23. Kale

Christian lookedat home in my bed. With the sunlight fanned out across the foot of the bed, his hair tousled from sleep and sex, with the sheets pooled loose around his waist, he seemed like something out of a fairytale. Maybe I'd conjured him out of my dreams, I wasn't certain. I didn't think too hard on it, on the off chance he wasn't real and thinking too hard would send my subconscious into some sort of crisis that would have Christian evaporating from my life if I blinked too slowly.

I was content to leave him in my bed because I liked him there, and because I needed coffee. The wood floors in my house were cool against my bare feet, and I turned up the heat on my way to the kitchen. Fall was fully wrapping itself around New York, and the pumpkins from my parents were already starting to rot in the back garden.

Thinking about my parents had me thinking about my brother and the distress of our last phone call. I hoped he'd decided to go visit our parents instead of doing something spontaneous, but that hadn't ever been his style. Boston had always been better suited for an unpredictable life. He loved the city, though not as much as me. He needed the fresh air of the farm on occasion, but he'd always been horrible at asking for what he needed. I was proud of him for realizing he needed something new, but as always, he was ever the romantic optimist, believing the grass would be greener anywhere he wasn't.

I made a note to offer him a job, which would effectively kill two birds with one stone. It would keep him in the city, and it would keep an assistant at the desk long enough to get him trained and running. Ford was many things, but he knew better than to sleep with my very straight brother. Hopefully, the tedium of entry-level work would remind Boston of his capabilities, which were far beyond scheduling my meetings and fielding phone calls, and he'd get his head out of his ass and back on track. And Ford could go entertain himself with someone else's employment pool.

I finished adding things to the mental to-do list of shit I had to do once Christian's little trip to New York was over just as my coffee finished brewing. I debated making a mug for Christian and taking it into the bedroom, but the hours of travel and the excitement of our little adventure had undoubtedly taken a toll on him. I decided to let him sleep a little longer. That would give me an opportunity to play back through the events of the night before uninterrupted, with no one to judge any sort of panic that might flash across my face when I remembered the fact I'd confessed my love to a man I barely knew.

It wasn't so much that I was avoidant of the four-letter word, but I hadn't been looking for it and I surely hadn't expected to find it. Unlike my brother, I thrived with predictability. Christian had come around and turned everything about my life on its head. Ford had called me out on as much, and I made sure to move calling Beamer to the top of my list. I owed him a much bigger apology than I'd managed before his move, and it was embarrassing that it had taken kidnapping a prince for me to realize that love could do crazy things to a man.

A knock on the door startled me, and I narrowed my eyes in the direction of the noise. My friends absolutely made a habit of coming by unannounced, but it was too early for any of them to even be coherent, let alone dressed and on my stoop. I took a fortifying drink of my coffee and headed toward the door, if for no other reason than I didn't want them to knock again and wake Christian prematurely.

I don't know who I expected to be on the porch, but it definitely wasn't Christian's security lead, Niko. I recognized him immediately, breath rushing out of me in a long and audible exhale. He was in a sharp black suit, like the last time I saw him, a in stark contrast to my loose navy pajamas and plain white undershirt. I ran a hand through my hair and leaned against the doorjamb.

"I thought we had more time," I said.

He worked his jaw back and forth, tilting his head to look up the front facade of my home.

"I tried." He raised his hand and crooked two fingers in a familiar come here gesture. It was only then that I noticed the sleek black town car double-parked on the street. I lived on the Upper East Side, town cars were a common sight here, after all. A man in a suit that looked much like Niko's opened the back passenger door of the car at his beckoning, and another man, one who looked like a less happy version of Christian, stepped onto the sidewalk.

"I see," I murmured, taking a drink of my coffee and eyeing the new third party as he crossed the sidewalk and unlatched the gate that led into my front garden.

"Parrish asked that you please don't make it harder for him," Niko said softly, stepping aside to make way for the man I assumed to be one of Christian's brothers. I didn't have time to ask if Parrish had wanted me to make it easy on this man or on Christian, but I imagined it was somehow one and the same.

The man gave my home a much more judgmental onceover than Niko had, and I frowned at the distaste that colored his expression when he turned his attention to me.

"Do you have my brother?" he asked.

"I don't know," I said, crossing my legs at the ankle and matching his frown with one of my own. "I don't even know who you are."

Niko groaned, and the man affected a tight and unimpressed look that I imagined worked on a person who cared about royalty and rank and social status. Fortunately for me, and unfortunately for him, I was not one of those people. I came from old money. A man who had enough of those things, the social status notwithstanding, on account of my name and my lineage, but I'd never dictate someone's life the way Christian's family tried to do to him. I couldn't have been more different from the man standing on my doorstep.

"I am Phillip Davenport-Spencer, Prince of?—"

I cut him off with a smirk, "Oh, you're Christian's brother. Yes, he's here."

My response clearly caught him off-guard, and I liked that. Phillip was likely not a man who'd ever been told no in his life, let alone been back-talked by a stranger. He was in America now, though. And respect wasn't freely given in the circles I moved in—it was earned.

He was no exception to the rule.

"It's time for him to come home," Phillip said.

"I have a flight on schedule for the day after tomorrow," I countered. "Happy to provide the details."

"He's needed now."

"Is he?" I arched a brow.

"Yes," Phillip grit out the single syllable.

"Well, there seems to be a conflict then, because he's needed here as well."

My statement couldn't have been closer to the truth. I did need Christian. Needed him naked in my bed, snoring softly until his body caught up on all the sleep he'd lost. He was exactly where he was supposed to be, and the only way his brother was going to get him out of my house was if Christian either went willingly or if Niko physically subdued me to get inside. Niko, thankfully, didn't strike me as the type for hand-to-hand combat, which was a relief because it was too early for that level of conflict. I took another drink of my coffee.

"My brother has obligations at home," Phillip said.

"Well, we did try to stay, but I wanted to take him out to dinner and we both decided that the restaurants in New York are more his speed."

"New York is nothing if not less respectful," Phillip said pointedly.

"I don't know." I gave him a lopsided shrug. "I've never had a problem."

"Go tell Christian I'm here. He's had his fun, and now it's time for him to come home."

I licked my lips, drawing them back between my teeth and biting down hard to stop myself from saying the first words that came to mind, which were he is home. I wanted my home to be his, my bed to be his, my kitchen, my closet, my friends, all of it. I loved the man asleep in my bed and I wanted him to stay with me for more than another day.

"I'm trying to do you a favor," Phillip said next, which felt like a deflection.

"Is that so?"

"There's no future in whatever this little tryst is." Christian's brother waved dismissively at me, and I straightened to my full height, eager to hear the rest of his assumptions. "Christian knows who he is and where he comes from. He'll come home and fall in line, and you'll be left alone again in this horrible little city."

I scoffed, smirking as I took another drink of my coffee.

Phillip was right about one thing. Christian did know who he was, but it was something he'd learned at my feet, not in the throne room of the palace he'd grown up in. Before me, Christian had only known ideas of the kind of man his father had meant for him to be. With me, he knew the man he truly was in his heart.

"I'd love to make a bet on that one," I said.

"If you'll go collect my brother, we'll be out of your hair."

"He's asleep," I countered.

"Wake him up."

"He'll be home the day after tomorrow." I scratched the side of my cheek, close to my mouth. "Before dinner."

"I don't think you understand that my brother is a prince," Phillip said, lowering his voice.

"I'm well aware." I didn't think Christian would want me to tell his brother about my favorite pet name for him, so I kept it tucked in the back of my mouth.

"He cannot just abscond."

"It was more like a kidnapping if that's easier for you to digest," I offered. "I planned it with my best friend before I chartered my flight."

"You're not doing yourself any favors, Mr. Sheffield."

I grimaced, hearing my full name roll off his tongue with so much disdain when his brother offered it up with so much admiration and affection. It was amazing how two men who shared the same DNA could be so grossly opposite each other. Phillip had flown halfway around the world to try and intimidate me, and he was about to fly the rest of the way back after learning the lesson I wasn't afraid of anyone, least of all him.

"I'm not letting you in and I'm not waking him up," I said, tired of the conversation and unsure of how much longer Christian would sleep through the commotion. "You know who I am, you know where he is, and you know when he'll be back. That needs to be enough."

I stepped back, hand around the door. I pushed it halfway closed, but not before I caught the frustrated flare of Phillip's nostrils.

"Is this the first time you've been told no?" I asked.

Niko snorted, then sputtered and coughed. Phillip's head swung around, giving him a sharp and disapproving look. Niko patted his chest, staring at the cobblestones beneath his feet until he was able to get himself back under control.

"Someone has to stay with him," Phillip said.

"I'm right here."

"Someone who can protect him."

I angled my head to the side, brow raised and ready for his next comment. There wasn't anyone who could take better care of Christian than me. I knew it, Christian knew it, and Phillip was about to learn it for himself.

"The day after tomorrow, he'll be home," I said again.

"Niko stays."

"He's welcome to explore the city." I smiled, gesturing toward the city behind them. "I don't have room for him here."

"I find that hard to believe," Phillip challenged.

"You can think about it on your trip home." I gave Niko an apologetic look. He'd done plenty for Christian and me in the short time we'd known each other and I hoped my sparring with Phillip wasn't going to make things harder for him. "And, besides, if I can get Christian out from under Niko once, what makes you think I won't do it again?"

"You have no idea what you're dealing with," Phillip said, smoothing his hand down the front of his suit jacket, as if he'd ever had a button out of place in his entire life.

"I'm sure I can manage it. Now, as fond as I already am of Niko here, I have to ask you to please take your security detail with you and get off my property."

"The day after tomorrow," Phillip grit out.

"Before dinner."

"If he's late, I'll be back for you and no one with me will take no for an answer," he warned.

"Duly noted." I offered Phillip half of a bow and closed the door in their faces.

From behind me, I heard a noise, and my heart skipped and lodged itself in my throat. I turned quickly, biting the inside of my cheek in an attempt to bring down my pulse and school my features. I was many things, but unflappable was not one of them, and Phillip's impromptu call was far from how I wanted to spend my morning. The fact that Christian's father had undoubtedly sent him to New York with the sole intention of collecting his wayward brother should have been proof enough that I was in over my head.

But Christian looked perfect, with his hair sticking up every which way and a pair of my pajamas cinched tight and low around his waist, and I couldn't find it in myself to care. I would happily drown if it meant I got to wake up one more morning with this man beside me.

"Who were you talking to?" Christian asked, scrubbing a hand over his face.

I locked the deadbolt and closed the space between us, taking him into my arms and kissing the side of his head.

"No one important," I promised, hoping it was true. "Let's get you some coffee."