Hidden Pleasures - Brenda Jackson [52]
She rubbed her arms where his hands had touched. “I know,” she said smiling faintly up at him. “But no one has ever given me anything before.” And that had been the truth. Even during the Christmas holidays when she’d received presents from her foster parents, she’d known the gifts had been donated by charity.
He took a step toward her and reached out and traced the curve of her mouth with his thumb. “But all that’s changed now, hasn’t it?”
He was standing close, so close she could feel his erection through his jeans pressing against her. She couldn’t stop the stab of sexual sensations that spiked through her veins.
His question made her realize that yes, it had changed. Her mother may have given her away when she was born, but before Gloria McIntyre had left this earth she had found her and had tried making things right. Not that they had been wrong. A part of her had always figured her mother had been a teenager who’d wanted the best for her. She’d had no way of knowing that what she’d wanted for her daughter and what her daughter eventually got were two different things. But then maybe she did know once she’d gotten the investigator’s report.
“Do you need my help?”
She gave Galen a reluctant smile. What she needed was for him to leave the kitchen so she could concentrate.
“No, I can handle things. Why don’t you go to the garage and start working,” she suggested. “I’ll call you when I’m done.”
“And you’re sure you don’t need my help?”
“I’m positive.”
“All right. And you don’t have to come to the garage looking for me. I’ll be back up in fifteen minutes or so. I’ll lay out my supplies and come back.”
He turned to leave, then, catching Brittany off guard, he pulled her against him and covered her lips in a kiss that sent her pulse racing. When he released her, he whispered against her moist lips, “I like you.” And then he moved toward the door that led to his garage.
“Tell me about your brothers, Galen.”
Galen glanced across the table. When he had returned from the garage, it had been just in time to see Brittany place the pancakes she’d prepared on a platter. Then there were the eggs, bacon and orange juice. Everything he would normally get at Flynn’s Breakfast Café where he ate most mornings. But he would be the first to say the meal Brittany had prepared could hold its own against Flynn’s any day.
He lifted a brow. “My brothers?”
“Yes.”
She had asked about his brothers before, a couple of times, and he’d always avoided her question. His family was his family, and most people living in Phoenix knew the Steele brothers. Most women he’d dated didn’t ask about his brothers, because Tyson, Eli, Jonas, Mercury and Gannon had managed to carve out reputations around the city on their own. He had to remember Brittany wasn’t from Phoenix, though, which could be a good thing. She wouldn’t know about the Steele brothers’ reputation. She had no idea some women considered them the “Bad News Steeles.” Nor would she know they liked women in their beds, but had no plans to keep them in their lives.
“I mentioned I’m the oldest,” he started off by saying.
“After me there’s Tyson. There’s only an eleven-month difference in our ages. At thirty-three he’s the doctor in the family, a heart surgeon and a damn good one.”
He took a sip of his coffee, thinking it tasted just as good as any he purchased from Starbucks. “After Tyson there’s Eli. As you already know, he’s the attorney in the family. He’s thirty-two. Then there’s Jonas, who’s thirty-one. Jonas owns a marketing firm and has some top names as clients. After Jonas there’s Mercury at thirty. He’s an ex-NFL player turned sports agent. And last but not least is Gannon, the youngest at twenty-nine, but he’s definitely not the smallest. He took over the day-to-day operations of my father’s trucking company and even gets behind a rig himself every once in a while.”
He leaned back in his chair. “So there you have it, the Phoenix Steeles.”
She smiled and lifted a brow. “There’s more?”
He chuckled. “Yes, mostly living in North Carolina. Have you