NFH 02 Perfection (29 page)

"You're giving me an e-reader?" she
asked softly.

He nodded, rather pleased with the
wobbly smile she was giving him. "You mentioned how much you wanted
one so I picked one up yesterday morning when I ran out to do
errands," he explained, not mentioning that he called Jason up for
help.

His cousin had been a little shocked
by the call, but pleased. He hated asking for help and thankfully
his cousin understood that which was why he called him. Out of all
the people who knew about his problem, and there weren't that many,
only Jason and his Uncle Jared made him feel comfortable about it.
His aunt babied him and the rest of his family was too damn
overprotective of him.

Although Jason was a little surprised
that he wanted an e-reader, he didn't really question it. For two
hours they looked around until they found one they both liked. He
liked the look and the easy features that Jason read to him and
Jason liked the rest of the technical nonsense so he bought one for
Haley that he planned on surprising her with later.

It actually surprised him that he'd
enjoyed shopping with Jason. Not that he wanted to make it a weekly
thing, the shopping that is, but he wouldn't mind spending more
time with his cousin. He hadn't realized how much he actually
missed the man until they were shoving a couple of teenagers away
from the demo video games so that they could play.

For the first time in a long time he
was actually looking forward to having Thanksgiving dinner with his
family. It was probably past time he gave up his bullshit and
stopped acting like an ass over his cousin's happiness. Not that he
ever truly begrudged Jason his happiness, but it had reminded him
that he was unhappy.

He wasn't really sure when he'd gotten
over his bullshit, but after spending time with Zoe and learning to
relax a little more he realized he was being an idiot. Of course
her telling him that he was being an idiot after he confided in her
late one late night might have something to do with it. Any other
woman would have probably been sympathetic and babied him, but Zoe
stared at him for a minute, just stared at him before she reached
up and slapped him upside his head and told him to get over
it.

She told him that he was missing out
over something that shouldn't matter since his family clearly loved
him and it was more than obvious to anyone that Jason was trying to
reach out to him. After he thought it over with the help of one of
her delicious sandwiches of course, he realized that it really was
petty bullshit. No matter how smart Jason was or how perfect his
life seemed Jason was just......Jason, the cousin who sometimes
went out of his way to embarrass everyone, but had a heart of
gold.

After everything Jason did for him as
a kid he wanted his cousin to have the best life and be happy. He
also realized he wanted to be part of it. He wanted to hang out
with Jason again and spend more time with his family. If he decided
to have children he hoped their kids could be friends, granted
Jason's kids would probably be freakishly smart and would probably
have to help his kids out a time or two, but they could be friends.
He wouldn't mind a second generation of Jason's looking out for his
kids.

"Really?" she asked, sounding unsure
and drawing his attention once again.

"I figured this way if you started to
read a book and didn't like it you could always find another one,"
he said, shrugging it off like it was no big deal, but he was
secretly pleased that he'd given her something that she clearly
liked so much......

"Zoe, are you crying?" he asked,
feeling like he'd just been kicked in the balls.

"No!" she said, sounding outraged, but
he didn't miss the way she ducked her head or tried to wipe her
eyes on the back of her sleeves. "I just have something in my eye
that's all."

Shit
.

He messed up on the gift. Damn it,
maybe he should have just gotten her that little German Sheppard
puppy that he'd spotted in the pet store. The damn thing looked so
small and lonely and he knew that Zoe would just love the damn
thing and Toby would probably like a little friend. Well, it looked
like he'd be hitting the mall again and picking out a different
gift.

It was all Jason's fault.

The bastard, he thought as he picked
up a particularly large chicken drumstick and held it up to taunt
the bastard only to spot Jason holding up a large juicy looking
rib. There were ribs? he wondered, licking his lips. Zoe's small
little sniffle brought him back. Focus. Zoe first, ribs second and
oh, there would be ribs.....lots and lots of ribs.

He reached across the table
to take the e-reader out of her hand. "I'll take it back and get
you something else--
ow
!" he yelped, pulling his poor battered hand away from the
crazed woman.

"Mine," she said, hugging the e-reader
to her chest as she glared at him.

"But, I was just-"

"
Mine
," she said more
firmly.

He held up his hands in surrender.
"Fine. It's yours," he said, secretly pleased that she liked it
enough to attack him. Always a good sign when giving a woman a
gift, although he couldn't remember any of his past girlfriends,
not that Zoe was his girlfriend, willing to harm him if he
threatened to take a gift away from them. Not that he ever gave
them anything more than a gift card for their birthday or
Christmas, but still, he was taking it as a good sign.

"Thank you, I love it," she said,
sounding close to tears again. Ah hell, he'd rather have her attack
him than cry.

"Zoe,-"

"I'm fine," she said, wiping at her
eyes again. "I just need to use the bathroom," she announced,
getting to her feet and reluctantly putting her gift down. "Thank
you," she said, again, looking even closer to crying.

"You're welcome," he said, wishing he
could take her into his arms and make her feel better. Maybe he
should back off on their arrangement and let the poor woman get
some rest. He really couldn't have her crying over every little
thing, especially now that he decided to get her that damn
puppy.

Which he was naming, damn
it!

**********

She felt so stupid.

Why the hell was she crying all the
time? Okay, so it wasn't really all the time, but it was a lot more
than she normally cried, which was pretty much never. Then again
she was pretty tired lately, but she was pretty sure that had
nothing to do with the reason why she was crying now.

Trevor had given her the nicest gift
she'd ever received. Growing up in foster care she'd gotten a small
gift from whatever family she'd been staying with for birthdays or
Christmas, but it was never anything much or personal, most of the
time it was just something that they probably grabbed while they
stood in the checkout line. The few boyfriends she'd have over the
years had given her some flowers or candy, basic dating fair, but
she couldn't actually remember any of them giving her an actual
gift, which probably had something to do with the fact that she
usually didn't have a boyfriend around her birthday or Christmas.
She'd received a few little token gifts from friends over the years
that she really loved, but no one had ever given her a gift like
this.

The gift was thoughtful and sweet and
something that she truly wanted. No one had ever taken the time to
buy her something special for absolutely no reason at all before
and god help her, but she feared she was a little more than halfway
in love with the big jerk.

"That's just what I need," she mumbled
to herself as she pressed the cold wet paper towel to her eyes. It
would just be her luck to fall in love with a man who would never
see her as anything more than a convenience.

Unfortunately knowing there was never
going to be anything more didn't stop her from doing something
completely stupid like fall madly in love with him.

When this was all over she knew she
would be broken and losing Trevor was going to hurt more than
anything she'd ever experienced before, but right now she was
pushing that rather depressing thought aside and focusing on the
here and now. Right now she had a great job, a great apartment, and
a great guy to spend time with as long as they kept it
simple.

Although it was actually starting to
hurt that he wanted to keep their relationship, well it really
couldn't be called a relationship, secret she realized that in the
end it might be for the best. When this was over she didn't want
anyone to look at her with pity.

Hell bent on enjoying her new gift,
spending a little more time with Trevor and hopefully getting
answers to a few questions that kept her up late at night, Zoe
forced all the depressing thoughts out of her head and left the
bathroom and came to a skidding stop.

"You can't ban us over that!" Jason
said, holding Cole, who was happily devouring a cookie, on his hip
as he was being herded out the door by what appeared to be a
manager and several very nervous employees. Granted, she'd be
nervous too if she was responsible for coming between not just one
Bradford male, but all of them from the looks of it.

Seriously, what the hell had they
done?

She was only in the bathroom for five
minutes, ten minutes tops. How was that enough time to get an
entire family banned?

Trevor, glaring at several young men
who were obviously Bradfords, gestured for her to walk
over.

"Can you hold, Elizabeth?" Haley said
before she could take so much as a step in the direction of the
exit, startling her.

Zoe readied her arms automatically for
the sleeping baby girl. She was so adorable and clearly favored the
Bradford side with her coloring. She really was a pretty little
girl.

"I can't believe she slept through all
of that," Haley whispered, sounding a little freaked out. It was
then that she noticed the woman was trembling.

"Haley, are you okay?" she asked,
wondering just what the hell happened.

Haley forced one of her smiles, but it
didn't quite meet her eyes. "Do you mind carrying her out for
me?"

"Of course," Zoe answered, for the
first time noticing the horrified expressions on the rest of the
customers' faces as they watched all the Bradford men as they were
herded out of the building.

Suddenly she wasn't so sure that she
wanted to know what she'd missed.

Chapter
25

This arrangement wasn't working for
him any longer, he realized as he stepped over his boys fighting
over that damn pretty pink princess chew toy. He hung up their
leashes and headed up the stairs only to come to an abrupt halt
when his sleep hazed mind remembered something.

Grunting at Toby and Max to keep it
down, he walked into Zoe's kitchen. He yawned as he grabbed a
glass, dropped some ice into the cup and filled it with ginger ale.
As he was leaving he shot a glance at the clock stove and nearly
groaned. It was nearly eight o'clock in the morning and if he
didn't leave soon he'd probably miss out on the fresh baked muffins
his aunts made every Thanksgiving morning, but he should be able to
make it in time for the huge breakfast spread they put
out.

If he didn't haul ass soon he wouldn't
have the proper nourishment that helping prepare Thanksgiving
dinner for his family required. He had about three hours of
peeling, chopping, dicing, washing dishes, and at least one
emergency run to the store for whatever ingredient the women of his
family needed to complete the insanely delicious dinner they'd
serve at one o'clock promptly, but first he wanted to check on Zoe
and tell her that things just weren't working out for him
anymore.

This wasn't her fault of course. She'd
respected their arrangement and even followed the rules that they
both set, but somewhere along the line it stopped working for him.
This whole bullshit situation of having sex with a woman but not
sleeping with her and having to sneak into her room first thing in
the morning just so he could cuddle with her and admittedly have
his very naughty way with her was just too much work.

Plus if he was going to be honest with
himself he'd have to admit that he was sick of all the work that it
required to keep his hands off of her in public. Every time he
wanted to touch her, hold her hand, or kiss her he had to remind
himself that it wasn't like that between them and hold back.
Denying himself what he wanted wasn't fun and he was done doing
it.

This whole thing was
ridiculous, he thought as he stepped back over the playful pups and
started up the stairs. They'd been together for months and he cared
for her, genuinely cared
for
her. He couldn't actually remember caring about a
woman before Zoe. Before her he only cared what being with a woman
did for him, food, sex, and a beautiful woman on his arm, but with
Zoe he'd have to get his own damn food or risk his own case of food
poisoning, unless she made him a yummy sandwich, he'd die without
sex with her, and he didn't give a flying fuck what anyone thought
about her. He enjoyed being with her and if anyone had a problem
with that they could fuck off.