Give Me More--A Sexy Billionaire Romance by A.C. Arthur (detective books to read txt) 📕

reached for his own cup. “No, that’s still Maurice. He’s the one who suggested we all skip the fitting and go do something fun.”

She’d taken a seat in the chair near her laptop, so RJ sat in the one across from her.

“And this is your idea of something fun? Bringing doughnuts and coffee to my room while I work?”

For a second, he could only stare at her. She had no idea how lovely she looked with her hair in a messy ponytail, her oversize T-shirt hanging off one shoulder and her face scrubbed totally free of makeup. “Maurice’s idea of fun was scuba diving, which interested me even less than trying on that tux. Besides, you love doughnuts.”

She sat back in the chair, both hands wrapped around the cup she now held close to her face. “Coffee and doughnuts are the breakfast of champions,” she said, her tone a little more wistful than it had been just seconds ago.

“So you always said.” He grinned because he couldn’t help it. There’d been so many mornings when they’d had this discussion.

Where RJ preferred something from a more traditional breakfast menu—eggs, bacon, pancakes—Grace wasn’t as formal with the meal and claimed the caffeine and sugar mixture she loved worked much better for her throughout the day. He could never vouch for how the combo improved her productivity, but it never failed to bring about that glorious grin on her face. The one that almost matched her look of being well-pleased in bed. How many times had he lost himself in that particular look? The one where she was heavy-lidded, a slow smile spreading across her face just before she’d drag her tongue over her teeth and say something sexy like how much she loved being with him.

“RJ?”

“Huh?” he responded to the raised tone of her voice, clearing his throat in hope that the thoughts he’d just had would dissipate. He felt like a total ass for thinking about getting her in bed at ten in the morning.

“I asked if you and the family had a good time on the hike yesterday.”

He sipped his coffee and watched as she reached for the bag of doughnuts, taking the Bavarian cream–filled one that had been dusted with powdered sugar. Deciding it was smarter not to watch her bite into it, he fished into the bag for one of his own. He grabbed a chocolate frosted one and a napkin, then set his coffee on the table.

“I’m not a hiking kind of guy,” he started. The memory of yesterday afternoon with the rest of the bridal party was still a hilarious scene in his mind.

“Oh no, what’d you do? You’re on an island, not at some snowcapped mountain. From what I can see of the resort it’s beautiful up there.”

Chewing the bite he’d taken only allowed him to shrug initially. “It’s a big rock. A steep rock. And it was about two hundred degrees outside by the time we finished lunch at the beachside café and started walking.” He left out the part about Nina and Desta being attacked by a bug and Major and Maurice bumping into each other trying to swat it away until they looked like a scene from a comedy sketch. They’d eventually tumbled into the waterfall they’d been exploring.

“Yeah, it was pretty warm out yesterday. I’d been hoping to get a chance to go for a swim, but I fell down so many rabbit holes while doing my research.” She was taking another bite of her doughnut, licking the cream from her finger.

The second he caught himself groaning he stuffed the last bite of his doughnut into his mouth. “You still enjoy swimming,” he said when he was finished chewing. It was a statement, not a question, because when they were dating, Grace had used the pool in his apartment building more than he had.

“You know it.” She reached for a napkin after finishing her doughnut. “And whenever I get around to buying a house, that’s going to be a prerequisite.”

A pool and at least four bathrooms because she didn’t want to have to share a bathroom with guests or anyone else. There’d been a few discussions about what type of home they might like to have together. Those conversations about their future had seemed so natural after the first year of their relationship, leading him to believe that they’d been on the same page about their trajectory.

“Your parents have a pool at their house. I’m sure they wouldn’t mind you moving back just to use it on a daily basis.” He liked Grace’s parents, Milton and Videtta. They were both professors of Black studies at a local college and he’d had the pleasure of meeting them multiple times during the year and a half he’d dated their daughter. He’d even called Milton and asked for his blessing before proposing to Grace.

“Yeah, they do, and so do Charity and her family of five, who’re still in Westchester with my parents. They have a house on an acre of land with a massive pool that I’m in each summer when I go home for vacation.” She grinned like an excited child just talking about swimming. It was her favorite hobby.

“That’s right, Charity and Bret, that’s his name, right? They’d just gotten engaged when—” He couldn’t finish that sentence. “You said she has a family of five, so she’s got three kids now?”

“That’s right.” Her hand was already in the bag for another doughnut—powdered and cream-filled again. He knew exactly what she liked. “Two girls and a boy. Trinity and her husband, Randall, don’t have any kids yet, to my mother’s dismay. But they’ve got a huge aquarium full of brilliantly colored fish.”

He nodded and smiled. Major just had a custom aquarium built in the basement of the house he and Nina purchased a few months ago. RJ thought it was a clever addition to the space but he wasn’t a pet person, at least not after the idea of having a dog with