Page 17 of Mountain Man's Bride
“No one else could ever take care of you like I do though,” I murmured, my eyes flickering to her lips and then back up to her eyes.
Her smile widened, her cheeks warming under my intense gaze. “I’m sure there are plenty of other men who would—”
I tightened my grip on her chin, resting my forehead on hers. “Don’t you dare finish that sentence,” I growled.
She giggled and twined her arms around my neck, her gloved fingers running over my skin. I shivered. And when her lips met mine in a soft, sweet kiss, I groaned and banded my arms around her, quickly taking over so I could show her all of the ways I was capable of taking care of her.
CHAPTER 11
Everlee
“Ihad a really good time,” I whispered. Tripp gripped my hips and tugged me closer to him, his fingertips digging into my soft flesh. I was already gaining weight in the little bit of time I’d been here, but I looked a lot healthier. Even though I knew the weight gain was needed, my cheeks still flushed and embarrassment rose inside of me when he touched me. Because I knew he could feel the change.
He brushed the tip of his nose with mine, and I shivered. “Cold?” he murmured.
I shook my head. “A little too warm,” I confessed in a soft voice, not wanting to break the tender moment between us.
He hummed before softly brushing his lips with mine. I pathetically whined when it was only that—a mere brush—instead of one of the deep kisses he’d been giving me all day. I wanted more.
“My brother is being a prick and watching us,” he said, breaking the moment, his eyes flicking over my head to the window that looked out onto the porch.
When I looked over my shoulder, I squeaked in alarm, my cheeks heating in embarrassment. Weston waved at me, a cheeky grin on his lips. Tripp chuckled and grasped my face in his hands, slanting his lips over mine. I sighed into the kiss, my body melting into his. Every thought in my head disappeared. Everything ceased to matter but him and how he felt against me and this moment between us.
“I’ll see you in a bit,” he said, forcing our lips apart. “I need to finish my chores.” He pressed a tender kiss to my cheek and then my brow, like he couldn’t bear to part with me. My heart melted into a puddle of goo at his feet. “Make sure you drink plenty of water. Understand?”
I nodded. “I will. I promise.” I pressed my hand to his chest, surprised to find his heart was beating as fast as mine was. My cheeks warmed a little more. “Be careful.”
He pecked the tip of my nose. “Always am, sweetheart.”
I watched him stride back to Brewer, and only after he mounted the massive stallion did I go inside, sagging back against the door, my fingertips pressing to my warm lips where they still tingled from his addictive kisses.
“Have fun?” Weston teased. I flinched in surprise, completely having forgotten that Tripp said his brother was watching us, and blushed all the way down to my chest. He chuckled and jerked his head in the direction of the kitchen. “Come on. I’m going to show you how to make spaghetti.”
I shrugged out of my coat, boots, hat, and gloves before following him into the kitchen in my sock-covered feet. Weston had a squash, a zucchini, an onion, a bell pepper, fresh mushrooms, and two jalapenos sitting on the counter. I frowned. “Squash and zucchini?”
“Yep,” he said, grabbing the squash and putting it on one of the chopping boards. “Cut this up into quarters,” he instructed. “We’re going to saute all of this together.”
I nodded and grabbed the knife, quickly getting to work. He turned on a country music station—sounded like the nineties—and let that fill the silence as we worked together. He instructed me on how to chop everything else, too, keeping a close eye on me as he did so, probably worried that I’d end up slicing off a finger.
But I did good, and within fifteen minutes—it took me a while—I had everything chopped up as he instructed and in a pot with lots of melted butter and olive oil to saute them. After adding crushed red pepper, salt, fine black pepper, soul food seasoning, cilantro flakes, parsley flakes, and thyme, he put the lid on the pot and left it to simmer.
“What now?” I asked, a little excited that I was finally learning how to cook something.
He grabbed the package of ground beef out of the sink. “Now, we cook this.”
While I worked on browning the ground beef after we added even more seasonings, Weston set the gluten-free noodles to boil and soften, adding salt to them. Once everything was ready, we drained the meat, added spaghetti sauce, left it to simmer, drained the veggies, added them to the simmering sauce and meat mixture, and then added the noodles before mixing it all up.
“You did it,” he praised, smiling at me.
I was practically bouncing on the tips of my toes. “I can’t believe I know how to make spaghetti now,” I chuckled. The day honestly couldn’t get better. I spent a lot of time with Tripp, got kissed more times than I could count, and now I knew how to make at least one meal. So, Tripp and I wouldn’t starve to death forever if we had to rely on me to cook.
The back door opened, and Tripp walked into the house, followed by Nash, Eli, and Jesse. Not caring that his brothers were watching, Tripp swept me into his arms and pressed a kiss to my lips. I giggled when I felt how cold they were compared to my own warm ones.
“Temperature dropped like crazy,” Nash said, rubbing his cold hands together. “Bro, can you stop sucking her face off?” he asked, kicking Tripp in the back of the knee. Tripp buckled for a moment before glaring at Nash, reluctantly releasing me.
“Smells good. What’d you make?” he asked Weston.
“Actually, Everlee made it,” Weston corrected him. “I only guided her.”