“Actually, it’s just three questions, not twenty,” I amended, and he looked at me, chewing.
When I said no more, mouth still full, he prompted, “Yeah?”
“Why do you park in front?”
His head jerked and he swallowed. “What?”
“You have a perfectly fine garage out back. Why do you park in front?”
“Because it’s half a football field away from the house,” he answered the answer I’d guessed.
I grinned at my plate because I liked being right, and I liked it more when Ren was witty, then I forked into French toast.
“Do you wanna park in back?” Ren asked, and I looked at him. “Got remotes for the opener. You should have one anyway, and when you do you can park where you want.”
“Okay. But I’m fine in the front. I just didn’t know why you didn’t park there,” I shared.
“And this is important?” he asked.
“No,” I answered.
He stared at me then he grinned. “You always wanted to know.”
I said nothing.
“And badass Ally Nightingale, holdin’ me at arm’s length, wouldn’t let herself ask.”
I rolled my eyes even though he was right.
“I was so totally in there,” he declared.
“I think we established that, Zano,” I replied.
“Just good to know how in there I was,” he murmured, still grinning even as he bit off half a sausage link. Bite in his mouth, he asked, “What else you always wanna know, honey?”
“Do you have a gardener?”
“Yes.”
Ren Zano didn’t mulch.
Why did having that confirmed make me feel melty inside?
I didn’t ponder that.
I kept going.
“You seem to have an aversion to the mall.”
His answer to that was, “Do I have a dick?”
I felt my lips curl up and I replied, “Yes, baby. You have a dick.”
“Then, yeah. I got an aversion to the mall.”
“Okay. Then how do you dress so well?” I asked.
He went back to his plate and answered, “Personal shopper.” He dug into French toast, lifted it to his mouth, chewed, swallowed and looked at me as I tried to process this surprising information. “Gotta have clothes. Don’t like shoppin’ for them. There you go.”
Interesting.
And an excellent solution to every badass’s problem of having to be clothed and being allergic to the mall.
“And, we gotta talk about this, so might as well do it now,” he started. I bit off part of my own smoky link and focused on him. “My woman’s her own woman, so I get that it’s likely gonna be important for you to feel you’re contributing. I’ll say now I’m good with covering everything until you get on your feet. I’m also cool with you making a contribution, just as long as it isn’t you making a statement that overextends what you can actually afford.”
I got what he was saying, so I told him, “I wouldn’t be good with living here without doing something, honey.”
“Right,” he replied. “Then come up with something you think you can afford, and we’ll talk about it. Yeah?”
Clearly, we were back to the easy part of this together togetherness.
Thank God.
“Yeah, Ren,” I said softly.
He grinned and went back to his plate.
I did the same and kept doing it until I heard him say, “This is delicious, baby.”
I looked at him. “It’s Roxie’s recipe for the French toast.”
“Your hand that made it.”
Again I felt melty.
God, I was totally becoming a Rock Chick.
Nevertheless, I decided breakfast in bed every Sunday until that day long in the future when Ren and I were both in a nursing home where we didn’t have kitchen privileges.
“You done with your questions?” he asked, and I nodded. When I did, he stated, “Right. Then we got something else we gotta talk about.”
I hoped whatever it was stuck with the easy vibe of our together togetherness because I was still riding the high of Ava and Luke’s wedding, the fact that I introduced Ren to Mom and Dad (eventually, between Ava and Luke’s dance and cake cutting) and they’d both acted genuinely nice instead of stiffly polite, and breakfast in bed with Ren was the bomb. I was digging easy. We hadn’t had a lot of that. And, with our personalities, this was as easy as I suspected it would get.
“What do we have to talk about?” I asked.
“What I’ve been needin’ to get down to talkin’ to you about since we got back from the mountains, just haven’t had the time.” He sucked back some coffee and finished, “Now we have the time.”
Okay.
Good.
I was happy we were getting to this. So much had been going on I hadn’t thought about it that much. That didn’t mean I wasn’t curious. Then again, I was always curious.
“Shoot,” I invited, grabbing my mug and leaning over him to deposit my plate on the bedside table.
Ren followed suit, lifted one knee and twisted partially to me.
“Shit’s goin’ down at work,” he announced.
Oh man.