The King Next Door (8 page)

But if she’d been a King, he wouldn’t be having her now, and that he couldn’t imagine. Still, the game they were playing was getting harder to put up with.

Yeah, most of what had just passed between them had been an act. Keep up the tension between them in front of other people so no one would suspect what was really going on. But, Griffin thought, what she had said also carried enough truth to be convincing.

Her damn pride was almost as tough as his. Objectively, he could understand that and respect it. But right now it was getting in his way and that was unacceptable.

Like the damn deductible for her insurance payout. He knew she didn’t have that kind of money to spend, but would she ask for help? No. She blamed him for the fire, but would refuse to allow him to pay for the blasted deductible. What the hell kind of sense did that make?

Lucas laughed and brought Griffin out of his thoughts.

“Damn, cuz, you’re living a rough life here, aren’t you?” He shuddered dramatically. “She’s riding you every day, isn’t she?”

“As often as possible,” Griffin muttered, his mind providing images of Nicole rising up over him in the night, holding his body in hers, riding him to an explosive—

“Look,” Lucas said agreeably, unknowingly shattering Griffin’s thoughts, “I know what life is like when you’re living with a woman who’s mad at you for some damn thing or other. How about I help you out? We had a job wrap up last night. So I can put an extra crew on Nicole’s job, wrap it up faster.”

Faster. Get Nicole back into her own home that much sooner. In theory, a good thing. In reality, not. When she was back home, whatever was between them would end. That was their new agreement. If she was back in her familiar world, it would reset their relationship—or whatever the hell it was—and there’d be no more nights with her.

Their summer affair would be over.

His hand fisted around the bottle of beer. Griffin wasn’t ready for it to be over. On the heels of that realization came a quick mental disclaimer: it wasn’t that he wanted a
permanent
thing with Nicole. Nothing like that. But he
did
want more than a measly few days.

“No,” he heard himself say. Lucas looked at him with surprise.

“Seriously? Why the hell not?”

Good question. “Because there’s no hurry,” he muttered, “that’s why not.”

“Uh-huh.” Lucas took a drink of his beer and leaned against the kitchen counter. “Sell that to somebody else, because I’m not buying it.”

Griffin gave his cousin the nearly legendary King freezing stare, designed to shake anyone who dared cross a King. Problem was, it didn’t work on the family. Lucas merely shook his head in pity.

“Fine. You don’t have to buy it, Lucas.”

“Right.” He snorted. “You’re trying to freeze me out, and it’s not working.”

“What will?” Griffin asked.

“Nothing,” Lucas assured him unnecessarily. “So, the thing is, you’re in no hurry to get Nicole out of here, even though she’s making you miserable.”

Miserable?

Hell, she was making him
nuts.

He looked away from his cousin and let his gaze slide across Rafe and Katie’s sun-washed kitchen. This place had become a second home to him over the past week or more. And memories were crashing over him. Nicole and him here, in this kitchen, having ice cream at midnight and laughing like a couple of kids. Him, plopping a naked Nicole down on the edge of the counter and her legs coming around his waist, pulling him deep into her heat until neither of them could have said where one of them ended and the other began.

Yeah, she was making him crazy.

And he didn’t want it to end.

At least not yet.

Frowning at his cousin, Griffin told him, “Don’t make anything out of this.”

“Oh, it’s already been made, and I’m not the one who did it,” his cousin said with a smirk. “You think I can’t read your face? Poker was never your game, Griff. Garrett’s the one with the unreadable expression. Yours is an open book.”

Irritation flooded him. He was a damn security expert, for God’s sake. He made a living by being hard to read. What the hell was Nicole doing to him? “Well, quit reading it.”

“Too late now,” Lucas said, hooting with laughter. “Damn, cuz. With Katie’s
best friend?
”

Some of the King family brawls were legendary. Once Adam and Travis had a knock-down, drag-out fight that went on for nearly eight hours. It had started at a family picnic, when Travis told Adam he had no skill for horse breeding. A lie of course. Adam had a string of some of the best horses in California—hell, anywhere. But Travis liked to get a dig in, and once Adam cut loose, the two of them battled while the rest of the cousins at the picnic made a damn fortune in bets.

It didn’t take much to set off guys with too much pride and too little temper control. Plus, it was just plain fun to get into a good fight once in a while. Usually Griffin and his twin could blow off some steam with a friendly fistfight. But since Garrett was off being a damn prince now, it had been a while since Griffin had had anyone to scuffle with. So if Lucas didn’t lay off fast, there was going to be a fight.

“Let it go, Lucas.”

“Sure,” Lucas said, laughing. He held up both hands. One empty, one still clutching his beer. “That’ll happen.” He took a hard look at Griffin’s expression. “Hey, hey, not looking for a fight. After the last time Rafe and I got into it, Rose told me she’d kick my ass if I came home battered again.”

“Hiding behind your wife?”

“Damn straight. She’s scarier than you,” Lucas said, still laughing, damn his eyes. “You do know that when Katie gets back, if she finds out what you’re up to, you’re dead meat.”

“Yeah,” Griffin said, taking a long sip of his beer. “I know.”

Katie wouldn’t hit him, but he’d never get another cookie in his whole, miserable life. And siding with his wife might cause Rafe to go all fury and fists on him, but Griffin wasn’t too worried about that. He could take Rafe.

Still, he didn’t like the idea of creating trouble in the family. And Nicole was seriously trouble. But if he had a choice between keeping things in the King family on an even keel or having Nicole, then the choice was a simple one. The family would get over a shakeup. He wasn’t ready to let Nicole go yet.

“You’re either in really deep,” Lucas said with a shake of his head, “or you’re nuts. Not sure which.”

“Might be both, I’m not thinking about it.”

“Not a good sign, cuz.”

“Tell me about it,” Griffin muttered darkly. He was a man who
always
knew what was next. The man with a plan. Always. He didn’t do a damn thing without knowing the consequences and what his response would be. In the security business, you’d better have a backup plan—and a plan for when that one went bottom up, too.

Only one other time in his life had he just gone with his heart instead of thinking things through logically, and that had turned to crap in a microsecond. So what were the chances this thing with Nicole wouldn’t go south in a big way someday soon?

Zip.

And wouldn’t you just know Lucas would pick up on what was going on? Most of his cousins would have been oblivious, too concerned with what was going on in their own lives to be working out someone else’s secrets. Figured he had to be dealing with one who noticed more than the job at hand.

“Seriously, man,” Lucas said with a slow shake of his head, “hope it’s worth the trouble.”

“Me, too,” Griffin muttered. The icy cool of the beer bottle in his hand was no match for the heat that streamed through him at the mere thought of Nicole.

So that was his answer. She was worth family trouble. She was worth the fight he and she would be having as soon as Nicole realized he’d already paid her deductible on the fire insurance. And worth the battle they’d have the second she found out he’d authorized upgrades she hadn’t approved for her kitchen.

Yeah. She was worth it.

And that worried him.

“Okay, it’s your funeral,” Lucas told him and pushed away from the counter.

“Thanks for the support.”

“Hey, I’m supportive,” Lucas argued. “I’m just not an idiot.”

“Thanks again.”

Lucas grinned and shot a glance at the doorway through which Nicole had disappeared. “So while she’s busy with Connor, you want to talk about the upgrades for Nicole’s kitchen?”

Nodding, Griffin said, “Let’s take our beers next door to talk about it, though. Don’t want to chance her overhearing.”

“Yeah,” Lucas agreed, already heading for the back door. “Me neither. I’m doing these changes on your authorization, not hers. Hell, if she wanted to, she could
sue
King Construction.”

“She won’t sue you.”

“I’m gonna hold you to that.”

“Go ahead. Nicole won’t sue.” She’d be mad as hell, but her fury would be aimed at Griffin, not Lucas. Griffin followed him out the door, then just to be mean, added, “She’ll turn your wife on you.”

“Oh, man.” Lucas looked back at him. “That’s cold.”

“Women are dangerous people, cousin,” Griffin said, looking over his shoulder at the empty room behind him.

“You can say that again, cuz,” Lucas was saying, walking toward the gate in the fence and Nicole’s house beyond. “But what would we do without them?”

“That’s the question,” Griffin murmured.

Too bad he didn’t have an answer.

Seven

T
he following day, Connor was at preschool, and Nicole was back at Sandy’s place with a question about that week’s billing. Not that she’d had a chance to ask it yet.

“So how’s the kitchen coming along?” Sandy asked.

“I’m not sure.” Nicole flipped through her friend’s business file, looking for one page in particular. “I haven’t actually seen it since the first day Lucas had his crew in.”

“What?” Sandy peeled the paper off her lemon cupcake and took a bite. As she chewed, she asked, “Are you
nuts?
It’s your kitchen. How can you not be curious about what they’re doing in there?”

Nicole found the paper she was looking for and slid it across the table to Sandy. “I was there when they were using sledgehammers to take out my grandmother’s cupboards and the ceiling. I saw a gigantic hole in the floor and looked straight down at the dirt.” She shuddered. “Way more than I wanted to see, so no thanks. I don’t want to see any more destruction in there.”

“But it’s
con
struction now. They’re fixing it all up.”

“And it’ll be great when they’re finished. Meanwhile, Griffin’s keeping an eye on what they’re doing and he tells me it looks terrific.”

“A guy?” Sandy shook her head as if she was hearing things. “You’re taking a
guy’s
word for what your remodel looks like?”

“Griffin’s there every day. He’s been working with the crew and—” And it was too hard to keep up the pretense of disinterest around others, Nicole thought.

Just yesterday, sniping at Griffin in front of Lucas had started as part of their game, but had gone off on a tangent that had felt all too real. And she didn’t want real at the moment. She wanted her fantasy to continue.

When Lucas was gone, she and Griffin hadn’t talked at all about the pseudo-argument, but she knew he was still thinking about it, just as she was. She couldn’t help it if he thought she was being stubborn. Nicole took care of her own bills. She stood on her own two feet. She wasn’t about to start looking around for a man to sweep in and rescue her.

Even if the fire
had
been his fault.

Sandy tapped her fingernails against the tabletop. “This makes no sense to me…unless this isn’t about avoiding your kitchen at all.”

Nicole glanced at her. “What else would it be?”

“You said Griffin’s over there every day. Maybe you’re trying to avoid him.”

She laughed. “I’m
living
with him, Sandy. Hard to avoid.”

“Uh-huh.”

“What?”

“Oh, nothing. Just that you haven’t touched your double-fudge cupcake. Every time you say the name
Griffin
you look away.
And
you look like a woman who’s been having regular sex.”

This time her laugh sounded nervous, even to herself. “Excuse me?”

“Oh, come on. I know that wow-am-I-a-lucky-woman look.” She winked. “I see it every time I look in the mirror.”

“You’re way too perceptive.”

“It’s a gift.”

“You should return it,” Nicole told her, grabbing up her cupcake for a deliberate bite. Flavor exploded in her mouth and she nearly groaned. Sandy might be irritating, but she was a hell of a good baker.

“Okay,” her friend demanded, “so give me details. You never did tell me how the night of magic orgasms went.”

“Why should I?”

“Because it was my idea for you to have this fling.”

True. If Sandy hadn’t suggested it, Nicole might never have made that move out in the hot tub. And then she would have missed…a lot.

“It was a good idea,” she admitted with a sigh.

“How good?”

Talking to Katie was out of the question, and if Nicole didn’t talk to someone soon, she’d burst. And Sandy was right, it
had
been her idea. Who better to talk things over with?

“So excellent,” Nicole heard herself say, “that one night wasn’t enough.”

Sandy blinked. “The fling continues?”

“It does.” Oh, boy did it.

Every time she told herself that was the best it could ever be, Griffin touched her again and set the bar a little higher. The man really did have magic hands. And a magic mouth. And a magic—oh, God, she really was getting herself deeper and deeper into a situation she wasn’t going to want to get out of.

She was in trouble. She was starting to feel things for Griffin she had no business feeling, and she didn’t have the slightest clue how to turn them off.

“Interesting.” Sandy leaned back in her chair, and Nicole stopped searching for the order sheet to meet her friend’s steady stare.

“Interesting. Sure. That’s one word for it.” Another word might be
dangerous.
Or
sexy.
Or
tempting.

“And was it your idea to keep the fling flinging, so to speak?”

Nicole laughed shortly. “No, it was his.”

“Really?”

“Don’t make this more than it is,” Nicole warned Sandy, and realized it was the same warning she kept giving herself. She’d known that Sandy would react just like this, but if she could find a way to convince her friend this affair meant nothing, then maybe Nicole might eventually believe it, too. “It’s a fling, Sandy. More than a one-night stand, but a fling. That’s all.”

“A fling would have been flung already,” Sandy said thoughtfully. “In one glorious night. Fling and move on. But this isn’t, is it?”

“It’s not over, but it’s like a really long one-night stand, that’s all.” Good for her. She sounded firm. “No strings. No promises. That’s a fling.”

“That’s an affair. You’re having an affair.”

Well, that sounded…uncomfortable. And so not like her. An affair? Nicole shifted on the chair and took another bite of her cupcake. An affair implied a relationship. But she and Griffin didn’t have a relationship. Did they? Okay, yes, they lived in the same house. They had meals together every day. They laughed and fought and made up. They shared a bed together every night—but, that was just
sex,
right?

Her stomach jittered a little as her thoughts flew in crazy circles around and around in her mind.

Sex was just that. But after sex, they didn’t split up and go to separate rooms. They slept in the same bed. Woke up together. Laughed together. Played with Connor together. Heck, they even shared duties around the house—everything from cooking to bathing Connor and doing laundry. That was a relationship, wasn’t it? Oh, God, was she sliding into something she hadn’t wanted? Hadn’t been looking for?

“Uh-oh,” Sandy muttered, “you look awfully pale all of a sudden.”

“No,” Nicole argued, “I’m not. I’m…fine.”

She so wasn’t fine.

Sandy just looked at her and shook her head. “You’re really not, are you?”

“No,” Nicole said softly. “I’m not.”

Images of Griffin rose up in her mind, like she was flipping through the photo gallery on her phone, except it was a slide show of all Griffin, all the time.

Him this morning, smiling at her over his coffee cup. Him last night, carrying Connor to bed, with the little boy’s giggles trailing behind them like a bright ribbon floating on the air. Griffin leaning in to kiss her as he used his body to push hers into heaven. Griffin sitting with Connor on his lap, reading the little boy a story and cuddling both Connor and the stuffed alligator close.

Griffin in the hot tub, holding out a glass of wine to her as she joined him. Making love under the shade of the elm tree in the yard. Griffin, a streak of grease across his forehead, bending over her car to fix the radiator. The picnic they’d had in the living room, candlelight dancing on the walls in softly shaded shadows.

There
was
more between them than she had realized. She didn’t know what it was, didn’t know how long it would last, but the one thing she was sure of was that when it ended, it was going to hurt. Bad.

She’d walked into this, completely sure of herself and her decision. Nicole had been so certain she could have a little fling without letting her heart get involved. Turned out that she just wasn’t the have-an-orgasm-or-two-and-move-on kind of girl.

“Oh, God.”

“Sweetie…”

She came up out of her thoughts to see soft concern and worry in Sandy’s eyes. That pride she and Griffin had fought over reared its head.

Instantly, Nicole shook her head. “This is exactly why I didn’t want anyone knowing what Griffin and I were doing. You’re different, of course, since you knew even before anything had happened, but Sandy, if you feel sorry for me now, I might scream. Or cry. And I don’t want to do either.”

“Yeah,” her friend said, “but I don’t like knowing you’re setting yourself up for pain.”

“Not my favorite thing, either,” Nicole admitted, already dreading the misery she’d feel when whatever it was she shared with Griffin was over. “No, I went into this with my eyes open, and they’re still open.”

“That’s the problem, isn’t it?” Sandy asked.

Sighing, Nicole admitted, “Probably. I can see the end coming, Sandy.”

“It doesn’t
have
to end.”

Nicole laughed shortly. “No sympathy
or
delusions, thanks. Of course it has to end. I’ve known that all along. It’s my own fault if I let myself forget that, even for a second.”

Taking a deep breath, Nicole changed the subject, because she really couldn’t take much more of Sandy’s warm, sympathetic gaze. Pretty soon she’d start feeling sorry for herself and where would that get her? Nowhere.

“So—” She tapped one finger on the sheet of paper she had slid in front of Sandy a few minutes before. “How about instead of my love life, we talk about this order from your supplier for the week’s flour and sugar? I couldn’t make out the amount at the bottom of the bill. Your handwriting sucks. Haven’t we talked about you entering all of your bills on the computer?”

As if understanding that her friend was close to the edge, Sandy picked up the paper and smiled. “But if I did that, I wouldn’t need
you,
would I?”

“Good point.” The only reason Nicole had a successful business was because her clients unilaterally loathed or were confused by the bookkeeping software available.

While Sandy studied her own handwriting as if it was hieroglyphics, Nicole thought about Griffin. Again. About the end that was coming and about the nights she still had to look forward to.

She was making memories, she told herself. Memories that would both comfort and torment her long after this affair with Griffin was over.

*

“Are the new cabinets in yet?”

“What?” Griffin looked at Nicole over the dinner table. This was getting so damn comfortable, he could hardly remember sitting in his empty condo with a nuked dinner and the sound of silence hanging over him. Funny, but he really wasn’t looking forward to having his nights to himself anymore. Okay, maybe that wasn’t funny, but it was a little unnerving.

“The cabinets?” she repeated.

“Oh. The cabinets.” He nodded and told himself to pay attention. “Yeah, they’re in.”

And they were light oak instead of pine, but she hadn’t asked him that, had she? He frowned down at his dessert. He wasn’t sorry he’d been upgrading Nicole’s kitchen, but he could at least admit to himself that he was beginning to regret lying to her about it.

“Oh, good. Then the counter should be going in soon, right?”

“Yeah, in a few days.” The granite guy they were working with was still searching for the right stone that would match the description Nicole had given Griffin when she’d described her dream kitchen. “They’re putting the floor in tomorrow, though.”

Nodding, Nicole leaned over Connor and dropped a few sliced strawberries onto his high-chair tray. Instantly, the boy made a lunge for them.

Griffin grinned at the action. The boy had sneaked up on him. He hadn’t meant to get involved with Connor; it had just happened. Those wide eyes and happy smiles had sucked him right in and now the boy had carved a place for himself in Griffin’s heart.

He was going to miss the little guy, he thought, and scowled even more fiercely at his plate.

“Do you think the linoleum I picked out will go with the green walls?”

“Absolutely,” Griffin said, dropping a couple of spoonfuls of whipped cream onto his own bowl of strawberries. The cream-colored flooring Nicole had chosen would have been a good match with the wall paint. But it was linoleum—cheap, but hardly the best choice, and it wouldn’t last more than five years. The warm, cream-and-green-flecked tiles Griffin had approved instead would look better. And last longer.

She still wouldn’t like it, but the deed would be done and unless she wanted to take a hammer to her new tile floor—which he wouldn’t put past her—she’d live with it. More, though she might not admit it, she’d
love
the changes to her kitchen.

Sometimes, Griffin told himself, you just had to do the right thing whether other people agreed with you or not. And damned if he’d let her shortchange herself because of her damn pride. He was prepared for the battle that would erupt when all of this came out.

He rubbed the back of his neck and listened to Connor’s laughter as he chortled at something only an almost-three-year-old would understand.

“My friend Sandy said I was crazy for not keeping an eye on the remodel, but I told her I trusted you,” Nicole was saying, and Griffin looked at her. In the overhead light, her blond hair looked bright as sunlight. Her blue eyes met his, and there was a question in those depths that he had no intention of answering.

The fact that she trusted him was working to his advantage here. And God, even thinking that made him feel like a bastard. But he was in too deep to change course now.

“Thanks,” he said, swallowing the knot of guilt in his throat along with a mouthful of strawberries. “I appreciate that.”

Outside, darkness crouched at the windows, but inside, the kitchen was warm and…cozy, Griffin thought. As soon as the thought appeared, he had to wonder when the last time he’d been around anything cozy had been. He couldn’t come up with a single example. Not since he was a kid, anyway. Back then, with his parents still alive and all of his brothers at home, there had been the same sort of feeling he had now: that sense of belonging to something bigger than yourself. To being a part of something.