Page 136 of The Business of Love Box Set 1: Books 1 - 4

KATIE

P eter took my plate from me and brought the dishes into the kitchen. While he was gone, I settled deeper into the low farmhouse-style chair on his porch and admired the view.

His little cabin was the polar opposite of my residence at the El Cartana.

Where my suite was a sprawling, glistening, pristine, and modern space, Peter’s cabin was quaint and simple.

I liked it. I liked the overgrown brush surrounding the property and the dirt road and the creaky porch steps.

I liked how his cabin smelled like the wood it was made of and how he didn’t have anything he didn’t need.

It was peaceful. There were no distractions here.

Peter returned with the remaining pot of coffee and refilled our mugs.

“Thank you,” I said as I wrapped both hands around the mug to warm them. “And thank you for last night, too. I don’t know what I would have done if you weren’t there to get me out of Skip’s.” I laughed at myself. “I guess I was sort of a wreck last night.”

“You weren’t that bad.”

“I was keeping my act together as best I could in front of you,” I admitted.

Peter sipped his coffee. “I’m sure if I hadn’t been there to carry you out, Roman would have risen to the occasion.”

“He would have been horrified if he had to carry me. He’s not very strong. And by not very strong, I mean I can lift more than him. When special orders come in, I’m always the one to move the boxes.”

Peter laughed.

“Seriously, Peter, thank you.”

He studied me for a minute. “You’re welcome.”

I was quite sure in that moment that I would have been content to sit there staring into his warm kind eyes until the end of time. I felt safe.

I felt as still as the air and the greenery around us.

“I like your cabin,” I said.

I like your cabin? How lame is that? It isn’t even his cabin!

Peter smirked. “I wish I could claim ownership. It’s a nice little place, isn’t it? I’ve done some sprucing up since I got here but it still needs a lot of work. New porch. New floors. New kitchen cupboards. This place is old and I don’t think it’s had much maintenance over the last decade.”

“Programmer slash handyman,” I teased. Hot.

“I used to work construction when I was younger,” Peter said.

Images of Peter working shirtless and in a pair of torn-up jeans drenched in sweat washed over me. My nipples went hard and I let out a little breath of surprise as my insides squirmed. What kind of body was hiding under his shirt?

“You okay?” Peter asked, watching me with concern.

I nodded. “Yes. Yes, I’m fine.”

More images of Peter working under the glaring hot sun tortured me.

In my hallucinations, he had deep V-cut hips and a trail of dark hair around his navel that disappeared beneath the waistband of his jeans in merciless teasing.

His hair was slicked back with sweat and he straightened to face the sun.

I crossed one leg over the other and adjusted myself in the chair.

Peter finished his coffee and set his mug down on the porch. He began fidgeting mindlessly with the bracelet I’d noticed the other day. He twirled the lava rock beads in his fingers as he stared into nothingness.

“Where did you get that?” I nodded at the bracelet.

He glanced down at it as if remembering it was there. “This thing?”

“Yes.”

He took the bracelet off and held it in his palm.

“My brother gave it to me. We used to fight a lot, like brothers do I suppose. He ran off when he was nineteen and he was gone for a few years. When he came back, he had this. He’d picked it up in Thailand, the first place he went, and carried it with him to eight other countries to bring it back home to me. He has one, too.”

“That’s sweet.”

Peter shrugged. “I don’t know if I’d say Mike has ever done anything sweet, but it is…

I don’t know. Wearing it reminds me that even if he and I don’t see eye to eye for years at a time, we’re still brothers.

” He pulled the bracelet back on and smiled at me.

“You mentioned you have a twin brother, right?”

“Yes, I do.”

“How interesting. So you are a freak.”

I laughed. “I won’t argue with you on that one. His name is Jackson. He’s actually going to be a father soon. Which will make me an auntie. That’s been such a weird thing for me to wrap my head around.”

“Auntie Katie. It has a nice ring to it.”

“It does, doesn’t it?” I smiled at the thought of my brother having a baby of his own, but as soon as I felt that joy, it was replaced by the all too familiar pit of despair in my gut.

I wanted that. Desperately. But I would never have it. Auntie was as close to a child related to me by blood that I would ever get.

“Did I say something wrong?” Peter asked.

“No,” I said, wishing my emotions hadn’t shown so plainly on my face. “No, not at all. Change is just a little scary sometimes, don’t you think?”

“I do, but those are usually the changes we’re grateful for the most.”

“Let me get this straight,” I said. “You’re a programmer, a handyman, and a prophet?”

Peter threw his head back and laughed. “That was kind of philosophical, wasn’t it?”

“A bit, but I didn’t hate it.”

“I hate that I said it.”

“Don’t. You’re right.”

“It was a little pretentious.”

I smiled at him. “Peter, I know I haven’t known you long, but you’re far from pretentious. Believe me. I know pretentious. They’re the kind of people I make a living off of.”

“I’ll take your word for it.”

I admired the line of his jaw and the swell of his chest beneath his shirt and wondered if he would mind if I climbed into his lap, straddled him, and kissed him like I wanted to crawl down his throat and be part of him.

It was aggressive, I knew that, but there was something so compelling about him. It scrambled my mind and had me itching to be touched by him. I wanted his strong, warm hand on my thigh. I wanted his lips on my lips.

I wanted Peter everywhere.

I stood up. Peter watched, his face covered in patches of shade and sunlight as the sun streamed in through the canopy of leafy trees above.

His eyes slid down and landed briefly on my ass, which I imagined couldn’t look all that good in his oversized sweatpants.

When his gaze flicked back to me, he looked horrified that I’d caught him in the act.

“Erm,” he started. I could see the wheels turning in his head as he tried to think of the appropriate thing to say or do.

Fuck appropriate.

I moved to stand in front of him. He gazed up at me, lips slightly parted, and when I stepped closer so that the inside of my thighs touched the outside of his, he reached out and put his hands on my hips.

I lowered myself down to sit in his lap and draped my arms over his shoulders. “Were you checking out my ass, Peter?”

He swallowed. I liked the way his Adam’s apple slid slowly up and down his throat. “Maybe. Did you want me to be? Looking, I mean?”

I smiled coyly at him. “Maybe.”

“I appreciate flirty banter,” Peter said a little breathlessly, “but I have to warn you. You’re far too beautiful for me to keep up with. So I apologize in advance if you catch me staring at you like a deer in the headlights.”

I giggled.

“I mean it,” he pressed. “I’m a bit clumsy. And sometimes I don’t realize I’m staring. But if you’re patient with me—”

I took his face in my hands. “Peter? Stop talking.”

He clamped his mouth shut.

Seconds slowed down as I leaned in and pressed my lips to his. He tasted like coffee. I smiled against his kiss and he relaxed enough to wrap his arms around my lower back and hug me to him. I arched my back and felt a flutter of excitement as he went hard beneath me.

“I’m sorry,” he muttered against my lips.

“Hush.” I rocked my hips.

Peter groaned.

My entire body trembled with need. Peter’s fingers pressed into my lower back.

Then his hands were up in my hair and cupping the nape of my neck.

Soon, they fell to the front of his shirt that I wore, and his touch moved down to my hips so he could slide his hands up under the shirt and rest them on my waist. His palms were warm upon my bare skin, and if I hadn’t had to leave for work, I knew I would have ripped his shirt off over my head and fucked him right there on the porch.

“I wish I didn’t have to leave,” I whispered.

“Do you work today?”

I nodded.

Peter didn’t take his hands out from under my shirt. His voice was strained when he spoke. “Can I drive you?”

“That would be great.”

“Will I see you again soon?”

“I leave for New York in a couple of days for my brother’s baby shower. But I’ll be waiting for your call when I get back to the island.”

He took his hands out from under my shirt and stroked my wet hair from my cheeks. “I’ll call.”

“I’m sorry to leave you like this.”

A smile tugged the corner of his lips. “Why?”

I bit my bottom lip and looked down, referring to his hard and admittedly large manhood pressing up against me. “Because of what I woke up.”

He chuckled. “I suspect you are worth the wait, Katie. Every second of it. And I am a patient man.”

If I didn’t get off his lap, I was going to fuck him right then and there.

So I forced myself up, offered him my hands, and hauled him up to his feet.

He caught me up in his arms for one last deep kiss before I went inside, grabbed my purse and clothes, and made for his truck to head back to the El Cartana.