KAGE (KAGE Trilogy #1) (22 page)

“I don’t mind. I’m used to taking care of boo-boos.” He reached up to ruffle my hair, like I truly was a kid in need of nursing. “The difference is, they’re usually my own.”

He stood up and carried the rag and tissue to the bathroom, and I heard him washing his hands. I looked down at my foot and saw that he was right. It had already stopped bleeding, though the skin was a little red and swollen around the gouge.

Kage turned on the shower. “Call the front desk while I wash up, will you? Have them send someone up to clean the floor. You can shower after me, and then we’ll head out to dinner. Maybe we’ll find some trouble to get into, like a club.”

Getting into trouble with Kage sounded a little too dangerous, but I didn’t say so. Maybe I needed a little dose of dangerous. Or a little dose of Kage.

I pushed aside my increasingly inappropriate thoughts and called the front desk. Within minutes a man and a woman showed up and made quick work of tidying the kitchen. They vacuumed the glass and used some sort of magical solution to get the stain out of the carpet. I asked if I could borrow some of the stain remover for our clothes, and they looked at me like I’d asked for free money. “Never mind,” I mumbled, and they hurried from the room.

Kage came out of the bathroom followed by a plume of steam. He was naked except for a white towel around his waist, and I tried not to notice his iliac furrows disappearing into the low-slung fabric, or the dark blush of his nipples.

“Did they get the kitchen clean?” he asked, pausing in front of the wide mirror over the vanity. He leaned in toward his reflection, checking his face, studying some imagined flaw there. From the back, his towel hugged his ass intimately, displaying those unreal dips in the sides of his muscled ass cheeks. I had never seen anyone in such amazing shape. He was truly a work of art, a walking statue of David.

And apparently oblivious to my inner turmoil. He looked like the last hour had never happened.

“Yeah, the kitchen’s spotless, Kage. Unlike me.” I pushed past him, needing to get into the shower, more concerned with washing away the confusion and dread rather than the wine. I reasoned that I was probably just exhausted from the trip. Freshening up ought to do the trick, set things back to the way they were before we walked into this place. It appeared to have worked for Kage.

The shower didn’t help me much, though. Physically, I was restored, but I was more emotionally wrecked than when I’d gone in. For one thing, I couldn’t stop thinking about jerking off. Several times, my hand had wandered down below and gotten my cock nice and slippery with hotel soap, only to fall away when I thought of the man in the next room. I just couldn’t do it with him out there. Not today. Not after what had happened.

But what exactly had happened, anyway? I was leaning toward the conclusion that I’d made an ass of myself, and Kage was too nice to call me out on it.

I’d only touched him, and just barely at that. Just a simple graze of skin.

Yeah, while looking up at him with that lovestruck expression, Jamie. You fucking moron.

“Your mom called while you were in the shower,” Kage told me when I finally emerged. I looked in the mirror and ran my fingers through my hair, noticing how long it was getting. How it was curling around my ears.

“Did you talk to her?”

“Yeah, I answered it. I wouldn’t have, but I figured since it was her, maybe it was okay.”

“I don’t mind you answering my phone, Kage. What did she say?”

“She said she loves you, Happy Birthday, and that she’s supposed to report for surgery at seven Monday week. What the hell is Monday week?”

“It means not next week, but the Monday after. Don’t ask. It’s something my grandmother always said.”

“Jamie, why didn’t you tell me your mom had breast cancer?”

“Because it’s got nothing to do with my job. Why would I bother you with my personal sob stories?”

He gave me a reproachful look. “Because I care. Because I could talk to you about it. And because I’m going to take you down there to be with her for her surgery.”

I whirled on him. “You can’t do that. It’s… please don’t make me be a burden on you. This job means a lot to me, and I don’t want to make you regret hiring me.”

“Shut up,” he said. “Don’t say things like that. You make me seem like a tyrant or something. I thought we were—”

He didn’t finish his sentence.

“What else did my mom say?” I asked, mainly to break the silence.

“I told her we would be flying down for it. She’s fussing about it just like you are. She thinks it’s a wasted trip, because she’s going to be fine. But I told her that it didn’t matter how minor the surgery was, because I wanted to bring you. A boy should be there for his mother. End of story.”

That made me smile. “And what did she say to that?”

“She said to tell you she loves you, and that she’s glad you have a friend like me.” He chuckled. “That part was a little embarrassing.”

“That’s because you don’t know how to take praise unless it’s about fighting.” I noticed Kage had set my toothbrush out on the counter for me. I picked it up, squirted toothpaste onto it, and started to brush, watching Kage in the mirror.

“Jennifer is bringing her boyfriend, too,” he said, emphasizing the word
her
.

I paused and stared at him for a second, then started brushing again, hopefully before he noticed my reaction.

“Chase?” I mumbled through a cloud of toothpaste bubbles. I finished brushing, rinsed, and splashed my face with cold water.

“I guess that’s his name. Does your family like him?”

I shrugged, turning to face him. “They’re fine with him, I think. I personally think he’s a bit of a tool. Why?”

“I’ve never met anyone’s family before.” Kage shuffled his feet, looking about as uncomfortable as I had ever seen him. “Do you think they’ll mind that I’m a fighter? I know some people don’t like fighters. They think we’re mean or crazy or something.”

I smiled. Maybe it was because it reminded me that he wasn’t perfect, but his sudden show of vulnerability was touching.

“Don’t sweat it,” I told him. “My family is gonna love you. All you have to do is flash those dimples, and they’ll be bitten by the Michael Kage love bug. I don’t know what it is about you, but everybody adores you, even when you treat them like shit.”

“Yeah?” He sat on the bed and started pulling one of his boots on, bunching his jeans down around the top in that casual, sexy way he seemed to do everything. His button-up shirt wasn’t buttoned up yet, and the top snap on his jeans was still unfastened, revealing the caramel fuzz of his happy trail. “Do you?”

“What?” I startled and snapped my gaze away from his body. “Do I what?”

He watched me closely as he pulled on the other boot, and there was nothing on his face to give away what he was feeling. “Do you adore me? You say everyone else does. I want to know how
you
feel.”

I stared at him, stunned into awkward silence. What exactly was he asking me? Did he want to know if I felt the way everyone else did about him? Because that one was easy to answer; I was just as enamored of Michael Kage as all of the fans he’d been racking up, and every person who got pulled into his gravity just by being near him. He was magnetic, irresistible, and special in a way I couldn’t quite put my finger on.

But if he was asking something else, something
more
…

But he couldn’t be. I was the one acting like I had a schoolgirl crush. The one whose knees got wobbly every time he got too close.

“Do you mean—” I took two faltering steps toward him on rubber legs, wondering what had happened to my muscles. They’d been there a moment ago. “I don’t— I can’t—I don’t know—”

Oh, Jesus. This is… impossible. I can’t tell him how I really feel.

“You don’t know?” He tilted his head at me, like he was trying to read me from a different angle. “It’s not exactly rocket science, Jamie. Stop over-thinking for once. It’s either yes or no, simple as that. Yes. Or. No.”

“Fuck you, Kage.” I don’t know why those were the words that came out of my mouth. They weren’t at all what I was thinking, but the way he was pressing me had me ready to bolt. I wanted to escape, so that I didn’t have to admit the uncomfortable truth that I felt more for Kage than I was supposed to. That I was some sort of freak.

“Hey, come here,” he said, his eyes softening. But instead of waiting for me to come to him, he stood up and closed the distance between us himself. His open shirt fluttered at his sides, exposing those ungodly abs and those smooth flanks that always seemed to draw my eyes.

“Uh…” I made a sound, a helpless little squeak, and felt my face flood with shame.

Kage stopped directly in front of me. “I just want to know how you feel about me is all. I’m not sure how else to find out besides asking.” He chose his next words carefully, slowly. “I know I’m reckless, at least when it comes to my life. But when it comes to something that really matters, I can’t afford to be reckless. I have to be careful, you know?” He took a deep breath, ran a hand over his head. “I’m trying to say something here, if you’ll let me. You know I have to be careful, but I’m asking—”

“Yes.” I hadn’t wanted to say the word, but it came out anyway. And there it was, on the air between us.

“Yeah?” He grinned, but there was something vulnerable in his eyes.

“Hell, yeah,” I assured him, this time with more energy.

Kage nodded, still smiling, then turned away and finished getting dressed. And that was it.

He seemed awfully chipper as he buttoned his clothes up, but I was confused. I couldn’t help wondering what I’d just confirmed. What exactly had we been talking about? Because for a minute there, it had seemed like—

No, I couldn’t afford to think crazy thoughts like that. And there was Kage busy getting dressed like it was just any other day. Not like I’d just admitted—

Oh. My. God. I might as well walk out into the middle of traffic and kill myself.

I’d just admitted that I had feelings for Kage. Whether he’d meant it that way or not, that’s what
I
had meant. No more pretending I was just horny, or that what I was feeling was a simple case of hero worship. Nope. The truth was I had a humdinger of a gay crush on my client. Like dicks and balls and ass and muscles and man kisses. Like gay as shit. Like…
ah, hell
.

I ran to the bathroom and splashed cold water on my face as a wave of nausea crashed over me.

14

KAGE and I got out the door in 20 minutes, and somehow we managed not to speak another word to each other until we were out of the hotel room. He still seemed to be in his chipper mood, while I was still brooding over what happened. I really needed to get past the ridiculous idea that somehow things had changed between me and him. If he had indeed meant what I thought he had meant, he wouldn’t be acting like there was nothing amiss.

Since we were in the middle of the shopping district of sorts, there were plenty of restaurants to choose from. There was a little Italian eatery on the corner near our hotel, an Ethiopian place in the next shopping center over, and the requisite Asian buffet took up what looked to be a whole city block. But the thing that caught Kage’s eye
was a little 1950s style diner with a checkerboard sign and about 10 booths in total. It had an old-fashioned soda fountain at the front with red vinyl barstools, and the workers wore white aprons and black and white striped paper hats. The tables were made of that old-fashioned gray Formica that I remember seeing in my grandmother’s kitchen before she had remodeled.

I wasn’t so sure this would have been my first choice, but the gleeful expression on Kage’s face won me over. The guy wanted to buy me a burger. Who was I to say no?

“You sit right there, and I’ll go order.” He gestured me toward a booth near the door. I really wanted to order for myself, but I sat down to humor him and watched as he strutted up to the counter with a spring in his step that made me chuckle to myself. He really was enjoying this. A few minutes later, he returned to the table with a big smile on his face and a tray loaded down with food.

“There’s a lot of grease on that tray,” I said, eyeing the two enormous burgers piled so high with fixings they were in danger of toppling over. A boat of fries sat between them, and they were flanked by monstrous 42 ounce cups of soda— the old red and white paper cups that collapse if you let them get too soggy. Kage was so utterly pleased with himself, even my grease comment couldn’t dislodge his smile. The glitter of excitement in his eyes was contagious, and soon we were both smiling like jackasses. “This looks delicious,” I told him, licking my chops at the sight of the strips of bacon dripping down the sides of the burgers. “What all did you order on these, everything they had in the kitchen?”