A/N — I love these two. Since I paired Tex and Rachel in my most recent series, I haven't written them as much and I forgot how much I like them together. Hope I'm converting other people. xoxo — kals
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Andrea and Tex
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Andrea stopped at the door to her kitchen, enjoying the view of Tex's ass in his BDUs. Despite being older than Andrea, Tex had kept himself in good shape — better shape than she realized until she saw him naked. Those thighs could do things...
"There you are, Red. Just finishing dinner up," Tex said, interrupting her thoughts.
Crossing the kitchen, Andrea dumped her bag into the closet before ducking into the bathroom to wash her hands. Exiting, she watched while Tex set a platter of what smelled like lasagna on the dining room table where they usually ate, given the lack of space in the small kitchen. She hid a grin at the bright pink oven mitts he was wearing, a gag Christmas gift from Kat.
"You need me to find Kat?" Andrea asked, as Tex disappeared and then reappeared with garlic bread and a bottle of wine.
"Hm?" Tex asked, before going to work on the bottle of wine. "Oh, Kat's out for the night. Staying with the Lynch girls again."
Andrea stopped two feet from the table, taking in the sight in front of her for the first time. Two plates, wine, a fancy meal — well, fancier than any of them normally threw together — and, oh dear lord, he was lighting candles. She scowled. "What's all this?"
"Last time I checked, it was dinner," Tex replied, lifting one of the glasses to hand it to Andrea. When she didn't take the glass, he took a drink. "Nice cabernet. It would be a shame to waste it."
"We agreed that this was just about sex," Andrea said bluntly, staring at Tex, uncertain about the whirl of emotions that was rolling through her. She recognized the irritation, definitely, but there was something else. Something that was almost like ... excitement? But that was impossible. Why the hell would she be excited that Tex decided to break the very clear rules they set down and make this entire thing messy?
Tex gazed at her a moment before pulling out his chair. "Take a load off, Red. I personally prefer arguing on a full stomach and lasagna is best right from the oven."
"I like it better warmed up," Andrea replied without thinking, before deciding that there was no point in skipping dinner. The solution to this dilemma was obvious. They would eat, argue, and then stop having sex. Strange how much that last part bothered her. Apparently she had gotten more used to regular sex over the last six weeks than she realized. She sat, spooning lasagna onto her plate.
"Before you start ripping me a new asshole, I started dinner before Kat called to say that she was spending the night there," Tex explained, before shoveling a huge forkful of food into his mouth. He chewed slowly. "As for the rest of this, I figured why not? Last time I checked we were both over twenty-one."
She was an idiot.
Andrea felt the distinct urge to squirm in her chair, taking a sip of wine instead. This was hardly the first time she and Tex ate alone after Kat bailed. When Kat and then Tex first moved in, eating together simply made sense. So, whoever got home first started the meal and then whoever was home ate it. Recently, Kat was home less and less. At seventeen, she was old enough to take care of herself and, so long as she did her schoolwork and told them where she was, Tex was fairly lenient about letting her go places. Andrea had definitely over-reacted.
But instead of apologizing, Andrea leaned back, taking another sip of her wine. Tex must have known that she was watching him, but he said nothing as he continued to devour his lasagna. Finishing the piece, he helped himself to another, gesturing at Andrea's plate. "You going to eat that or wait for it to get cold enough to reheat?"
Andrea took a forkful of food but didn't lift it from her plate. "I don't want anyone to get hurt here, Kenneth. And that includes you. I'm not ... ready to move on. That's why I put the rules in place."
"You know me and rules. The best part about rules is breaking them," Tex quipped. Then, seeing her face, he sobered. "I'm not trying to pressure you into anything you don't want here, Andrea. Scout's honor." He paused, fiddling with his fork, before continuing. "The last year, it's been good. You, me and Kat — we rub along well. And Kat ... needed that after losing her mama. A nice meal now and again is just my way of saying thank you. For giving her, both of us, some stability when we needed it. The sex is just the cherry on top of the sundae from where I'm sitting."
She felt the same way.
Heck, that was why she considered having sex with Tex to begin with. Having him and Kat here had been her salvation, a distraction from her own grief at a time when it would have been too easy to throw in the towel and simply give up. Coming home to Tex and Kat — even in the early days when the two of them fought more than Andrea knew was humanly possible, forcing her to mediate a litany of complaints from Kat's valid claims of abandonment to an absurd argument over Tex's beard — was preferable to walking into a dark and empty house. Strange how she never realized that Tex felt the same way.
Suddenly feeling much more relaxed, Andrea picked up her fork. "If you're ever inspired to do more than cook, you're more than welcome to clean the bathroom."
Laughing, Tex raised his glass to click hers. "And deprive you of the pleasure of cleaning my nose hair out of the drain, Red? Not a chance in hell."