Page 14 of The Woman at the Funeral (Costa Family #11)

“Did you break in?” she asked, whipping around, her eyes a mix of shock and hurt.

“No. No, I wouldn’t do that. Unless I heard you screaming or something. No, that’s the thing. When I got here, the door was wide open.”

“What?”

“Yeah. I went in because, well…”

“Was someone in here?” she asked, stiffening more with each breath she took.

“I didn’t think so at first. I ran into your bedroom. But as I was checking your closet for fallen furniture or something, I heard someone. When I rushed out, he was running out of your spare room. I chased him down the steps, but lost him on the street.”

“Did he take anything?”

“Not that I could see. But you’re going to want to check. I think the crash I heard, though, was the safe in the closet.”

“Oh,” she said, her brows pinching. “That.”

“He didn’t seem to get it open.”

“Almost wish he did. I don’t have a key. It was Matt’s,” she admitted. “I had no idea it existed. He had it really well hidden.”

“In your old apartment?” It seemed unlikely that Matt’s family, with their thorough inspection, would have missed a safe.

“No, in the storage cage in the basement,” she told me, going over to the kitchen to make coffee. “I forgot it was even there. I never kept anything in it. But when I told the property manager I was moving, she reminded me to clean out the cage.”

“Matt kept shit in it?”

“It was so crammed in there that it caused a mini avalanche just to open the door.”

“What was it all?”

To that, she huffed out a breath as she grabbed a second cup of coffee, passing the finished first one to me.

“You know Matthew. Just… junk. Boxes of random electronics. I honestly didn’t even go through it all.

I just called someone to load it all up and take it to the storage unit I was already paying for for Matthew’s junk.

I figured I could give Ronny the key and let her deal with it all.

But it felt wrong to put the safe in there.

So I had that brought here with everything else. ”

“What kind of electronics?” I asked, feeling a weird tingle move up my spine.

“What? Oh, um, phones mostly. He probably found a box that ‘fell off the back of a truck’ or something and thought he could resell them.”

She paused to take a long sniff of her coffee before taking a careful sip. She stared down at her mug for a second. “I had the worst, most turbulent flight, and now this.”

She sounded as exhausted as she looked.

“Sorry to be the bearer of bad news. But I’m glad I was the one to come up here and find the guy, not you.”

“Yeah,” she agreed, sucking in a deep breath. Then, “Nico? I don’t think this was the first time.”

“What do you mean?”

“A little while back, when I came home, the lock wasn’t locked. I tried to brush it off. Maybe I was distracted or something like that. But I haven’t been able to stop thinking about it. Because I’m never too distracted not to lock my door.

“It’s a holdover from childhood. I once forgot when I came home from school.

I came out of the shower to find someone in the apartment.

And my grandma wasn’t there. So, I was standing there in a towel with some guy leering at me.

I screamed, though, and my neighbor came brandishing her cast iron frying pan.

It was terrifying. And I never forgot again. I usually even double-check.”

“Was anything missing or messed up that time?”

“Not that I ever found. I brushed it off. But I don’t think I can do that anymore.”

There was a quiver in her voice before she took a sip of her coffee.

“I need a security system.”

“Yeah,” I agreed. “I can help you with that. Zeno is actually really good at installing them.”

“Okay,” she agreed, sounding numb. “That would be good,” she added.

“Hey, honey, why don’t you go take a bath? Unwind for a bit. You seem really overwhelmed.”

She sniffled at that but blinked the glisten of tears quickly away.

“I don’t know.” Her gaze slid to the door, her posture stiffening.

“I’ll stay,” I told her, moving closer. “I will hang here in the living room. No one is going to get to you.”

Her gaze finally moved to me, making me realize how hard she’d been trying not to look directly at me.

Because, I realized as her gaze slid helplessly down, I was once again in nothing but a pair of sleep pants. These ones were at least navy, so she couldn’t see the whole outline of my cock. But that didn’t mean I didn’t catch her looking. Just for a second before her head snapped back up.

“I can’t ask you to—”

“You’re not. I’m offering.”

Fuck, did her dark eyes look pretty when her lids were all heavy like that.

“Okay. Thank you,” she said, giving me a wobbly smile, then moving past me, taking her coffee and her suitcase with her.

If I knew anything about her, she’d stash it in her closet to deal with as soon as possible. She wasn’t someone who let tasks like that pile up.

Alone, I sipped my banana bread coffee and pretended I wasn’t listening to the sound as she filled her bathtub.

That I wasn’t imagining her slipping out of her heels, her slacks, shirt, bra, panties.

All that flawless, creamy skin on full display.

The way her breasts would peak out of the water when she took a deep breath.

How her hand might just drift down, slip between her thighs, and tease that hint of desire until she was moaning and writhing.

“ Fuck ,” I sighed as my cock stirred and stiffened.

She had me like some virgin. No control over myself and my desires. I was a full-grown man who hadn’t needed to excuse myself because of a hard-on in a damn decade.

That said, there was no talking this one down as it strained against the material of my pants, dragging a little groan out of me.

I felt like a complete fucking creep as I set my mug down and moved into the hall bathroom. I mean who the hell jerked off at a woman’s house?

But if I didn’t, I knew I would still be pressing against my pants when she came back out of her bath. And the last thing she needed was to feel threatened or uncomfortable because of my obvious desire.

What I hadn’t expected when I locked the door and leaned back against the wall was that this bathroom shared the wall with hers.

I heard the splash of water as she moved.

That was bad enough.

But then, just barely audible, I heard a little whimper.

Then another.

Christ.

I’d been right about that little fantasy I’d conjured up.

There she was, one wall away, in the tub, her hand between her legs. To thoughts of me.

The creep factor ratcheted up as I yanked my pants down and closed my hand around my length, stroking as I strained to listen to her as her whimpers became little moans, as she got closer and closer.

Her sounds reached a fever pitch, then a sweet little cry escaped her as she came.

And fuck if I didn’t come with her. So hard that my legs felt weak and my vision flickered.

It was the post-nut embarrassment that had me rushing to clean up and make my way out of the bathroom.

Because what the fuck?

That had been such an invasion of her privacy.

I was still beating myself up when she came back out half an hour later, that chocolate scent announcing her presence before I even turned to find her standing there.

Christ.

You’d never know I’d just rubbed one out with the way my cock started to stir at the sight of her.

She had another of those silky shorts and cami sets on. This one was a barely-there pink that cut down low between her breasts and left most of her legs on display. I’d bet that when she moved around, a bit of ass peeked out from the bottom.

This .

This was the woman Matt had fumbled.

Of all the stupid shit he’d done in his life, that was the dumbest.

“Thanks for staying,” she said as I got distracted by the way her loose, wet hair dripped onto her cami, wetting the material and making her nipple press out at the cold.

“Of course,” I said. “I can stay the night if you want. Right here,” I added, patting the couch. “Unless you don’t want someone sleeping on the couch. I can have Zeno here tomorrow with the security system to make you feel better. But tonight, I can stay.”

“Really?” she asked, sounding so soft, so vulnerable that it took everything I had not to get up and wrap my arms around her.

“Really.”

“Thank you,” she said, blinking back tears yet again.

Suddenly, I wanted to resurrect Matt just to beat the shit out of him. Clearly, he’d been making any small task for Blair seem like a major inconvenience if she was having such a strong reaction to the smallest bit of kindness and protection.

“I’ll get you a pillow,” she said. “And a blanket.”

“There’s a blanket right here,” I said, gesturing toward the one on the back of the couch.

“Yeah, but it’s pink.”

“And that might matter if I was five years old.”

That had a small smile tugging at her lips.

“Okay. I’ll be right back.”

She was.

Then she was leaning over to carefully place and fluff the pillows, giving me a decent view of the swells of her breasts as I breathed in that chocolate scent of her.

It was going to be a long night.