Her heart might have skipped a beat, which was why there was this ringing in her ears causing her to hear things that couldn’t possibly have been said.
“Your mom and Mrs. Fedora are…best friends?”
He nodded slowly.
“So…you’re not a thief because you could buy that brooch?”
“I could buy this boat.”
Change of mindset needed. The rags-to-riches makeover took a few seconds, and the result was she didn’t really know what to say.
“Okay.”
He leaned over her where she sat on the table. “Okay? That’s it?”
“Well, I figured dancing on the table would seem like a bit of a mercenary response. As would screaming holy shit I hit the jackpot!”
His laugh deepened. “So glad you’re not running away in fear like I’d expected.”
“Fear?”
He nodded. “Because that dinner tonight? Was very informal compared to what we’ve got coming down the line. I can ask my parents to keep the parties small, but there will be a few events we’ll have to attend, like a mating party for some family and business friends.”
A shiver raced over her skin. Maybe she needed to borrow Tessa’s rebounder and sprint for a while. “How many friends are we talking about?”
He shrugged. “Six? Seven?”
She snorted in derision before realizing he couldn’t mean only that many people. Her mouth went dry. “Hundred?”
She held her breath in anticipation. The pause was worse than an answer.
Well, not really.
“Thousand.”
The pent-up air in her lungs escaped in a gasp and she bolted.
He caught her before she could hit the door and hoisted her over his shoulder. “No, no running away.”
Keri laughed and pounded on his back. “Put me down. I’m kidding. I mean, oh my, that’s a hell of a lot of people all wanting to sniff us, but as long as you’re there, it’ll be fine.”
Jared lowered her back to the tabletop. “Seriously?”
“Seriously. Poor little me can deal with having mated a millionaire.”
“Oh, you found someone else? With less money?”
She smacked him on the shoulder even as they laughed together. Then he rolled with her to the middle of the table and proceeded to remove all thought of thefts, parties and cash of any sort. Her dress went one way, his suit the other, until the only thing left between them was skin.
It had been a hell of a day. A hell of a good day.
Chapter Ten
Jared stared at his clothes and wondered if swearing like a coal miner in front of his new mate would lose him all the brownie points he’d gained the day before. “Umm, Keri?”
She strolled out of her bathroom in the buff, and he fought to keep from drooling on the carpet. “Yes?”
Concentrate. “You remember I showed up naked yesterday?”
“I don’t think I’ll ever forget.” She pulled open drawers, and he was really distracted when she bent to get something from the bottom drawer, her naked ass facing—
Oh boy. Concentrate harder. “A co-worker grabbed my things for me and hung them to dry. Someone was nice enough to drop them off here for me this morning, all folded and everything.”
“Well, that is nice.”
“No, it’s not.”
He held the pile out. She slipped a T-shirt over her head before coming to his side. “What’s wrong?”
There was a largish bulge in the front of his jeans—well, he’d had such a thing, but never without actually being in the pants before. And when Keri reached into his pocket, the mysterious objects she pulled out and laid on top of the fabric were exactly what he’d thought they’d find.
A fist full of watches, necklaces and shining diamond earrings.
“You have a very classy tailor.”
Jared snorted in relief. “You’re not mad at me?”
“For what? Good taste in jeans?” Keri patted his naked ass and his blood pressure shot skyward. “That pair with the tatters and the threadbare patch on the crotch you wore when you came on board? Makes me all growly. Especially the part right here…”
His clothes and everything with them fell to the floor as he grabbed her wrist a second after she’d grabbed his jewels. She cupped him gently and he swallowed hard. “Someone put that stuff in there to get me in trouble.”
“Of course they did. But we’ll figure out who.”
Jared groaned as she continued to torture him with her touch. “I have to get to work. Keri, love, stop. You’re killing me.”
She kissed his shoulder and squeezed gently one last time before retreating with a sigh. “Yes, me too. The work bit, as well as the killing me. Let me take the pile of contraband to Tessa, and we’ll get everything back to the proper places. Don’t worry about it.”
“Tessa’s going to think you’ve gone nuts.”
“She’ll understand. She’s a shifter—I mean, she’s a cat, but she gets the mate thing. And you do have an impeccable record, right?”
“And I could buy the boat?”
“That too…” Keri leapt into his arms, clinging like a limpet. “I know I joked about your financial situation, and I’m not mad that you have money, but don’t think that’s the reason you make me happy, okay?”
He kissed her nose, squeezed her tightly. He dressed and sent up a request to whatever shipboard deities there were that time would fly until they could be together again.
Alone. He should have added alone with Keri to his request. Because it was only thirty minutes after he’d left Keri to head to what he expected would be a dirty, filthy, miserable job assignment before he saw her again.
And they weren’t alone. Least Likely Chaperones for a thousand, Alex…
“You nearly done?”
Chad leaned on the wall, arms folded, and got in the way. The man wasn’t close enough for Jared to shove the toilet plunger over his face, but the thought was tempting. “It’s not working. Looks like we’ll need a snake.”
“Why don’t you go get one?” Chad suggested.
He could do one better. Jared pulled out his phone and texted quickly. “It’ll be here in a minute.”
Chad frowned. “Really?”
“Really. It’s called delegating, Chad. You should try it sometime. I’m here, elbows deep in a project, so one of the guys currently walking the floor will bring the things we need. How long have you been working on this ship, anyway?”
Okay, he wasn’t being as polite as he’d been the day before. But knowing the creep had been after Keri made Jared’s fur stand on end which, when he was in human form, was a really uncomfortable sensation.
“This is my sixth trip. I did five with Tessa’s brother. Now there was a guy who knew how to run things.”
Not if he hired you four more times. “Tessa seems to be doing a great job.”
“She’s a girl.”
Jared kept his mouth shut but his brain screamed good observation, genius.
Chad didn’t need any encouragement. “Always that type. Get the job because they’re family, you know. Flash a little hip, and then poof, they’ve got the position someone more competent should have.”
“Really. Were you looking for her position?”
Chad laughed. “Me? Nahhh. I like coordinating behind the scenes. The front-line stuff was Tony’s place. He was good at it. Should come back.”
Jared wasn’t going to waste air responding. The guy clearly wasn’t listening to anything but his own voice.
Silence reigned except for the sloshing water as he worked the stopped-up water lines. Who knew that the summers he’d spent hanging out with the pool staff would have taught him so much about plumbing? Life really was an education.