Neat (Becker Brothers, #2)(55)

We’d paint, and build, and catalog and arrange. We’d test out equipment, and do calculations on the prices each class would have to cost to make a profit, and make plans for how to allocate supplies to each class so that we didn’t overspend what we were making. We got the necessary permits and insurance — expedited, of course, thanks to her last name — and with every evening we spent together, working until after midnight, that dream of hers slowly came together.

And somehow, it felt like mine, too.

Mallory asked my opinion on everything, and I had a hand in every single corner of that space. It almost felt like building a home together, and I blamed that for the insane way I was feeling. It had to be that we were spending every day at work together, every night together, only separating long enough for me to shower and crash at my place just to wake up and do it all again. I brought food and toys for her cat and she cooked us dinner. I rubbed her shoulders after a long day and she straddled me at the end of a very long night.

I hadn’t thought about the hard drive, or the password that protected it, or anything remotely negative since we’d made our agreement.

Because it was easy, playing house with Mallory — hell, playing life with Mallory.

And I found myself in extreme danger of falling faster than an anvil in an old Looney Tunes episode.

I was watching her read next to me on her couch Wednesday night when I realized it. It’d been another long night, and she was wearing only the t-shirt she’d ripped off me when the work was done. I was sated from her touch, smiling at the way she tucked her feet under her on the cushion, the way her wide eyes scanned each page, the way she nervously chewed her thumbnail as she read. Her platinum hair was grown out a bit, the darker, brunette shade showing at the roots, and she had all of it pulled back in the tiniest little ponytail, with loose strands falling all around her face and down the back of her neck.

In that moment — that quiet, seemingly average moment — she was the most beautiful woman I’d ever seen.

I’d never fallen for a woman, or for a girl — not in all the years I’d “dated.” Women had mostly been a pastime for me, as ashamed as I was to admit it. I warmed a bed from time to time, let them give me a fun distraction from my routine, provide me company to combat the loneliness.

But, falling in love? I’d never been even close to that. If anything, dating those other girls was like walking in the plains of Oklahoma. There wasn’t a cliff in sight, not an edge nearby to accidentally trip over and tumble down into an unknown territory of emotions. It’d been safe, level ground, and I’d walked it easily — and left it just the same.

With Mallory, it was a tight wire.

I knew I was balancing on that thinly stretched, wobbling wire the moment I met her. Even when she frustrated me, even when I wanted to throttle her more than I wanted to kiss her — I still somehow sensed it. I’d been walking that wire since she walked into my office that Monday after Thanksgiving, and now, I was balancing on one foot, with a stack of plates on my head and a glorious fall calling my name from below.

But I couldn’t surrender to it — that was the kicker. Where we were now, this little hidden secret that we lived in — that was our world. That was where we could exist, and we’d drawn that line so we knew where we couldn’t exist. Her father would rip this shop out from under her faster than she could say wait if he ever found out she’d slept with a Becker. And my own mother nearly had a heart attack when I’d told her I was interested in Mallory. She’d disown me if I told her I was falling for her, and if she couldn’t even understand, there wasn’t a prayer that my brothers would.

Everyone in my family had a sick feeling in their gut that Patrick Scooter was hiding something when it came to my father’s death.

And here I was, pretending there was absolutely nothing wrong with the fact that I was falling for his daughter.

Still, there was a part of me — the larger part of me — that wondered what she’d say if I told her what I was feeling. If I told her everything I was feeling. Would she run, tell me I’m crazy, cut off what we have now because it’s apparent that I can’t handle it? Would she shake her head and tell me she wished I could be casual and low key like she suggested, that now I’d ruined everything?

Or would she fall into me, too?

I closed my book, setting it on her coffee table before I reached over and grabbed the one from her hands, too.

“Hey,” she pouted, reaching for it even after I’d set it down next to mine. “Come on, Becker. You get me into reading and then you take my book away just when things are getting crazy? What sick kind of cruel are you?”

I didn’t laugh, didn’t make a joke back. I just pulled her into my lap, framing her face with my hands, and slowly, I pulled her lips to mine.

There was no roll of my hips — or hers. There was no quick rush of air on an inhale, or slick coat of desire pooling deep in my gut. With that kiss, I whispered things I couldn’t say out loud against her lips, nipping at each one, my tongue seeking hers, hands sliding back until I cradled her neck, holding her to me.

She melted into the touch, but pulled away with a giggle, shaking her head and kissing my nose as she settled on my lap. “Nice distraction, but I’m still mad at you for taking me away from Marie-Laure and her fight against the Nazis.”

“Come to my place tomorrow night.”