Rock Chick Rescue (Rock Chick #2)(70)

“I’m okay” to Indy, Al y, Daisy, Tod and Stevie (yes, even Daisy). Neither Duke nor Tex had cel phones.

The backdoor opened and Eddie came in. He was wearing a tight, gray, long-sleeved tee, seriously faded jeans, no belt this time and running shoes instead of cowboy boots.

It was the first time I’d seen him without cowboy boots and it affected me in a strange way, as if he’d taken off some kind of mask and was showing me a different Eddie, an Eddie no one else saw.

He was carrying two coffees and a white bag. Before either of us could say a word, my phone rang.

It was Indy.

Eddie’s brows came up and I said, “Indy,” then flipped open my phone.

“Hey,” I said.

“Hey. You okay?” she answered.

“Yeah,” I said.

Eddie handed me a coffee and upended the bag on the counter. Two enormous blueberry muffins fel out.

“Where are you?” Indy asked as I took a sip of coffee.

Cappuccino, no sugar, just like I took it.

Eddie knew how I liked my coffee.

Um… eek!

Eddie leaned a hip against the counter less than a foot away from me, tore off the muffin paper and took a bite, sliding the other muffin to me.

“Eddie’s,” I answered Indy and looked ful y at him.

His eyes were on me and my face began to burn.

Something about this was bizarrely intimate and I wasn’t ready for it. I’d had too many emotional traumas to stand around in Eddie’s kitchen calmly eating muffins like I did it every Sunday.

I dropped my head and put my coffee on the counter. I tried to take the paper off my muffin one-handed and felt a new appreciation for my mother’s disability.

“Lee tel s me Eddie’s branded you. Never heard it cal ed that before, but Lee did it with me during my ordeal. Beat the shit out of the guy who hit me, spreading a message.

It’s a good thing, Jet,” she was obviously trying to talk me into trusting Eddie and not going into a ful -fledged freak out.

Too late, I was way passed freak out. I’d look back on my endless freak outs with happy nostalgia. Nope, I was in

“Pissed Off Female with a Score to Settle” mode.

Except, of course, when it came to eating muffins in Eddie’s kitchen.

“Eddie explained it last night. I’m okay with it,” I told Indy.

I’d managed to get the muffin cup off and tore the bottom of the muffin free. I took a bite and Eddie’s hand came into my vision.

I looked up at him just as he cupped my jaw.

“Say good-bye,” Eddie ordered, his eyes warm.

My stomach clenched and I gulped down my bite.

“Is that Eddie?” Indy asked. “Tel him hel o.”

“Indy says hel o,” I said to Eddie.

Eddie’s head came down.

“Good-bye,” he muttered against my mouth.

I turned my head away to escape his mouth.

“Eddie says hel o too,” I told Indy, feeling like an idiot but keeping her on the line as if my life depended on it.

Eddie’s mouth detoured to my neck and tingles spread from my neck south.

Indy laughed.

“I heard what he said. I’l let you go. See you tonight.”

“No!” I said desperately, but she disconnected.

I took the phone away from my ear and flipped it shut.

One of Eddie’s arms wrapped around me and he pul ed me tight to him. I felt his tongue touch below my ear and the tingles intensified.

My phone rang again.

His head lifted and just before I could flip it open and embark on a very, very long conversation with whoever cal ed me, he pul ed it out of my hand, looked at it and then opened it with his thumb and put it at his ear.

“Yeah?” he said, then he waited. “She’s fine. Cal back later.” Then he flipped it shut without even saying good-bye.

I glared at him as he slid the phone on the counter.

“Who was that?” I asked and both his arms came around me.

“Al y, checkin’ in.”

“I would have liked to talk to her,” I said to him, my voice fil ed with attitude, an attitude I never knew I had before.

“I know, Chiquita, you’re so scared of me, you’d talk to Ted Bundy if you thought he’d keep you out of my bed.”

“That’s not true!” I lied.

It was s o true. Ted Bundy was gross but he’d be interesting to talk to and I was in a serious Eek Moment at the thought of being back in Eddie’s bed, especial y with Eddie in it.

“It’s true and it’s not gonna happen. I final y got almost an entire day where you don’t have to run around like a crazy woman, chargin’ through grocery stores or beggin’ bank tel ers to stay open for you. And you don’t have to work.

You’re mine al day and I have plans.”

Dear Lord.

Eddie had plans.

I felt my doo-da quiver.

“Eddie, I have to cal my Mom. Then I have to go get some flowers for your Mom. Then I have to make something, I don’t know, cookies or a pie, so we don’t go to Blanca’s empty-handed. My Mom would just die if we went to your Mom’s without some sort of baked good. Then I have to…”

He picked up my phone and handed it to me, then his arm went back around me.