The Game Plan (Neighbor from Hell #5)(21)

She should be climbing out of the bed and putting some space between her and those confusing kisses of his, but she just couldn’t seem to find the energy or the willpower to ask him to let her go, not when it felt so good to be in his arms. She’d blame it on the medicine, she decided as she stopped fighting and gave in.

*-*-*-*

“You look like shit.”

“Thanks,” Danny said, plopping down on the bed next to his brother as he lazily rubbed his hair dry with a towel.

“Did you get any sleep after we left?” Aidan asked, reaching over and ran his fingers over the pink streak left behind on Danny’s shoulder. “This should be gone within a few days.”

“You mean after you and that bastard ran off like the cowards that you are, but only after you ate everything within sight?” he asked, tossing the towel in his brother’s face.

“Yes,” Aidan said with an unconcerned shrug as he stood and walked over to the closet. “Were you able to sleep?” he asked, throwing him an assessing glance before he turned his attention to Danny’s limited wardrobe.

“Yeah,” he said, not mentioning that he couldn’t remember ever sleeping so well before.

Before his career had been f*cked up by a sniper, he’d managed to spend the night holding a woman a few times. Although he’d enjoyed the feeling of falling asleep with a warm soft feminine body pressed up against him, it had never felt as good as it had last night with Tinkerbelle lying in his arms.

Holding her had been…..

Unbelievable.

Waking up to find her gone had left him reeling. He’d never expected to feel that way, especially not about a woman he barely knew, but the moment that he’d woken up to find himself alone he’d felt…..

Lost.

He’d felt like a part of him was missing, which was f*cking ridiculous. He didn’t know this woman, had never spent any real time with her, not to mention the fact that he’d spent the last two months tormenting her in the usual Bradford fashion. So why he was feeling like a part of him was missing was beyond him. Maybe he should just agree to go out with one of the women that Aidan had stashed in the other room and was trying to spring on him, to clear his head.

Maybe a night away from his apartment with a beautiful woman that wasn’t expecting anything more than a good meal and a good time was just what he needed. He looked down at the pillow that he’d shared with Tinkerbelle and nodded. Maybe it was time to move on and let go of the past and he couldn’t do that by hiding in his apartment, mooning over a woman that hated his guts.

*-*-*-*

“Who says thank you with meatloaf?” she mumbled with disgust as she looked down at the plate overflowing with meatloaf, mashed potatoes, cranberry sauce, corn, homemade honey butter and a thick slice of chocolate cake with fudge frosting on a smaller plate in her other hand.

“Someone too broke to buy a decent thank you gift, that’s who,” she answered her own question with a shake of her head.

Deciding to get this over with, she opened her door and walked out into the hall, wishing that she could be anywhere else, doing anything else, but she didn’t have much of a choice in the matter. Danny had taken care of her not once, but twice and she had yet to thank him properly. As embarrassed as she was about the whole situation, and God was she embarrassed, she couldn’t pretend that it never happened. Her parents hadn’t raised her that way.

She shifted the smaller plate onto her other arm, raised her hand to knock and nearly dropped both plates when the door suddenly opened and a vaguely familiar, handsome man with a beautiful brunette by his side stepped out into the hallway.

“How are you feeling?” he asked with a warm smile and real concern in his expression as he quickly looked her over, his gaze pausing on the light pink streaks marking her arms and face.

“I’m fine,” she answered, forcing a smile as she wracked her brain trying to figure out who this man was.

“Good,” he said, nodding approvingly as he stepped out into the hall with the pretty woman and made room for-

“Tinkerbelle?” Danny said, stepping into the hall with a beautiful blonde by his side, somehow making this moment more painful than that moment she had to step in front of the church and announce to a group of strangers that they’d showed up for nothing.

“Umm, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to interrupt. I just wanted to thank you for everything and, so umm, I made you dinner, but I can see that you’re going out so I’ll just put this back in the fridge,” she rambled on, somehow managing to stop herself at the end there before she made a complete ass out of herself. With a tight smile, she turned around to-

“You made me dinner?” Danny asked, sounding surprised.

Nodding, she turned around to answer him when she suddenly found her arms empty.

“What did she make?” the vaguely familiar man asked, stepping closer to Danny, seeming to forget the beautiful brunette by his side to peer down at the dishes in Danny’s hands.

“It’s nothing special,” she said, watching as Danny tore back the aluminum foil. “It’s just a meatloaf dinner.”

“Oh-”

“-God,” Vaguely familiar man said, finishing for Danny as both men stared down at the plate of food, licking their lips and looking as though they were in heaven.

She looked down at the plate and sighed. She’d forgot the biscuits. “Look, I didn’t mean to interrupt your night. I just wanted to say thank you for everything that you did for me. Let me just run back into my apartment and get the biscuits and I’ll leave you to enjoy your evening.”