her credit for coming up with something so quick. But the guilty looks on both Drea and Dalton’s faces told him that there was way more to the story.
“Whatever,” he scoffed and took off down the hall.
Kyle burst into the kitchen, not bothering to care if the door slammed behind him. He wasn’t entirely sure exactly why he was so mad, but seeing the two of them together had ignited something in him. She told him last night there was nothing going on...with Brig. But if there was nothing with Brig, certainly there wasn’t something with Dalton. Dalton had been out with Staci. And Drea...Drea had been in his lap, kissing him back, moaning out his name. Pulling out one of the chairs from the family table, he threw himself into it and pounded his fist on the table.
“Something the matter, son?” Miller’s voice came from behind him.
“No, yes. I dunno.”
“Girl trouble?” Miller slid into the seat across from him, wiping his hands on his apron.
Kyle looked up at him. “No,” he lied.
“We don’t need to get into specifics, son, but how about we stick to the truth.”
“Okay, yeah. It’s about a girl.”
“I’m gonna wager a guess that if it’s evoking this kind of emotion, you got pretty strong feelings for her.”
“I don’t know what I’m feeling. I mean, I do, but, I don’t know.”
Miller chuckled, relaxing back into his seat, sliding down a bit. “That pretty much sums up how I felt when I met Marta. She twisted me into knots. One minute I was high as a kite, the next, I was raging because someone said ‘excuse me’ to her on the street.”
“So what’d you do about it?”
“I told her how I felt. Told her I was crazy about her and I had no idea what I was doing, but whatever it was, I wanted her there by my side. When she told me she felt the same, well, that was easily the best damn feeling in the world,” he sighed, taking a moment to relish the memory. He looked back up and straight at Kyle. “Your girl share your feelings?”
“I’m not sure. I thought so, but, now, now I’m confused.”
“Well, son, you’re never going to be anything but confused unless you remove your head from your ass and go talk to her. And I mean really talk with her, let her be heard. I don’t mean just listening. Hear what she is telling you, with her words and her heart.”
The kitchen door burst open again and Dalton plowed through, making his way over to Kyle.
“What the fuck was that, dude? Your granny panties in a wad?” he accused, stopping dead in front of Kyle.
Kyle stood up, billowing out his chest like an angry bird trying to defend its nest. “Really? You’re gonna ask me what the fuck that was? I think you’ve got plenty of explaining to do yourself.”
“Why don’t you boys take this out back? I am probably not the person who you should be having this discussion in front of,” Miller said, not bothering to get up from the table.
“Good call,” Kyle ground out. He turned, stomping out the back door of the kitchen, with Dalton on his heels.
Once they were both outside and the door had closed, they turned to face each other, arms crossed, scowls across their faces.
“Kyle, do you really, for one fucking second, think that there was something to that back there?”
“I don’t know what to think anymore.”