Page 160 of Reaper

A moment later, familiar, large hands sift through my hair, and I hum when Anthony takes over for me. I’d never say anything, but I think he secretly loves washing my hair. Or I should say, one of the things he loves to do for me. He’s constantly doing things for me and showing me with every touch that he loves me and wants to take care of me. Personally, I love when he washes my hair—it feels so good and relaxing when he does it.

“I didn’t even hear you come in,” I murmur and he places a kiss to my shoulder.

He turns me and I rest my hands on his chest as I keep my eyes closed and he rinses my hair, careful not to let the soap run into my eyes. Without a word, he does the same with my conditioner. I reach for my luffa only to roll my eyes playfully when he takes it out of my hands and squirts my rose scented body wash on it. I bite my lip to keep from moaning as his hands caress my body. As he washes my leg, he smirks up knowingly at me, but the smug bastard just keeps washing my body.

As he continues, I feel stress leeching out of my muscles and in its place, tiredness creeps in.

I go to grab his shampoo, but he gently grasps my hands and shuts off the water.

“I already showered, Darlin’. I just wanted to do this for you.”

He opens the door and I sigh happily as he drapes a warm towel around me and I realize he must have put one on the warmer because I know I didn’t. He then wraps a towel around his waist and I bite back a moan at seeing him aroused, but then my eyes droop as he rubs my body dry with the towel. When he’s done, I damn near melt into a puddle when he squirts a generous amount of my body lotion into his hands and rubs it into my skin, gently massaging my muscles as he does.

I groan in bliss when his hands get to my shoulders. “You keep this up and I’ll be asleep in no time.”

He chuckles and after a few moments, I step away, needing to put distance between my skin and his magical hands. He watches me as we both get dressed and I sigh as early questions I have about yesterday come back. I never got to talk to Thor last night and with how busy he was today, I didn’t want to interrupt him.

“Is Thor mad at me for taking Miracle and the Prospects up to the walk?” I ask him as I brush my hair, but I keep my gaze on him in the mirror, watching for his little tells to see if there’s more to what he’s saying or not.

To my relief, Anthony shakes his head. “He was more worried than mad, especially after I told him what Mama C told me privately on the phone.” I frown at that and he shakes his head. “It’s nothing bad, Darlin’. She just told me there were things you were going to need to do and that I needed to trust you rather than try to smother you with protection. However, he does want to see you and Miracle down at the gun range sometime to see for himself what all you can do.”

My chest warms at his words. Putting my brush down, I wrap my arms around his waist and rest my chin against his chest. When his hands grip my hips, I kiss his chest. “Thank you for trusting me.”

His hands tighten on my waist and a sliver of worry skates down my spine at the look in his eyes.

“I know you can take care of yourself, Darlin’, but I’ll always worry. It’s instinct to want to protect you. I love you, Darlin’, and I don’t want anything to happen to you. I won’t say I’m your last line of defense, since I know you’re always armed in some way now, but I am and will always be your last human line of defense. That said, I know I won’t be perfect, but I’ll try to respect your ability to protect yourself and not smother you.”

I damn near melt into a puddle at his words and go up on my toes, kissing him. “Thank you.” I pause, smirking at him. “And don’t worry, I’ll most definitely call you out on your shit if you get too protective.”

His chest shakes as he chuckles. Leaning down, he kisses me again before lightly tapping my hip.

“Finish up, Darlin’. I bet the food will be here soon.”

Chapter 59

Lark

Tenminuteslater,we’rewalking down the path toward the houses, and I frown when Reaper tugs my hand, and leads us up the walk leading to our condo.

“I need to grab something real quick before we go to Half-pint’s house.”

I nod as I follow him into our condo, but I don’t really pay attention to what he’s doing. I chew my lip as my mind mentally prepares for what I’ll need to most likely do tomorrow. I’m so distracted that I scream and pull my gun when people jump up out of nowhere.

“Happy birthday!” they all cheer but then they all duck back down when they notice the gun.

Anthony chuckles and lowers my arms before taking my gun out of my hands as I try and catch my breath.

“Right, so no more surprise parties. Got it,” he says and I blanch when my brain finally catches up to what’s happened. However, his grin tells me no one’s upset.

I take my gun back from him, double checking the safety is still on and holster it. Licking my lips, I try to force my cheeks not to heat in embarrassment, but I’m pretty sure I fail. Miracle grins at me and I roll my eyes at her, knowing she was part of this. She knows I hate surprise parties, but she still insists on them occasionally.

“Thank you, and sorry about that,” I say and feel my cheeks heat even more. Then I frown. “My birthday isn’t for another two days though.”

Levi shrugs as she walks over to me and hugs me. “When Andre told us that you and Chris have birthdays on the same day, we wanted to do something for you. Especially when we found out that you were insisting on Chris having a party to celebrate his 18th birthday, but you wanted the party to only be about him. So, we decided you still needed a celebration, and this is it!” she says as she gestures around our condo which is now decorated with balloons, streamers, and pictures the kids have drawn.

Shit, that’s right. In a couple of days, I’ll be meeting Chris, Anthony’s nephew, in person. Sure, I’ve spoken to him a few times at the supper club, but his mom, Julie, was always present. Something about her always put me on edge and I never felt like I could freely talk around her. Anthony slings an arm over my shoulders and kisses my temple, bringing me out of my thoughts.

“It’s going to go fine. He’s going to love you. You already know you two get along from texting with him for the past month or so. This is just the next step,” he whispers in my ear. Sighing, I nod.