Reaper's Property Read Free Page B

me on the phone.
    “Sis, my associates are going to stay for
dinner,” he announced grandly. “You better go get your bread, I think it’s done
rising. You guys are gonna love this, Marie’s bread is amazing. She’ll fix you
a fuckin’ great dinner.”
    I smiled at him a little shakily, cussing
him out in my head. What the hell? Sure, I cooked for him, but I didn’t want to
cook for this group. They scared me, which combined oddly with my disobedient
body’s desire to jump Big Guy’s bones. I couldn’t think of a way out of it
though, not without breaking our little pretense that there was nothing weird
about three scary biker dudes showing up out of nowhere.
    Not only that, the bread would be ruined if
I didn’t cook it soon. I had spaghetti sauce simmering on the stove and it
smelled amazing. I couldn’t even claim it was too hot to use the oven because
we had a couple of those little window air conditioners chugging along like the
Little Engine That Could, so the interior was pretty comfortable. The men
settled themselves in the living room, except for Big Guy, who pulled out one
of the stools at the kitchen bar, which was also our table. He sat down,
leaning back against the wall comfortably, arms crossed in front of him.
    He’d be able to watch me cook the whole
time while still following the action in the living room.
    I ran out to get the bread while Jeff
turned on the TV. When I got back there was some kind of fighting on. Not
wrestling this time, but real fighting in some sort of cage.
    “Grab us some beers, sweet butt,” said the
third guy, a dark-haired man with slightly pock-marked cheeks. I bit my lip. I
really didn’t like being called that. Not only was it degrading, there was some
sort of nasty implication in the way he said it. But Jeff glanced up at me and
mouthed “please”, so I set down the bread, went to the fridge and pulled out four
beers. They ignored me for the most part while I fixed dinner, except for my
Big Guy. Every few minutes I’d look up to find him watching me, pensive. He
didn’t smile, he didn’t talk to me, nothing. Just studied me, with special
attention for my boobs (smaller than some but perkier than most) and ass
(slightly larger than I’d like).
    I grabbed a beer for myself, relaxing after
a while and rolling with it. I supposed I should be indignant that he just sat
there, blatantly checking me out, but it felt kind of good to have a man
appreciate me.
    It’d been a long time.
    By the time I pulled the bread out of the
oven the fight on TV had ended. I set out some hot pads for the pasta and sauce
and grabbed the salad. The guys fell on the food like a bunch of starving animals.
    “This is amazing,” the man with blue eyes
said, as if seeing me as a person for the first time. He had strong, sculpted
features and I decided he was pretty hot for an old guy. “You can really cook.
My old lady used to cook like this.”
    “Thanks,” I said, hoping I wasn’t blushing.
This might go down as the oddest dinner party of my life, but I loved to cook
for people who appreciated good food. In fact, during high school I’d planned
on going to culinary school.
    Thanks for nothing, Gary.
    Big Guy didn’t say anything, but I noticed
he took seconds and then thirds of everything. While they finished, I started
cleaning up, but he reached across the bar and grabbed my arm.
    “You might want to go for a drive,” he
said, jerking his chin toward the door. “We’ve got business.”
    I glanced over at Jeff, who offered me a
placating smile.
    “Do you mind, sis?” he asked. I shook my
head, although I felt a twinge at leaving without even learning their names.
Somehow over the course of dinner they’d stopped scaring me, turning alarmingly
human. I knew when I wasn’t wanted though, and I owed it to Jeff not to cause
trouble. I smiled brightly at everyone and went to the door, grabbing my purse
off the rack next to it.
    “Well, nice to meet all of you, um…”
    Mr.