The Perfect Stroke (Lucas Brothers #1)(56)

I carefully get out of the bed, clutching the bat as tight as I can. My heart is pounding in my ears and bumping so hard against my chest, it’s a wonder I can breathe. Quietly, I walk through the hallway. As I near the end of it, I can make out a shadowy figure standing by the couch, bending over. I pick up my speed, walking quickly and forgetting silence in hopes I can attack fast and hard. He has to have heard me because he jerks up just as I swing with the bat, claiming the lamp on my sofa table. I close my eyes tight as I hear my lamp shatter, then wait for the dull thud of hitting the person breaking in.

That sound never comes because the bat is jerked out of my hand. I try to hold on and wrestle with it, but it only succeeds in bringing me closer to the person. So, instead, I let go all at once. I hear a muffled, “Motherf*cker!” before the figure goes barreling back and falls on the ground.

I take off running towards the front door, deciding there’s no way I’d win in a fight with this *. If it had been a woman, sure, and even some men, I think I could take on. But this man was strong when we were fighting over the bat and his voice was very male. Banger didn’t raise a fool. Run now, live tomorrow.

“Jesus Christ!”

I stop with the door halfway open. I know that voice. I hit the light switch by the door. It takes me a few minutes before my eyes adjust, and when they do, it’s to discover Gray lying there looking pissed—but somehow still sexy as hell. He’s sprawled out on the floor, which I can only assume is where he landed, and he’s sitting among the broken glass of my favorite lamp.

“Gray?” I’m sure I’m hallucinating. Heck, maybe I am still asleep.

“Fucking hell, Cooper. Are you trying to kill me?”

“What? No. I mean… Wait… What are you doing here?”

“I caught a red-eye so I could get home to my woman sooner! Now I’m thinking I shouldn’t have bothered.”

I close the door slowly and lean on it while I still my breath.

It’s just Gray. Gray, home early. Gray, coming in the door at four in the morning to surprise me. Gray, missing me so much that he took a flight out of Florida to get here. Gray, calling me his woman. As soon as I kill him for scaring the hell out of me, I might finally admit that I’m… in love with him.

“You almost gave me a heart attack!” I growl, trying to ignore the way my heart is still pounding. I have a feeling it has more to do with the thought of being in love with Gray Lucas than it does still being scared from thinking someone is breaking in.

“Yeah, well, you almost killed me, so I guess we’re even,” he grumbles, slowly getting to his feet. I watch him for a minute before walking to him and taking his hand in mine, palm up, and trying to see what he’s looking at. I wince as I see little slivers of glass all over his skin and some of them sticking in it.

“Shit, that doesn’t look good.”

“It doesn’t feel good either,” he grumbles.

“Let’s get you into the bathroom and I’ll clean the glass off of you,” I tell him. As we walk down towards the hall, I look back at my shattered lamp forlornly. “I really loved that lamp,” I sigh.

“You would have never known it. I think you could probably give my brother lessons in swinging a bat there, Babe Ruth.”

“Bite me. You owe me a lamp. It won’t be easy to find one that I like as much.”

“I’ll give you something besides a lamp you’ll like better,” he says, grinning.

“You’re horrible. Besides, that will be hard to do, but I’m lonely so I’ll let you try.”

“I’ll show you hard.”

“You never stop, do you?”

“Not even when you beg, but there is just one thing that’s going to have to happen first.”

“Oh yeah? What’s that?” I ask him as we make it to the bedroom and I head in the direction of the adjoining bathroom.

“You’re probably going to have to dig glass out of my ass first, sweet lips.”

I look around at his behind and wince when I see one particularly big shard sticking through the jeans.

Yikes.





“Ow! Damn it, woman, leave some of my ass back there, will you?”

“Oh, good Lord, you’re such a baby. There’s no way that could hurt.”

“Easy for you to say. It’s not your ass all bleeding and cut open. I may need a blood transfusion,” I exaggerate, hiding my grin as I bury my head in my hand so she can’t see. We’re lying on the bed and, even if all CC is doing is bandaging up my ass, I’m completely naked and she’s in a t-shirt (mine, by the way; she’s totally wearing my shirt to sleep in while I’m gone, and I call that a f*cking win) and I’m happier right now than I have been since she left.

“Oh my God, men are such babies,” she says as she slaps a Band-Aid on my butt. “There. You’re finished, whiny boy.”

I roll over and pull her down against my chest. For a minute, I can do nothing but stare at her. It’s been weeks since I’ve seen her, but I must have forgotten just how beautiful she is. Right now as I’m staring at her laughing face, her eyes glowing, her cheeks red, her lips moist and plump and begging for attention, the curve of her neck, the gentle sway her breasts make with each breath, I’m completely and utterly hypnotized by her. I’m owned by her. The man I was before I met her seems like a different person. I never want anyone in my life but this woman. I want her when I’m old. I want babies with her. I want to fight with her and, f*ck, I really, really want to make it up with her. I want her face to be the last thing I see before I go to sleep and the first thing I see when I wake up. I’m dying to tell her that, but I hold back, still unsure of her. In a lot of ways, CC is like a frightened doe, ready to take off and run at the first approach. Keeping that in mind, I give her the only words I feel like I can right now. They’re thick with unspoken emotion; I can’t help that.