Page 101 of Crash Course
Cruz cracked up. God bless her, for making him laugh again. "Holy hell, sugar. I’m straight-up crazy about you. Just, you know, don’t let my mother hear you call her house a brothel."
Five minutes later,Cruz held his suite door open. Phin stood there in basketball shorts and a T-shirt that looked straight off the hanger. Even in the middle of the night, his brother looked neat.
By the look of it, he’d wet his normally stylishly shaggy hair and now had it slicked back, a look Cruz wasn’t used to, but couldn’t think too hard about.
Phin was the fashion junkie. Constantly worried about his clothes and appearance. Cruz? Give him a good pair of boots, some jeans and T-shirts and a haircut every couple of months and he was good to go.
"Hey," Phin said, striding by Cruz.
Once inside, he glanced at Cilla, now standing in front of the couch dressed in the jeans and sweater she’d worn earlier.
"Morning," Phin said.
"Good morning to you. Sorry we woke you."
Cilla did her best to act like it was completely fucking normal for her to be in Cruz’s suite. She’d changed into her own clothes and did her best to fix her hair, but it didn’t take a rocket scientist to know they’d just thrashed each other.
A few times.
And what a thrashing it was.Eh-hem.But this was . . . weird.
Cruz hated weird. Hated it more that she should feel awkward.
The whole thing only reinforced the idea of having his own place—and privacy.
Phin swung an accusing gaze at Cruz, the message clear. Cilla was his friend and Cruz better not be doing a fly-by.
Which, yeah, despite his reputation for being a womanizer, kind of insulted him. He could be serious about a woman. He could. He just hadn’t found the right woman.
Until now.
Until smart, sexy Cilla Randolph almost broke him in two.
"Uh," Phin said, hands on hips, "does anyone want to tell me what I’m doing here?"
Cruz hopped to it. "Yeah. We were researching Randolph Industries."
"This is the forever chemicals issue?"
Cilla nodded. "Yes. I found some documents."
She broke eye contact and moved from behind the coffee table to the French doors leading to the patio where she peeked out.
Stalling.
Had to be.
Behind her back, Phin shot Cruz a WTF face and Cruz shook him off while he stepped closer to Cilla.
"You okay?"
She spun back to him, gave him a forced smile. "I’m good. Just getting my thoughts together."
Then, like the warrior she was, she patted his arm, stepped around him to face Phin,
and Cruz knew he had to have this woman.
Forever.
