Page 23 of Frankie and the Fed (Untamed Rascals #3)

I wrapped my arm around her waist, pulling her close and letting her lean on me.

I knew all about homophobic parents. I couldn’t imagine a day my mother would ever be ok with me, much less try to win me back, but she didn’t need to know that. I’d already shared too much of my real self with her. Any more, and I’d never be able to leave.

“What happened?” I shouldn’t pry, but I couldn’t hold back. I needed to know everything about the woman whose hand had pulled me so excitedly through the museum.

“The usual. I told you about my nanny already. I… she used to brush my hair every night and tell me how beautiful it was. My mom never did anything like that. She only cared that I looked presentable to the world. Anyway, as if anyone could turn someone gay just by existing around them. I know she was only my nanny—”

“She cared for you. Seems like more than your mom. Trust me, I get the unsupportive parent trauma.” We paused outside the dinosaur exhibit, my favorite.

“Exactly. But mine think they can buy back my affection without having to actually apologize. So, they pay professionals to come in and decorate the place every year. They are very efficient.” She stood very close to me, and despite the heavy conversation, her eyes were lit with excitement.

“Show me whatever put that look on your face, chaos whore.” I pressed a kiss to her lips.

“I shouldn’t love that you call me that, but I do. So much.” She pulled me around the corner into the top of the spiraling exhibit.

I didn’t see at first what had her so excited, but then there on the largest skeleton we had was an equally large witches hat, complete with a cape flying out behind it and a broomstick lying next to it like it was about to pick it up and fly away.

“Oh my god, that’s fantastic!” She pulled me over to it, and the closer I got, the more I realized the hat didn’t touch the skeleton at all and instead hung from the ceiling just so.

“Right! They dress it up as something different every year. Last year, it was a detective. Did I tell you I’m part of a coven?”

“Wait, what?” I laughed at the chaotic path of her thoughts.

My job required I keep everything so organized and categorized. It would be impossible to solve a case without being methodical and following a logical string of events. Frankie wasn’t like that. There was no logical movement from one thing to the next with her, and I loved her chaotic nature.

“It was unwilling mostly. Lily and her friends—which you have no idea how unusual that is—started it, and somehow, I was adopted into it.” Her eyes sparkled in the low purple and green lighting around us, and I absolutely believed she was magical .

“The friends at the bakery?”

She looked momentarily startled, and I reviewed that night to make sure I remembered correctly, and it wasn’t information I shouldn’t have known about her.

“You remembered that?”

Oh, thank god.

“Did I remember spilling my drink on your thin purple shirt and having to do my best not to stare like a creep as it clung to those amazing tits of yours? I don’t think I’ll ever forget it.”

She laughed, all tension seeping out of her body, and I knew my secrets were safe for now.

“Yeah, that was awkward.”

“It was adorable. Tell me about this coven.” I grabbed her hips, needing to touch her, and ran my thumbs along the expanse of skin peeking out above her skirt. The move unbalanced her, and she reached out, bracing herself on me.

“Lily’s boyfriend’s Marine buddies’ girlfriends”—she rolled her eyes—“decided they needed to practice magic. Actually, I think Grace, the one that owns the bakery, said she’s been practicing for a while.

Mostly, they hang out on the roof of the building that house all their businesses.

I’ve been, but—” She cut herself off, uncertainty flitting across her face.

I pulled her closer to me, wrapping my arms around her. I didn’t like that look on her face, so at odds with the confident woman she usually shows the world. “But?”

“I… I don’t feel like I belong there. I don’t belong anywhere,” she said, shrugging like it were just a fact.

“Fuck, Frankie, no.” I stroked her jaw and tilted her face up to me. I wanted to tell her she belonged with me , but the words stuck in my throat, clogging it, and filling my eyes with unshed tears at the terrible position we found ourselves in.

I couldn’t reassure her. That would be a lie. She didn’t belong with me, and I would only break her heart in the end.

I could kiss her, though, and I did, pouring everything I couldn’t say into it. The truth and the lies. It was nothing more than comfort and reassurance and need—need to be one, to be together, to belong, because I understood, completely, what that felt like.

When we parted, she didn’t move, but clung to me, resting her head on my chest, breathing at the same frantic pace—desperate even in this to stay together.

Her phone buzzed, and she reluctantly pulled back. “Dinner’s here,” she said after checking it.

I followed her out the back door to get the food.

“Hope you like seafood. This local place I love has the best blackened oysters, buttery scallops, and seared salmon.” She generously tipped the delivery driver while I tried to school my expression.

Seafood has never been a favorite of mine.

It didn’t work. “Uh oh. I should have asked. Shit. Do you have allergies? I just had this picture of us slurping oysters and then slurping each other. Which said like that, is very much not romantic.”

“Frankie,” I said to stop her spiral. “I have never tried oysters, and salmon isn’t my favorite, but I’ve also never had seafood outside of a landlocked state, so maybe freshness matters.”

“Oh, well, yes, but also this place only stocks the best. I promise. It’s good.” She didn’t fight with me when I took all the bags .

We settled on a picnic blanket she spread in the back corner of the planetarium, away from the chairs and into the shadows. She fiddled with the podium and started a program, turned the volume off, and pulled out a few bottles that were tucked away in a forgotten storage space.

“I see you came prepared,” I said, unloading all the food. “Also, how is this just three seafood dishes?”

“Oh, it isn’t. I also ordered lobster tail and filet mignon, just in case you didn’t like seafood. Oh, and a bunch of their sides. Really, I just wanted you to enjoy the food.” She poured us each a glass of white wine. “Hope you like Chardonnay.”

“Lobster isn’t seafood?” I snorted with laughter at the implication. “I have no idea if I like Chardonnay. Guess we will find out.” I took the glass from her and took a sip, trying not to make a face at the flavor. Maybe the next one would be better.

“Right. Ex Mormon alcohol virgin over here, and everyone likes lobster it doesn’t count,” she teased as she brought her glass up to her lips and sipped.

The liquid left a faint sheen on her lips, and I decided it might be better if the source was something other than a glass.

I kissed her, licking the wine from her lips and tongue until all I could taste was her.

“Much better that way,” I said. I opened the oysters and pulled one out.

“Tell me if I do this wrong.” I fed it to her, tipping the shell against her mouth while the meat and chutney topping slid out, grazing her open lips and landing on her tongue.

She swallowed it down, and I licked into her mouth, getting my first taste of oyster straight from her. “Delicious.”

I fed her another before trying one directly. The oyster itself had a faint taste, overpowered by the fruity chutney that topped it. I much preferred our earlier game, and it seems so did Frankie when she leaned into me, taking my mouth much like I had tasted hers.

We didn’t get to the rest of the food before I pushed it out of the way, wanting to eat her .

“Jamie!” she cried, gripping my hair as I pushed aside her panties and pleasured her right through her fishnet stockings.

“You taste better than anything you could order,” I said as I crawled up her body after she came on my lips, covering her, kissing her, taking my fill.

Never enough. The thought raced through me, pushing me for more even while it eviscerated me.

“Let’s eat before the seafood goes bad,” she said, breathless when I rolled off her and propped myself up beside her.

The food wasn’t exactly picnic food, but we managed under the stars in our own little world—the moment so perfect nothing could disturb it.

Except something did.

The real reason Frankie was here.

The real reason I was here.

Her phone buzzed, an alarm set for when she was supposed to take delivery of the goods. It shattered the bubble we had been in and brought the world crashing down around us.

Each of us had a job to do, even if she didn’t know it. Even if she could never know .

“Wanna come with me or stay here?” She asked as she straightened herself out, erasing any evidence of our time together. I swallowed past the lump in my throat.

“I’ll come with.” I stood, helping her pack away the leftovers to drop in the break room fridge on our way, and held out my free hand for her, clinging to it as I clung to the last vestiges of my sanity.