Clusterf*@k (Life Sucks Book 4) Read online

  But they’d been driving by on the way to the restaurant, and she’d off-handedly mentioned that she had seen this place a million times and had always wanted to try it.

  Chance hadn’t been able to resist flipping a U-turn, pulling into the parking lot, and seeing if they had availability.

  Luckily they had…in the Pirate’s Booty room.

  Which sounded like some sort of twisted sex shop or orgy location but was really a small set of two rooms that had been successfully crafted into an escape room complete with buried treasure, a ship’s wheel, plenty of pretend rum, and multiple puzzles that had both him and Misty struggling to solve them in the allotted one-hour time frame.

  Truthfully, he hadn’t been too focused.

  Mostly because the moment he’d turned around and pulled into the parking lot of Escape Rooms R Us, he’d been captivated by the pleasure on Misty’s face.

  Surprise that he’d drop everything he had planned to do something she wanted.

  Joy when he’d taken her hand and led her inside, securing that spot in Pirate’s Booty.

  Excitement when they’d been led into the dark room and watched the video. She’d jumped at the fake thunder and lightning, allowing him to slip an arm around her waist and “comfort” her.

  Now frustration because their time was running out and they had to solve this puzzle to win.

  So, Misty was competitive in addition to caring about her brother and his sister and his family’s future happiness. She was sweet enough to be surprised that he would go a little out of his way and change his plans to do something that would make her smile. Add in beautiful with a sexy body, enough spine to turn him down even though she was attracted to him, and soft enough to jump at fake lightning and thunder.

  He liked her.

  Enough that it might be a problem.

  Because he preferred things light and casual, to be with a woman for as long as it worked for both of them. He preferred that fun, fucking, and then ending in friendship, and he was starting to think that he didn’t want friendship with a woman like Misty.

  She was…different.

  She made him wonder if he could do different, too.

  Except, he didn’t play for keeps.

  Not because he got off on hurting women. Not at all. He just didn’t think the type of commitment his parents had found, what Soph had found, was worth the risk. His job was dangerous (though less so now that he’d left his work at the FBI and the DEA and had started his own investigation firm). But still, it might mean that he left a good woman alone, mourning him, and God, if he took it too far and made a family, he might leave his kids without a father.

  He’d almost had that.

  His dad had almost died.

  He wouldn’t do that to the people he cared about.

  But…Misty made that decision, born of a boy’s fear that the man who’d been all but a superhero would die, seem a little short-sighted.

  What would it be like if he did play for keeps?

  Because he’d spent only a couple of hours with her—most of them sitting across the table wanting to kill Carter for daring to lean close and talk to her, making her smile—and already letting her down gently was so fucking far off the map, it might as well be on another planet.

  And then he was considering that he might very well get a spaceship to start mapping out the galaxy.

  Fun. Fucking. Yes.

  It was the friendship part he was reconsidering for the first time in his life.

  “We only have two minutes left,” Misty said, jarring him out of his thoughts, her cheeks flushed, her hair mussed from running her hands through it in frustration. Those tiger’s eyes swirled with emotion in the dim light, feelings flitting through them so fast that he couldn’t decipher them.

  But then they settled on determination.

  And that spaceship took flight.

  Maybe the fun and fucking didn’t have to end at friendship.

  Maybe the risk of leaving something behind was minimal when compared to the risk of never going for it in the first place.

  Fear down his spine.

  But was it fear because he was considering breaking every rule because Misty was different from any woman he’d ever met before, or fear because he might not experience it at all?

  That he wasn’t sure of.

  That he didn’t have time to delve into any further.

  Misty crossed back over to him, snatched his hand, dragged him to the table where they were supposed to be organizing the puzzle pieces on what he assumed was a built-in sensor.

  Either that or the people behind the cameras in this room were watching very closely.

  “We need to figure this out!”

  He concentrated, for the first time in nearly an hour, not on the woman who smelled like hibiscus flowers and coconut and whose curves were distracting as hell in those tight jeans, but on the puzzle on the table in front of them. There was no doubt she’d been doing the heavy lifting of the puzzle-solving portion of events, and he supposed—with fifty-five seconds left on the clock—that he should begin pulling his weight, too.

  A quick study of the letters.

  T-Y-O-B-O

  A glance at the paper she’d uncovered in the buried treasure. It had been written in code and said, “A pirate’s favorite thing.”

  The five slots for those pieces—gold coins he realized now—sending an impressed thought into the universe for the people who’d come up with this room and their stick-to-it-ness to the theme.

  Then he brushed Misty’s fingers aside, rearranged the letters (B-O-O-T-Y), and placed them in the proper slots just as the clock wound down.

  Three. Two. One…

  He got the Y in.

  The lights came on, and the far door swung open.

  And Misty—once she was done gaping at the open door and the puzzle pieces—smiled wide, threw her arms up, and did a little dance, singing, “Pirate’s Booty! Pirate’s Booty! Pirate’s—”

  He kissed her.

  It wasn’t the first kiss he’d planned—that being later, on her front porch, soft and sweet and hopefully coaxing her into inviting him in for more kisses (and other things). Instead, it was hot and needy and had his cock hard faster than that spaceship rocketing through the air searching for reasons to keep her.

  Forever.

  Her chant was against his lips, on his tongue, and then her arms were around him…and then her moan was against his tongue, her fingers in his hair, and she was leaping into his arms so that he had the fucking glorious pleasure of having her ass in his hands as she laid a kiss on him that had him spinning and knocking the locks and keys and fake rum bottles and gold pieces from the pirate’s table to the ground.

  It was a kiss that would have had him stripping her down and getting some of his favorite thing—booty—if not for the throat clearing.

  The persistent throat clearing.

  Persistent and loud enough to let him know that it hadn’t been the first time that throat clearing had happened.

  Reluctantly, he released Misty’s mouth, nearly forgetting about the throat clearing and taking it again when she made a soft mewling sound of protest, her lids half-closed, the tiger’s eyes darkened to a rich amber.

  He glanced up and over her shoulder, saw the kid who’d let them in here with bright pink cheeks. “Um,” the teenager said, “you need to take your picture up front.”

  The soft—and embarrassed—words seemed to snap Misty back into herself.

  He watched her cheeks grow pinker now, but then she straightened her shoulders, sighed, and brushed her mouth across his. “I want my victory picture.”

  “Okay,” he murmured, willing his cock to soften.

  “Chance?”

  His brows lifted.

  “To get my victory picture, you have to put me down.” She pressed her lips to his jaw. “Or at least step back, so I can climb down.”

  He didn’t want to do either.

  His hands were still on he
r ass, her legs spread wide and wrapped around him.

  But he stepped back and set her feet on the ground anyway. Then nearly groaned when she bent and started picking up gold coins and keys and fake rum bottles and locks.

  That ass.

  Fuck, any softening of his cock was done for.

  To save himself the embarrassment of coming in his pants and the poor teenage boy whose cheeks had gone somehow even redder, Chance bent and helped her, even though he really wanted to continue enjoying the view. Instead, he made a mental note to fuck her that way so he could get a perfect view of that naked booty of hers and grabbed the last of the gold pieces before taking her hand and leading her from the room.

  Trailing the kid into the lobby area.

  Standing still while she sorted through the props and chose the ones she wanted—and the ones (yes, plural) she wanted him to hold. He took them when she extended them then promptly set them back into the basket.

  “I—”

  He slid an arm around Misty’s waist, hauled her close. “Smile for the camera, baby.”

  The flash went.

  And for the record, he thought it was the best victory photo ever.

  7

  Scarves for Everyone

  Misty

  She had a picture in her purse of her in Chance’s arms, his head close to hers, whispering in her ear, while she grinned at the camera.

  Smiling like she was having the time of her life.

  And she kind of was.

  Escape room. Check.

  Escape room conquered. Also, check.

  A kiss to end all kisses, followed by a warm, sexy man nuzzling her neck and telling her to smile. Another checkmark.

  Then holding her hand to the car, driving her to her favorite restaurant (whether that was by chance since it was the only Italian place in town, or if Rob and Soph had dished, she didn’t know), and taking her hand again as they’d walked into Tony’s, while they waited for their table, which took a while because they’d missed their reservation due to the escape room diversion, and until he’d deposited her into her seat.

  Perfect date.

  All her worrying about complications was for nothing.

  Chance was awesome.

  He was funny and charming, telling her stories about his job as a private investigator, which she thought sounded really freaking cool. But he told her it was less stakeout and more scouring through copious amounts of online records, requesting and rereading old police or government files, and the occasional bit of fieldwork, depending on if he’d been hired by an agency or by a private citizen. Of course, he’d said that occasional bit of fieldwork mostly involved interviews, though it had a dash of staking out, along with the occasional taking down and handcuffing of bad guys until the authorities got there.

  The last two were both cool and a little scary.

  “Really,” he said when she told him that. “People think it’s a lot more exciting than it is. Though I can’t lie and say it’s not occasionally dangerous. I just try to be smart and safe, because I have plans to continue seeing a gorgeous blonde who likes all things booty.”

  She snorted and shook her head, glancing down at her menu and pretending to study it even though she ordered the same thing every time. She thought he was underselling himself significantly, but she kind of dug that he wasn’t super cocky. Confident, yes, but not over the top. It was sexy, that confidence, enough that she wanted to scoot her chair around the table and sit next to him.

  Okay, not sit.

  She wanted to crawl into his lap and kiss him again.

  But she could control herself (barely), and, anyway, she had other questions. “You didn’t want to work for the FBI like your dad?”

  “I did work for them. For a time,” he said, surprising her.

  Her brows lifted in question.

  He answered without her saying it aloud. “It was my dream for a long time, to do what my dad did, and for a while it was awesome.”

  His eyes held a glint of pain, and she reached across the table for his hand. “What happened?”

  Misty hadn’t expected him to answer, let alone to give her the truth, straight up without any varnish. “Lost a couple people I cared about because of shitty orders and fucking stupid regulations. The shit that was supposed to keep them safe sent them into a mission with their wrists handcuffed behind their backs and their feet shackled. I decided I wasn’t going into anymore situations that I couldn’t handle my way and that I wasn’t going to let the fucking rules get in the way of someone’s safety.”

  She inhaled sharply. “I’m sorry.”

  A nod, his hand turning over in hers, weaving their fingers together, his eyes losing that glint of pain. “Thanks, honey. It was a long time ago, but thank you, all the same.” He brushed his thumb over her wrist. “Not to be an asshole, but I don’t really like to talk about this shit.”

  “I’m sorry,” she said again.

  “Nothing to apologize for.” He squeezed her hand. “I try to live my life by being honest, giving answers to genuine questions when someone asks.”

  Her brows lifted, but he kept talking.

  “It’s easier that way, means that the shit doesn’t get heavy and eat at me, eat at whatever I’m building with the pretty woman sitting across the table from me.”

  Her cheeks heated. “You don’t have much of a filter, do you?”

  He grinned. “No. Never have. Not gonna start now.”

  Maybe that should be a problem. He didn’t seem like the kind of guy who sugarcoated things, and she didn’t exactly have the thickest skin, so she might get hurt. But he also didn’t seem mean, and she’d grown up with Rob, who was also a straight-shooter. Plus, he’d brought her to the escape room and held her hand, and now they were sitting across the table at Tony’s, her favorite place ever.

  But her mind was drifting because Soph had told her a little of what Chance’s dad had done to get her away from her family (thus leading to his adopting her all those years ago), and she wondered about the occasionally dangerous part of his job. But then again, Chance said he was out of the FBI and on his own now.

  Did that make it better or worse?

  She didn’t know, but she supposed the reality was that a lot of jobs were dangerous, and it sounded like he was doing good, important work that was awesome.

  Just like Chance.

  A leg brushing hers under the table had her glancing up, almost gasping at the intensity in his eyes.

  “Is it too much for you?”

  Her breath caught.

  Serious.

  He’d suddenly gone so, so serious.

  And she had the feeling that if she answered wrong, he’d walk her to her door after dinner, kiss her on the cheek, and then they would never go on another date again. It would be family dinners and friendship and nothing romantic.

  One date. They’d had one date, and that was such a painful thought it had her lungs burning, her heart aching, her throat going tight.

  So…it was key that she answered this correctly.

  “It’s not too much for me.”

  He opened his mouth like he was going to say something, the intensity in his gaze not abating in the least.

  So, she went on before he could. “I was thinking that you are doing important work, and that while it might be occasionally dangerous, a lot of jobs can be dangerous. Hell, I could trip at the shop and impale myself on a basket of knitting needles tomorrow. And then I was thinking that what you’re doing is awesome in a way that’s cool because I’ve seen a lot of action movies and I can pretend that you’re like a hero in one of those, even though I know that isn’t reality, but it’s cool anyway because you’re modest about it.” His eyes gentled. She kept talking. “And finally, I was thinking that if you’re a guy who can be modest about something like a job that’s occasionally dangerous then you’re pretty awesome, and I’m guessing your job is, too, and that a woman who was with you would be lucky to be with such an awesome guy.”r />
  “You think I’m awesome?”

  He really didn’t have much of a filter.

  Well, she could do the same.

  “Yes.”

  “You think my job is awesome?”

  “You’re helping people.” She shrugged. “I don’t see how anyone couldn’t see it was awesome and worth whatever kind of risk occasionally dangerous might bring you.”

  A ripple went through him. His eyes went intense again, but there wasn’t the sense that he was going to be leaving her on the porch with a kiss on the cheek. This was an intensity that said he’d be in her bed…and wouldn’t be leaving.

  And just when her breath was catching at that very pleasurable thought—based on that kiss in the Pirate’s Booty Room—the heat faded, dropped down to a simmer.

  He grinned, mischief in his eyes. “Impale yourself on knitting needles?”

  Another shrug. “It’s possible.”

  His fingers found hers. “For the record, I’m not a superhero, babe.”

  “I get that, but I still think you might be a normal hero,” she said, knowing that she should probably say something more, but their entrees arrived, and they pulled their hands apart, spending the next couple of minutes sorting out plates and refills of their wine and utensils and first bites.

  Hers: fettuccini alfredo with extra mushrooms, no chicken.

  His: spaghetti bolognese with two of Tony’s special meatballs.

  Then she’d chewed and swallowed and started to scoop up another bite when he asked, “Why yarn?”

  She set down her fork. Apparently, they were done discussing occasionally dangerous. “Why my store?”

  A nod. “Or more accurately, how did you come to open your own yarn store?”

  “It’s a boring story,” she warned, “but since I have a lot of practice at telling it”—people asked her a lot at the shop—“I’ll give you the Cliff’s Notes version. My mom was a knitter, taught me and my brother—”

  “Rob?”

  Misty grinned. “Yup. Rob is as good as me, maybe better at some of the stitches.” She giggled at the expression on Chance’s face. “We used to knit every night with my mom. It was like our…decompressing time. We’d tell her about our day and whatever was big or important during that point in our lives. We’d talk and eat cookies she’d baked and just…be together. My dad was there, too, usually watching some game, while Rob and I talked her ear off as she put us to work on whatever project she was working on.”