Page 70 of Ballrooms & Blackmail

“You awake?” I ask a few minutes later.

“Uh-uh.”

I chuckle at her grumpy tone.

“Shh,” she grumbles. “Sleeping.”

“It’s late,” I say. “And I thought I’d cook for you for a change.”

She presses up, her eyes studying mine suspiciously. “You cook?”

“I mean”—I shrug—“a man’s got to eat, sweetheart.”

“Let me rephrase. You cook breakfast?”

Not normally.

But I can.

“French toast or omelets?”

Her lips press flat and I see the inner war she’s waging with herself—to let me do it or to do it herself.

“How about you make the coffee and I’ll make the omelets,” I offer.

Those blue eyes go soft. “You’re a good man, Thorn.”

That hits…fuck. It hits deep.

Because I want it to be true.

But it’s not.

I shove that away, tease instead, “You won’t say that when I tell you that you drool when you sleep.”

Her eyes narrow immediately. “You’re lying.”

I make a show of wiping my chest. “Unfortunately not.”

“Thorn—”

I can’t help it. I start laughing.

She scowls and smacks me lightly on the shoulder. “Rude.”

I catch her wrist, use it tug her closer then press a quick kiss against the inside of it.

She goes still, her voice soft when she murmurs my name, her body melting against mine.

More. I want more.

And her eyes tell me she does too.

She leans in, her lips a hairsbreadth away from mine. My dick goes even harder, my desire for her grows, but I hold still. Wait for her to close that final inch between us.

But then she freezes, her brow furrowing. “Where’s Violet?”

I jerk then quickly scan the room, expecting to find the cat looking very disgruntled at being dislodged from her normal spot. But she’s not curled at the end of the bed, not grumpily staring up at us from the floor.