Ryan (Mallick Brothers #2)(18)

See, the funny thing about comfort zones was, sometimes it was a gun. Sometimes it was a keepsake. Sometimes it was an entire apartment. But sometimes, oh sometimes, it could be a person.

And I was going to try like hell to prove to her that I could be that for her, that I would always be a safe place to land, that I could take her hand and lead her out and show her that those mother fucking wolves cowered down before me and they could never hurt her again.

Maybe it was too soon for that.

Maybe it was irrational to want to be that for someone you barely knew.

Maybe she didn't even want me to be that for her.

But regardless of all that, I was going to fucking try.





TEN





Dusty





It took him forever to make his phone call which, well, was none of my business. So I finished up the dishes and put away the uncut veggies Ryan had left out and I went back into the bedroom to make the bed.

Ryan's housekeeper ran a tight ship. Even with my slightly OCD need for things to be in the right order and clean, I found that after I fixed the things Ryan, Eli, and I had mussed up that morning, there was literally nothing left to do.

So, at a loss, having none of my usual comforts to keep me busy, I found a notepad in the kitchen drawer that Ryan and Anita used to leave messages back and forth judging by the six pages of said messages asking Anita to buy lemons and protein powder or Anita telling Ryan that she used the card he gave her to buy cleaning supplies and groceries and that the receipt was in the drawer.

After finding myself looking at his scribbly, slanted handwriting for far longer than I cared to admit, I took a pen and the notepad over to the couch and sat down to do a little writing.

I hadn't really even heard him come in, finding that he moved around quietly when he wasn't in work shoes which I found interesting because literally every other man I had ever met in my life seemed to do everything with heavy footsteps- stomping to the bathroom in the middle of the night, slamming cabinets in the kitchen, yawning like they were being paid to really make it believable.

But then the couch beside me depressed as he dropped down, making my cushion jump slightly and my heart fly up into my throat, still not used to having anyone around.

I looked over and watched as Ryan's somewhat tense expression softened until there was a small smile there. He reached out toward me, his thumb pressing into my cheek and rubbing. "Ink," he explained, pulling his finger away and showing me the blue.



       
         
       
        

When I was thinking, I had a habit of tapping a pen against my cheek impatiently.

"Thanks," I offered, closing the pad so that the notes from him and his housekeeper hid my words, always having been shy about mine until they were a finished project and I unleashed them to the masses.

"So I got a couple things from your place," he said, nodding his chin over toward the kitchen, making my gaze follow, shocking me when I realized the entire island was actually covered. So he wasn't just quiet, he was pretty much a ninja. "Found your laptop and charger since the computer was too much of a project, some bath stuff, some clothes, and a few of the books that seemed to be in an unread pile."

It totally was an unread pile with a stack of bookmarks on top, one for each book.

"Thank you," I said again, giving him another grateful smile. Good. He was too damn good.

"I ran into Bry," he said just as I stood up and started toward the pile, making me whirl back around, mouth parted, eyes bugging.

"What?" I hissed, my heart slamming again, but not in a surprised way, in a very anxious way.

Ryan and Bry?

No.

Bad, bad combination.

"Dusty, breathe," he suggested, tone almost annoyingly calm while I was running over the million or two reasons him talking to Bry was an absolutely terrible thing. "We just had some things to discuss and came to the same conclusions. Which," he went on when I moved to interrupt, "don't include letting you worry about a damn thing concerning it. You've been through enough. We have it handled. But anyway, he also dropped off your Christmas presents. It's in the box with the bath stuff," he added, casual as ever even though he had literally just told me that he was 'handling' a problem that involved a drug dealer and guys who beat and robbed me when he barely even knew me. "So, I hear you like baths when you're anxious," he went on, standing and stepping across the floor toward me. He reached for the box I held my bath bombs in and handed it to me. "I have literally never used that bath in there, but Anita cleans it every time she's here so it's clean and it's all yours. Take all the time you need."

All the time I'd need?

To come to terms with a guy I was maybe developing feelings for for the first time in years that barely knew me somehow 'handling' my problem with illegal prescription drug distribution?

Yeah, I was pretty sure there wasn't enough hot water in the building to last me until I came to grips with that kind of thing.

"While you do that, I will start getting things ready for later."

"Later?" I repeated, my mind going in too many directions to decipher what that meant.

His head ducked a bit, eyes warm, smile sweet. "New Years Eve, honey. We have a date." 

A date.

I was pretty sure I actually freaking blushed at that word.

It had been so long since I had something as normal as a date with a man.

"Right," I agreed with a hesitant smile.

"I got confetti cannons," he added, looking almost a little sheepish at the idea.

Seeing that, I felt some of my tension melt away. If there were things that made him feel a little uncertain, and those things were freaking confetti cannons, then he seemed a bit more human to me.

"Sounds good," I said, genuinely meaning it.

Then I went ahead and took a bath of a respectable length. By my standards. So it was a two hour long bath by normal standards.

But, well, after the anxiety melted away some about Bry and all that, another idea crossed my mind. I was having a date. With a man I had already made out with and, sort of, dry-humped in my living room the week before. So, if things followed the way they would usually, those things and more could happen.

That meant, um, that some extra attention needed to be paid to some grooming.

So I did that and I slathered on lotion he had packed for me and slipped into the clothes he had picked out, feeling just the smallest bit of embarrassment at knowing he had gone through my underwear drawer seeing as he had matching bras and panties all stacked in the kitchen.

But, if things went the way I hoped, and was somewhat mildly terrified they might, the end game was for him to see my panties and bras anyway. Preferably as he pulled them off. Maybe with his teeth.

Okay.

I was getting ahead of myself.

When I walked back out, Ryan was in the kitchen chopping vegetables and put them on a platter that I would put good money on the fact that he hadn't bought it for himself. What man thought of things like having serving platters?

"Feel better?" he asked, having somehow heard me even with his back to me.

"Yes, thanks. Um, where did all my stuff go?" I asked, walking over to the island that had been stacked when I left but was suddenly only covered in snacky foods for our little New Years Eve date. Even the idea of that made my belly do a little butterfly flutter, something I wasn't sure I experienced since high school.

"Clothes are in the second drawer in the bedroom. You took your bath stuff. Your laptop and books are on the coffee table in the living room."

He was... moving me in?

I mean moving the books and laptop to the living room wasn't strange at all; he needed the counter space to put out the spread. But putting my clothes in his dresser? He was the kind of man who dressed well; he had to have used all his dresser drawers. So had he emptied one out for me?

"You didn't have to..."

"I figured you're not feeling too comfortable with your apartment now. You seem good here."

He let that hang, waiting I thought, for some kind of agreement. "I am," I agreed, taking a look around. It was nothing like my apartment. Everything was dark and streamlined. While my apartment was always neat, I had knickknacks and personal items to make it feel homey. Ryan didn't have much in the way of that aside from maybe the framed pictures of his nieces. It shouldn't have been comfortable to me. It was the opposite of everything I thought I found relaxing. But somehow, it still was. Maybe because it was so much of him. Maybe my comfort wasn't in the place itself, but the person who owned it, who lived in it, who touched everything inside it.

"Good. And like I said, you're welcome for as long as you need. It made sense to put things away."

He said it so casually, shrugging it off like it was no big deal that I almost believed it. That was until I remembered the boyfriend I dated from eighteen to twenty-two wouldn't let me have a drawer at his place until I demanded it with an ultimatum.



       
         
       
        

It said something when a man willingly, without having been asked, made room for you.

And right about then was when the full weight of understanding came over me- I was going to be living with Ryan freaking Mallick.