“No, you really don’t!” I leaned back in my chair, eyes wide.
Aiden was still laughing so hard he could barely keep his arm up as he teased me. “I’ll even feed it to you—we’ll call it foreplay.”
A shot of desire hit my stomach hearing his deep voice say that, but I was able to maintain my sanity for the time being and dodged the piece of cake in his hands. “Kinlee! We are not friends for the rest of the day and no free cupcakes all next week.”
She gasped. “What? That is beyond rude! Jace, hold her arms down!”
I slipped out of the chair, darted past Jace, and took off for the living room. It was just like Kinlee to say something like that in front of guys I’d just met—one of whom she was trying to set me up with—but they didn’t understand, it was really embarrassing the way I reacted to my sweets. No way in hell I was gonna allow them to feed me!
I’d just rounded the corner leading out of the living room when I ran into a brick wall. The wall’s hands shot out and grabbed my upper arms to steady me at the same time I reached out and grabbed broad shoulders in an attempt to keep myself upright and looked up. I inhaled audibly, and his gray eyes widened as his lips separated. My chest was rising and falling quicker than normal, and it had absolutely nothing to do with running away from Jace or running into the most incredible-looking man I’d ever seen, but damn if it didn’t have everything to do with the man himself.
He was looking at me as if he’d just found what he’d been looking for—and the look was so open, so intense, it sent a shiver running down my spine. It should have scared me, but it somehow felt like what I was looking at was a reflection of what I was feeling.
And that just made no sense. I wasn’t looking for anyone. But this man? Yeah, I’d found everything I’d never even known I’d been looking for . . . in him. I could feel it in the way I felt like I needed to be closer to him than I already was, the way the tips of my fingers were tingling with a need to explore his body, the way I was physically aching to know everything about him. And yet, I felt like I knew everything there was to know about him, and we still hadn’t said a word. It felt like hours had passed before Jace’s voice sounded behind me.
“Kace, sooner you eat a bite, sooner this is all over!”
Eat a bite . . . what? I couldn’t remember why I’d even ended up in the entryway of Jace and Kinlee’s house, let alone make sense of his words right now. All I knew was that Jace had brought me back to reality, that I felt like I was home, like I was where I was meant to be for the first time in my life . . . and it was in a stranger’s arms. That thought—that realization—was scaring the ever-living hell out of me.
The stranger holding me blinked rapidly, and his hands tightened before he let go and took a step away from me. Even then, we still couldn’t tear our eyes away from each other . . .
“KC, you can’t hi—What the hell, you’re not even trying to hide. Oh, hey, Brody!” Jace said loudly, stepping between us to hug him.
. . . until Jace’s last word. I dropped my head to stare at the floor, my eyes wide with horror.
Brody? Oh, God, this is Brody? The married brother? I felt so stupid, I should have realized it the second I’d seen him. I didn’t have to look back up to notice that he was practically the same height as Jace, with the same black hair, amazing smile, and tan skin from their Italian heritage. It was obvious they were brothers, but at the same time they looked nothing alike to me.
Of course, Jace was attractive, hell, he was more than attractive, but Brody was . . . you couldn’t even begin to describe Brody as attractive. Perfection was a better word to start with. Though nothing about him was so perfect that he looked put together in the way Charles always did. His nose had a slight bump along the ridge, his white smile showed perfectly straight teeth, but was crooked . . . and I could look at that crooked smile all day long.
“Yeah, just walked in and I ran into . . .” I glanced up when he trailed off, noticing that his gray eyes were on mine, and his gravelly voice lowered even more. “. . . Uh, I ran into her.”
“Oh, right. Brody, this is KC. Kace, this is my brother, Brody.”
That crooked smile was back as he reached an arm out, only this time it was directed at me instead of his brother. And God it took everything in me to stay away from him when he directed it at me.
“It’s a pleasure,” he said quietly.
“Jace, it’s not fair if only you see KC’s O face,” Kinlee called out. “She has to be in the kitchen for all of us to see!”
My breath rushed out in a huff, Brody’s eyebrows lifted, and Jace started laughing along with Craig and Aiden as Kinlee came around the corner.
“Hey, Brody! I didn’t know you were here already! Good to see you.” Kinlee hugged his waist hard and looked up at him. “Glad you got to come out today. Can I get you anything?”
He smirked at her, and his eyes met mine again. “Well, apparently I’m here just in time to see KC’s O face.”
My shoulders slumped, and I dropped my head to look at the floor again. “Kinlee, swear to all that is holy no more free cupcakes, ever.”
“Oh, get over it, Kace.” She bumped my shoulder and smiled sweetly at me. “It’s funny and you know it is. Plus, we don’t have to worry about an icebreaker now, everyone’s having a good time.” She squeezed my hand and began towing me back toward the living room, but I pulled my arm free.