Brawn Read online

  Becca held the front door open and her mouth dropped open. Trey brought in three cases of soda. “Were they having a sale?”

  “New Species have a fondness for caffeine.” Trey unloaded it all and leaned against the counter. “So, who are you dating right now?”

  “I’m not.”

  “Do you want to go out to dinner with me?” He smiled.

  She smiled back. “Nope. But thanks for the offer.”

  He winked. “Do you want to at least have awesome, mind-blowing sex?”

  She laughed. “I’ll pass.”

  His smile faded. “Have you gotten past it? It’s been over a year since his death.”

  Her grin died too. “I went out a few weeks ago with a guy I met through work and I had fun. He kissed me but all I could think about was how it wasn’t the way Bradley did it. That kind of killed the moment and I sent him home. I refused a second date. He was a nice guy and I didn’t want to string him along.”

  “I won’t kiss you.” He suddenly grinned again. “I could do you right here.” He pointed to the wall. “I bet that wouldn’t remind you of him. I can’t see him lifting and holding you in place while he screwed you blind.”

  “Go home.” She shook her head at him, laughing. “That kind of talk is probably why you’re still single. Does that work with women?”

  “Sometimes. I’m just trying to help you.”

  “Right. You want to help me right out of my clothes.”

  All humor faded from his intense brown eyes. “It might be the kind of help you need. You have heard that saying that to get over someone, you need to get under someone, haven’t you? It really works. I worry about you, honey.” He reached up and brushed back a lock of her auburn hair. “I’m here any time you want to talk, if you need someone to hold you or just a really great fuck.” He smiled. “My body is at your disposal.”

  “Go home.” She gave him a nod. “But thanks.”

  “Do you want to talk?”

  “Not about that.”

  “Are you sure? It might help.”

  “I appreciate it but I’m doing well. I promise to call you though if that ever changes.”

  “You can call me any time.” He leaned closer to brush a soft kiss on her forehead. “If you change your mind you know my number. I’m not opposed to a two a.m. booty call.”

  Becca laughed. “I bet you aren’t.”

  “I’m good at it.” His hand dropped away from her and he wiggled his eyebrows in a comical way. “At least that’s what I’ve been told. You could take me for a test drive and rate my performance.”

  “Not a chance! Don’t you have somewhere else to be and someone else to annoy? Move it, soldier. You’ve been given your marching orders.”

  He walked away. “I keep trying to move, damn it, but you aren’t letting me show you the motion of the ocean.” He chuckled, waved and closed the door behind him. His truck started a moment later and he drove away.

  Becca put her hands on the counter and stared out the kitchen window toward the large tree, enjoying the sight of birds flittering around the thick branches. She appreciated Trey’s concern, he’d known her for a lot of years, but she would never take him up on his offers of having sex or getting too close to her. He had enough stress in his life without adding her burdens on his broad shoulders.

  “What is a booty call?”

  She grabbed her heart and spun to face her houseguest. “You scared me. I didn’t hear you come down the stairs. They creak a little.”

  Brawn stood in the doorway of the kitchen. His hair was wet, pulled back in a ponytail, and he’d changed clothes. He wore faded, snug jeans with a black, heavy metal band T-shirt. His feet were bare.

  “What is a booty call? I’ve never heard that before.”

  She grinned. “It is a term for calling someone to just come have sex with you and they leave afterward. There’s no attachment or emotional involvement in the sex.”

  He nodded. “I’ll remember. Is that a normal human custom?”

  “For some but not me. He was just joking.”

  “That man who was here is your lover?”

  She shook her head. “He’s my friend. He will be working with you on the task force. He’ll be your team leader if you are replacing Jessie Dupree. You should like him. He’s got a good sense of humor so hopefully you appreciate that in a person. I know I do. Your food and uniforms are here. He also brought you lots of soda.”

  “Thank you. Human friends offer booty calls to each other? I’m trying to learn about human interaction. I’ll be working with them and need to try to understand your customs.”

  “No. Most friends don’t offer booty calls. Trey offers because he is trying to talk me into sleeping with a man again and he’s partly teasing, trying to cheer me up. He thinks if he gets me into bed that I’ll find it easier to do when I go out on a date with someone, that it will result in sex.”

  “He wants to share sex with you so you will have sex with another male? Is the male a good friend of his? I have seen those kind of situations in the pornographic videos but didn’t believe they were real representations of human sexual habits. Is this a common practice amongst human males? I don’t want to make friends if it means they will offer to share their women.” He grimaced. “I don’t mean to offend you but that is disgusting. I don’t want to see another male mount someone. It wouldn’t make me desire her and the last thing I want to see or smell is another male while sharing sex with a female. It would kill my arousal and I don’t want a human woman.”

  Becca laughed hard at his interpretation. It cracked her up and she hugged her stomach.

  “I apologize if I’ve insulted your sexual preferences but I’m Species and it doesn’t take two of our males to satisfy a female’s sex drive. Your males don’t have our stamina during sex. I’m afraid one of your females may be overwhelmed by one of us, if she could even handle the roughness of sharing sex.”

  Those bits of information killed her sense of humor and she sobered. “It’s complicated but don’t believe what you see in the skin flicks. Those are actors with really bad scripts for the most part, not true situations and that’s not his motive. He doesn’t want to talk me into having a threesome with him and one of his friends. I was married but I’m a widow now. I kind of stopped dating after that and Trey thinks I’ll stop being hung up on my husband if he gets me into bed. He thinks if I just have sex with someone—anyone—that I’ll be more likely to get on with my life. You can make friends and they won’t ask you to sleep with their girlfriends or wives.”

  “What is a widow?”

  “My husband had a defective heart. A widow is a woman whose husband died.”

  Brawn leaned against the wall. “I am sorry. Our people were put down too if they were found to be defective physically by Mercile Industries.”

  She felt punched in the gut. “They did that? Those assholes killed anyone with physical defects? Jesus. No. My husband wasn’t murdered. We don’t just end someone’s life if they aren’t healthy. He had a heart defect and died when a large vessel inside his heart ruptured. It happened very quickly. He just grabbed his chest, gasped and passed out. He probably didn’t know what happened before it was over. The doctor I spoke to assured me that he wouldn’t have suffered and death happened within minutes.”

  “The doctors could not fix his defect before his death?”

  “We didn’t know about it. It was a rare defect they only discovered afterward when they performed the autopsy.” She took a deep breath to prevent getting choked up. She usually did that when she remembered Bradley and avoided discussing the grim details. A change in subject was needed to avoid tears. “Are you hungry?”

  “Starving.”

  “I’ll get out of the kitchen and let you fix your meal. Trey said you needed cast-iron skillets and he put one on the stove for you to use. There are more under that cabinet there.” She pointed. “Make yourself at home.”

  He nodded. “Are you leaving now?”<
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  She inwardly flinched, realizing he didn’t understand the situation. “Actually, about that…” She took a breath. “I’m not moving into the main house with my father. He’d drive me nuts and trust me when I tell you that you’re better off here than living with him. He’s kind of a jerk sometimes and tends to be super controlling. I am staying here. You’ll hardly see me and I keep a pretty busy schedule.” She pulled air into her lungs. “It’s a big house and we’ll make it work. It will almost be as if I’m not here.”

  He gawked at her. “I’m to live with you?” A frown dipped his lips.

  “I’m really sorry that this isn’t what you expected but no one asked me before your living arrangements were made. My father had no right to offer you my house but I’m willing to share it with you. There’s a spare house key hanging from a peg on the right side of the front door. Take it and use it.”

  His chin lifted and his shoulders braced back enough to puff out that massive chest of his. “I understand. I’m here to learn about humans and to adjust to being around them. This will be a good experience to share a house with one. You’ve taught me a lot in such a short time and I look forward to learning more. Thank you.”

  She had to give him a lot of credit for taking the news better than she expected. “Good. I’ll leave you to cook your meal now. I’m going to return to the family room and get shit-face drunk. You’ll discover that I do that after I have a blowout with my dad. He drives me to drink.”

  She spun and walked away before he could question her further. All that talk about her husband left her feeling sad and vulnerable. Intense pain squeezed her heart as she walked into the family room, sat at the bar and poured another drink.

  The shit part was that her father had been right about Bradley but she couldn’t ever admit that aloud because her dad would never allow her to forget it. He’d rub it in and use it as an example in every argument they had. That would be so often that it wasn’t funny. She downed another shot, closed her eyes and hissed from the burn of the booze sliding down into her belly.

  Brawn watched Becca leave the kitchen and sighed. He knew what shit-faced drunk meant. She planned to drink to excess, get completely inebriated and he hoped his new house mate wasn’t one of those humans who did it often. He hated the smell of alcohol and he’d seen movies of drunk people enough to wish to avoid them.

  This was not going the way he had thought it would. Not at all. He’d been promised a secluded home, privacy, yet instead he lived with a human woman. Worse, he found her attractive. The memory of her bent over the bed he’d sleep in later would stick with him for a while. She had a curved, lush body, very unlike Species women. She appeared supple, fragile and would probably scream if he ever unleashed his desire on her.

  Her hand had been small and very soft when he’d held it after their introduction. The idea of having her touch him with them made his cock twitch. Of course the thought of pinning her under him only made it worse. He’d probably crush her under his weight or accidentally break her somehow.

  He softly growled as he moved around the kitchen to familiarize himself with it. He pulled out a few steaks, heated the skillet and found a plate, then got the tongs to turn his steaks as he seared them.

  He sat at the island eating while thoughts of Becca Oberto plagued him. She was a complication he wasn’t sure he wanted to deal with. He could ask her father to allow him to live in the bigger house near the road. It would simplify things but that would be cowardly. He lifted his gaze to the fridge, studying the photos that were stuck on it—Becca with different humans. She smiled in all of them and appeared happy. It was a confusing contradiction if she had turned to drinking a lot of alcohol. He wasn’t too sure of his human facts but it implied she had serious issues. Her mate dying would do it.

  He finished his dinner, cleaned up the mess and washed his dishes. He heard music when he turned off the water and dried his hands. It was too early to go to bed and his room didn’t have a television. He’d need to ask for one, he missed his cable channels already and regretted volunteering to take the mission for his people.

  Someone needed to work with the human task force though. A Species female would have been perfect for the job but he hadn’t wanted to expose any of them to human males. Everything he’d learned so far about them made him believe they’d harass her. It was a man’s world outside the NSO gates, or so he’d been told. Females were to be protected at all costs. The idea of allowing one to go into danger made his entire body stiffen. He’d tough it out and would deal with whatever came his way. Better him than one of the females.

  He worried about Becca as he put his foot on the bottom step to return to his room. She wasn’t a big female and a memory of a movie he’d watched made him turn back. She could drink enough to become violently ill and he wanted to check on her health.

  He followed the rock music and paused in the archway to the family room. Becca sat at the bar with a bottle and a tiny glass in front of her. She seemed to sense him and turned her head. The wide grin she gave him and her overly bright, blue eyes assured him that she’d drunk too much. She waved him over, her movements clumsy.

  “Hello, handsome. Wanna drink?”

  Her voice slurred a little and it shocked him that she’d called him that. “My name is Brawn. I don’t know of any Species who chose to be called that.”

  A giggle made her shoulders shake and she snorted softly. “I know your name. You’re good-looking but you know that, right?”

  She found him attractive. That fact left him speechless.

  She patted the seat next to her. “Wanna drink? It doesn’t burn going down anymore.”

  He inched into the room. “I don’t drink alcohol but thank you for the offer. How many have you had?”

  “I don’t know.” She nearly slipped off the chair as she adjusted on the seat. “Not enough. I’m still conscious.”

  “Drinking alcohol inebriates you, slows your response time and makes logic difficult to practice.”

  She laughed. “You are so cute.”

  His eyebrows lifted. No one had ever called him that before. Ferocious, a bastard and other choice names but never something that implied that definition. Worry ate at him more over her mental state.

  “Perhaps you should go to bed and sleep. I’ve heard a saying that things always look better in the morning.”

  “It’s early.” She patted the barstool next to her. “Come over here. I won’t bite.”

  “Aren’t you afraid I will?” He couldn’t resist opening his mouth and showing her his canines, curious why she didn’t seem to fear him. Human women always did.

  “Nope.” She patted the barstool again. “Come closer.” Her eyes narrowed. “You’re kind of blurry.” She giggled. “I don’t drink often but when I do, wow boy, do I do it right.”

  He’d never heard that phrasing before and approached her cautiously. It was a bad idea, he should go to his room, but worry kept him there. She needed someone to look out for her. Her mate wasn’t around anymore to do it and her father wasn’t living inside her home. It was up to him to make certain she didn’t have any misadventures in her defenseless state.

  He sat on the barstool, too close to her in his estimation—and hoped she didn’t throw up the way he’d seen women do in movies. “I don’t understand why you would purposely do this to your body.”

  “You mean the calories?” She glanced down. “I could lose some weight. I sit on my butt too much at work but it’s not as though I have to impress anyone anymore.”

  “Calories?”

  “You know, because I’m a little overweight.”

  He studied her body. “You’re very small. You can’t weigh much.”

  “I’m a hundred-and-sixty pounds.” She laughed then clasped a hand over her mouth and giggled before lowering it. “I usually lie.” She leaned closer to him. “I say I weigh twenty pounds less than I really do.”

  “Why would you do that?”

  “Lie?” She
reached out and pressed her palm to his chest. “It’s what women do. We lie about our weight, our age and our sexual history.”

  Confusion gripped him again and he tried to ignore the warmth of her hand soaking through the thin cotton of his shirt. “Why would you do that?”

  “You want to know about humans? They lie. We’re sneaky bastards or bitches sometimes. If our mouths are moving, well, expect some bullshit. It’s just human nature. In my case, I hate admitting that I’ve only slept with two men. It sounds pathetic and I lie about my age because I’m coming up on the big three-o. Thirty. That’s a bad thing to women. As for the weight, we wear stuff, trying to hide the flab.”

  “Flab?”

  “You know, those extra little unsightly bulges.”

  He glanced down her body, paused on her breasts and frowned. His gaze lifted. “There is nothing unsightly about you.”

  Her free hand reached for his and he allowed her to move it to her side. She pressed it against her waist. “Squeeze.”

  He gently did as she bid, amazed at how soft she felt through her clothes and the give in her skin. She smiled at him.

  “Feel that? Love handles. I’ve got them.”

  He opened his hand and released her. “You feel nice.”

  “It doesn’t look so hot.” She patted his chest. “You’re so nice. I hope the guys on my dad’s team don’t rub off on you. Men can be real lying jerks but you’re different.”

  “I’m honest.”

  Her eyes narrowed and she licked her lips—her pink tongue darted out to wet the lower one and her hand slid a little lower to press over his heart. “Stay that way.”

  “I don’t like deceit.”

  “Me neither.” She inhaled deeply, leaned back, removed her hand and faced the bar. “But it’s necessary.”

  “I don’t understand. You have secrets you need to protect?”

  She wrapped her hand around the glass, lifted it and took a sip. A grimace twisted her features and she put it down. “The burn is gone but it tastes like shit.”

  He inhaled, the vile smell of alcohol there, but nothing to indicate it would taste of excrement. “Don’t drink it.”