Instead of giving her the answer that she’d been waiting five long years for, they laughed. “Sorry,” Aidan said, grinning hugely as he shook his head, “you’re going to have to ask him and that includes finding out his real name.”

Shrugging, she said, “I already know his real name.”

Aidan rolled his eyes. “Yeah, right.”

Before she got a chance to respond, the man in question was there, glaring down at her, which was a little unsettling since his hair was messed up, his shirt was a bit torn and there were familiar looking scratch marks on his arms and chest.

“Did you find the bag?” she asked as she nibbled on a fry.

“Run,” he snarled and since she was almost positive that he was talking to her, she decided that it was probably for the best if she called it a night.

“Lovely seeing, you gentlemen, again,” she said with a smile as she carefully scooted to the end of the soft bench, stood up and took a step towards safety when she remembered the ice pack that had been keeping her bottom comfortably numb.

“Excuse me,” she said softly, shooting Lucifer a smile as she reached around him, grabbed her ice pack and with another murmured, “Goodnight,” quickly shuffled towards the back door where she found Mojo, lying on his side, drooling and wagging his tail like the naughty little boy that he was.

“You let me down, buddy,” she said, sighing as she carefully scooted around him so that she didn’t slip in the puddle of drool that he’d created, “you let me down.”

Chapter 33

“I like her,” his father said with a fond smile as the three of them watched Rebecca shuffle towards the back entrance.

He considered going after her, but…

It was probably for the best if he took this opportunity to calm down before he did something irrational like spank that bruised ass of hers. He’d give her twenty minutes to make it back upstairs, get ready for bed, curl up beneath the covers and come up with some asinine excuse that would explain why she’d left his apartment and decided to sneak his father and brother into the Fire & Brimstone, the one place on earth that he’d worked his ass off to keep Bradford free.

He didn’t do it because he hated them or because they embarrassed him, but because he wasn’t ready for them to see what he’d done. If there was one thing in the world that his family took seriously, it was food. He wanted to make sure that everything was fucking perfect before his family finally managed to break into the place.

He’d always been like that. It was the reason that he’d had his own room when he was a kid, why his parents never had to ask him to do his homework, clean his room or do his chores. The problem they had with him was getting him to stop cleaning his room, doing his homework and glaring at anyone that came near the sink when he had dish duty. Things really hadn’t changed that much when he got older and he wasn’t sure if that was a good thing or a bad thing anymore.

“This is the best burger I’ve ever had,” his father said, pulling his attention back to the fact that he had two Bradfords in his restaurant for the first time since he’d opened its doors.

Aidan nodded in agreement as he tore into his burger. “Is this your recipe?” his brother asked, and if it had been any other Bradford he would have assumed that they were fucking with him, but this Aidan, the brother who had always accepted his fucked up ways without question.

“Yes,” he said, eyeing them both carefully, looking for any signs that they were just trying to be polite.

“You need to give your mother this recipe,” his father said, devouring the last bite of his cheeseburger before moving onto the next platter and digging in.

Aidan murmured his agreement as he continued to tear into his food. Every few seconds he would glance over at Lucifer, probably waiting for him to kick him out, but thanks to the little brat upstairs, he had other things on his mind.

He waved Pauline over and gestured to the two men eying him suspiciously. “Bring them a few orders of the House Special and four orders of the dessert sampler, please.”

“You got it, Mr. Bradford,” Pauline said with a smile as she made a quick note of it.

“Thanks for coming,” he said with a nod of thanks to his brother and father, who had apparently forgotten that he was alive since they’d discovered the coleslaw that had taken him two years to perfect.

“Yeah, no problem,” Aidan mumbled as he reached for a small bowl of coleslaw only to end up grabbing air when their father snatched it away from him.

Praying that he didn’t regret this, he headed upstairs, counting on the fact that his father wouldn’t fuck him over and start a riot. He could hope at least, he thought as he made his way upstairs where a very beautiful woman better be waiting in his bed with a fully thought out apology and a sexy little smile just for him.

Just thinking about her waiting in his bed had him moving his ass faster. He knew that sex was out of the question and surprisingly he didn’t care. He just wanted to see her. Pretending that didn’t scare him wasn’t even an option anymore. He’d still had absolutely no idea why he’d told her that he was falling for her.

He should have kept that to himself, had actually planned on doing just that, but the second that she’d blurted out that she felt the same he’d lost control of his fucking mind. The truth was that he’d never felt like this about anyone and he still wasn’t sure what it meant, because he’d never been in love before.

The thought of falling in love with Rebecca terrified him, but it also excited him. She was an annoying pain in the ass that got way too much fucking pleasure out of fucking with his head and he couldn’t stop thinking about her.

“Shit,” he muttered to himself, backtracking to the refrigerator when he remembered the fourth item on her aftercare list, ice.

After quickly putting together an ice pack, he headed towards his bedroom and the woman that was most likely going to be responsible for his stay at either a mental institution or a high max security prison. Either way, she was guaranteed to make him lose his fucking mind.

“What…the…fuck…,” he said when he walked into his room to find it empty.

Maybe she was in the shower? he wondered, but he knew before he opened the door that she wasn’t there.

Sighing, he tossed the bag of ice into the bathroom sink and leaned back against the wall. This was probably for the best. She needed her rest and he had a lot of shit to do anyway. He’d check on her in the morning. He headed to the kitchen, deciding that this was a good time to play around with those recipes that he found last week.