Need You for Keeps (Heroes of St. Helena, #1)(52)
Shay slid the key into the lock and smiled as the bells jingled on the front door. Signing on that dotted line for the lease had been a terrifying thought, but now that she’d done it, she felt free. It was hard to explain, but somehow forcing herself to stick around gave her the courage to believe that she could make a life for herself here.
She unleashed her brood, and they took off running in different directions—except for Boss, who moseyed over to the first chair and plopped down beneath it to watch Jabba shove Socks out of the way to get the leftover kibble at the bottom of the bowl Shay had brought over.
The shop still needed lots of work, but it was slowly coming together. The walls were now a playful yellow and the trim, which she’d stayed up last night finishing, was a crisp white.
Woof. Woof. Jabba alerted Shay to the dire emergency at hand—the bowl was seriously short on kibble. Then he eyed Socks as if to pass the blame on to the five-pound ball of powder-white fur, who looked more like a Shrinky-Dinked Ewok than a dog.
“Uh-huh, and I bet you had nothing to do with it disappearing,” Shay accused, picking up the bowl. Jabba snorted his innocence. “I’ve got more in the back.”
With a quick pet to the dogs, she strode into the back room and gasped.
Her couch was already there—and it was perfect. Big enough to hold an entire family of four, yet its L shape hugged the wall in the new meet-and-greet room and left plenty of room for floor play. It was also currently occupied.
Jonah leaned against the cushions, his arms casually strewn across the back of the couch as though he owned the space. And the man looked good owning her space. Dressed in a pair of loose-fitting jeans, a soft-looking blue collared shirt that had the sleeves rolled to the forearms, and a little sweat from the hot afternoon, he looked like a magazine ad for sex.
“What are you doing here?” Shay asked, hoping that he said sex, because now that she’d seen him on her couch, she couldn’t think of anything else.
She followed his gaze to the counter to her right. And there, sitting on a crystal platter, three tiers high with yellow creamy frosting smoothed over the top and sides, was the most amazing lemon-iced fig cake she’d ever seen.
“You made me a cake?”
He sat forward, resting his elbows on his knees, and chuckled. “No. I brought you a cake. Clovis made it. After three failed attempts, and one visit from the fire department, I bribed her into making me one.”
Shay walked closer, stopping a few feet from the edge of the couch—and him. “And did you bribe her to let you in?”
“No, I was dropping off papers across the street when I saw a couple of delivery guys trying to navigate this mammoth in through the door.” He patted the seat of the couch and she wondered if he was asking her to join him—for sex.
Hot couch sex.
“And since Clovis was harping about not scratching the walls, and unlawful entry isn’t my thing, I offered to help.” Shay watched as he considered that for a moment and seemed to give extra consideration to the tie at the waist of her wraparound dress. “But with you I always seem to want to ignore the rules.”
She liked the sound of that. A lot. “Ignoring the rules can be fun.”
“They can also lead to trouble,” he said and then smiled.
“Trouble can be fun.”
Fire flickered in his eyes, telling her she was the exact kind of trouble he was looking for. Reaching out, he cupped her hip and slowly drew her toward him. He parted his legs to make room for her and—pow, all she could think about was hot couch sex.
The kind that led to naked bodies sticking to the leather.
To each other.
And more than anything she wanted to stick with Jonah. Stick to him all night, well into the morning, and maybe for longer. His always-ready attitude and attention to detail would make him the rock star of hot couch sex, but the way he touched her as though she were special, someone to be treasured, made her want to be the kind of woman Jonah would stick with.
“Do you know what this couch is for?” she asked.
He shook his head, his palms moving from her hips to her lower back, scooting her closer.
“It’s the wishing couch,” she explained.
“Wishing couch?” he asked but there was no mockery in his tone, just a deep interest in her answer—a deep interest in her.
“Most people come into a shelter with a pretty good idea of what they are looking for in a companion, but then they gravitate toward the one that has the highest cute factor, never once taking into account what that kind of companion needs.” She’d seen it a thousand times, and it never ended happily—for anyone. “Let’s say someone comes in looking for a lap dog to keep them company at night and maybe go to the park with them on the weekends, but then they see a cute terrier in the window and instantly fall in love. They don’t care that terriers were bred to be herders or that they love to climb and are by nature in constant motion. All they see is small and cute.”
“And they want the terrier.”
“At least they think they do,” she said quietly. “But one too many times of coming home from work to find their shoes chewed to bits or their couch destroyed, the cute starts to fade, and eventually something has to give.” Sadly, it usually led to giving up the dog. “Because no matter how much that couple wants their terrier to be a lazy lap dog, they’ll never be one.”