Takedown Teague (Caged #1)(35)

We didn’t waste any time but went straight back to her place and got to work. Tria shoved items into some empty beer crates I brought over from Feet First, and I carried them up to my apartment—our apartment—and stacked them in the living room.

Our apartment.

I smiled a little at the thought as I set a crate of freaking heavy books down next to my rowing machine in the living room. Though it was staying cool outside, I was sweating up a storm going back and forth, carrying boxes between apartments. I pulled up the edge of my T-shirt and wiped it over my face, and then I headed back downstairs.

We had both agreed the best thing to do was just to get stuff moved so the landlord would have no excuse to keep her security deposit. The extra money would come in really handy if she were to get it back. I had my doubts, but I knew the landlord wouldn’t return a nickel if she wasn’t totally out of the place on time. Sure, there were laws about evicting people, but you had to be able to afford to take the landlord to court. No one in this building could manage that. Given that it was the last day of the month, there was no chance of leniency, so we focused on just getting everything out as quickly as possible.

“This is just about it,” Tria said as I walked back in. “There are a few more things in the bathroom to pack up, but I should be able to fit them in here.”

She held up the Beast Bag.

“Well, if I had known we could pack stuff in that thing,”—I grinned—“I wouldn’t have bothered to bring those crates from the bar. Here, let me shove the fridge in there…”

I moved across the floor and wrapped my arms around the front of the refrigerator and acted as if I were going to pick it up.

“Don’t be ridiculous.” Tria sighed, but she also smiled slightly and shook her head at me. “There are two more boxes in the kitchen, one in the bedroom, and the bathroom stuff. I think that’s it. I’ll just need to clean everything off and then tell the landlord I’m out.”

“I’ll get this stuff upstairs,” I said. I picked up the kitchen boxes, dropped them off on my kitchen table, and ran back down for the last bits.

Tria was already vacuuming the floors when I got there, and she spent the next hour cleaning the whole place up. She seemed to think having it nice and clean was going to make any difference in the landlord’s decision to return her deposit. I wasn’t so sure, but we had plenty of time before three o’clock, and it certainly couldn’t hurt.

I went upstairs, grabbed two beers, and brought them back down. I popped the caps off and handed a beer to Tria, who paused from cleaning the countertop to sit and eye the bottle a bit before shrugging and having a drink.

“Better than apple juice?” I asked, teasing.

“No,” she replied seriously. “Not really.”

I laughed because she was right. The beer was cheap and not very good. It was cold, though, and there was something about beer and physical labor that just went together.

“Oh! I almost forgot!” Tria jumped up and opened the refrigerator. She brought out a small paper plate with two large, red apples coated in caramel. There was a big Popsicle stick shoved into the top of each one.

“What’s this?” I asked.

“Caramel apples!” Tria announced. “I thought they would be appropriate, and it is Halloween.”

“Oh yeah,” I said with a nod. I hadn’t really thought about it, but I couldn’t argue with the date. The apples were crunchy, and the caramel was gooey and sweeter than I remembered from childhood. “This is different than the ones I’ve had before.”

“How so?” Tria asked. She looked up at me through her lashes, appearing apprehensive.

“The caramel is different,” I said. “It’s…sweeter, maybe? Definitely stickier.”

“Is that bad?”

“No,” I replied, “I like it this way.”

“Good,” she said as she smiled. “I made it from scratch.”

“You made caramel?”

“Yep,” she said, and she licked a bit off her lip.

I could have helped with that.

“So, you really do like it?”

Yeah…I’d definitely like to lick the caramel off…

“Liam?”

“Hmm? Oh…sorry.” I swallowed the mouthful of apple and tried to focus. “What did you say?”

Tria gave me a weird look and shook her head minutely.

“I asked if you liked the apple.”

“Yeah! It’s awesome!”

“See, I was thinking about this whole mooching off you thing,” she said, but I interrupted her.

“I told you, it’s not mooching,” I said. “We’re just helping each other out.”

“Yeah, whatever,” Tria said dismissively. She waved her hand around a bit, trying to make her point. “It’s seriously lopsided, but I’m not going to argue about that any more. Anyway, I thought maybe I could even it up a little by doing the cooking.”

“Cooking?”

“Yes,” she said as she looked through her lashes again at me. I tried not to focus on her when she did that because it did funny things to my cock. “I like cooking, but it never seems worth it for just me.”

“Cooking,” I said again.