Just Bob (Assassins Inc. #1)(9)

“I don’t want to talk about it,” I said when the man looked back to me. I didn’t. I was still reeling from the fact that I had been fired.

I ignored Shade as I hurried to the bathroom to clean up. The man was still standing there when I got back and grabbed my pajamas and pulled them back on.

Well, I tried to ignore him. The man was standing there naked.

Oh man, was he naked.

“Do you ever get soft?”

He wasn’t.

He wasn’t exactly rock hard either, much to my disappointment, but close enough. If the man tripped and fell, he was going to hurt something vital.

Shade smirked. “Not around you.”

My eyebrows rose. “Really?”

That had to mean the man liked me, right?

“You belong to me, remember?”

I nodded because I did remember him saying that. It wasn’t like I was going to forget.

Ever.

I still didn’t know what it meant, though, but I wasn’t about to argue with the man.

He might change his mind.

“So, are you hungry?”

“Can you cook?” Shade asked.

“Sure. Can’t everyone?” I wasn’t a gourmet chef by any stretch of the imagination, even mine, but I knew my way around the kitchen. “What would you like?”

“I would be satisfied with anything prepared by your hand, Bob.”

Okaaay.

That was an odd way of saying something, very formal.

“I could make eggs and bacon.” I gave Shade a long look from the top of his head down to his toes. Wow, he was a big dude. “And pancakes. You look like you could eat a stack of pancakes.”

And an entire side of beef.

“I would be delighted to eat whatever you prepare.”

Huh.

Weird guy.

Oh well.

I shook off my misgivings and headed for the kitchen. I walked to the fridge and started pulling out items to make the meal. Eggs, butter, bacon, green onions, cheese. When I turned around, I admit it, I screamed and dropped the stuff in my hands.

Shade quickly reached out and grabbed everything before it could hit the floor, setting it on the counter next to the stove.

I pressed my hand to my chest, my heart beating so fast, I feared it would jump right out of my chest. “Don’t scare me like that.”

I was disappointed to see the man in pants.

“My apologies, little one.”

“Bob.”

Shade smiled. “Bob.”

Somehow, it sounded different coming from Shade, almost…intriguing.

That couldn’t be right.

Bob was not an intriguing name.

“Is there anything you can’t eat?” I needed to get my mind off of how Shade said my name, or I would mess this up before it even got started. That was assuming something had been started. I still wasn’t sure.

I didn’t help that the man was standing there in nothing but his pants, which seemed to hug his thighs as if afraid to let go. I finally understood the term “second skin.”

Damn.

“Not that I am aware of.”

“Really?”

Huh. Most people were allergic to something, even if they never really had a reaction to it.

“Are you?” Shade asked.

“Oh yeah.” I laughed because there had been some hairy situations when I was younger. Once my mother figured out what was making me look like a giant raspberry, things got better. “Strawberries.”

“You’re allergic to strawberries?”

“Very. Like, hives all over my body allergic.”

“Anything else?”

“No, not that I know of.”

“I’ll remember.”

I glanced up. “Why?”

I seem to be asking that a lot.

“Because I would never do anything that would put you in danger, even if it was something as simple as feeding you strawberries.”

“Oh.” I suppose that made sense.

I broke several eggs into a bowl and then chopped the green onions and set them aside. I wanted to get the bacon and pancakes going first. Eggs didn’t take long to cook.

“Have you seen my cat?” I asked as I looked around. Mustachio usually came running when I was in the kitchen, hoping I’d drop something he could eat.

Mustachio was ruled by his stomach.

“He’s under your bed.”

I stopped what I was doing and looked up. “My thirty-pound cat is under my bed?”

How?

Shade grinned as he nodded. “We had a little disagreement about who was the more dominant cat. I won.”

I snickered. It wasn’t a pretty sound, but I couldn’t help it. I was amused. I made funny noises when I was amused. “What’d you do? Hiss at him?”

“Yes.”

I blinked. “You hissed at my cat?”

“He hissed first.”

“What are you? Five?”

I just stared when Shade chuckled. It changed the whole demeanor of the man and made him almost less like a cold-blooded killer.

Wow. I was going there again.

“Were you really going to kill me?”

Shade let out a breath, the smile falling from his lips. “It’s what I do, Bob.”

Huh.