“Now?” I echoed, feeling like I was dangling off the edge of a cliff.
“Now there’s you.” He took my face in his hands and kissed me. “Without making specific promises, I’m up for seeing where this takes us—if you can put up with me…with us. We’re sort of a package deal.”
Relief and affection for him made me smile. “I’ll try. Let’s go slow—one step at a time.” I grinned at him. “So we don’t lose our balance.”
He kissed me again and pulled me into his arms. “I don’t deserve you, Girl Friday. But I want to.”
? ? ?
While Levi made dinner, I mixed two Old Fashioneds. “Do you like this whiskey?” I asked, showing him the bottle. “My guy at the liquor store said it’s awesome.”
He looked up from his tray of bacon-wrapped steak. He’d cuffed his sleeves, which meant I could see his watch, which meant I might have drooled a little bit. “Journeyman? I love it. I’d like to visit that distillery.”
“We should go sometime,” I said, putting a little sugar in the bottom of each glass. “I looked it up, and it’s pretty much a straight shot down ninety-four. Then we could go to Chicago!”
“Is that before or after our ski trip?”
“Hmm, we do have a lot of big plans, don’t we?” I wet the sugar with some bitters and a splash of soda, swirled it around to coat the bottom, then added an ice cube. “Maybe we should start a little smaller.”
“I was thinking the same earlier today,” he said, sliding the tray of steak bites into the oven. “I’d like to spend a night with you somewhere.”
I poured the whiskey into the glasses as my stomach flipped. “Like a sleepover?”
“Yes, a sleepover.” He shut the oven and turned around, laughing. “Although I have never called it that before.”
I handed him his drink. “I’d love that. Open invitation here, whenever you can work it out.”
“Thanks.” He took a sip and raised his eyebrows. “This is perfect. My God—she’s beautiful, smart, and mixes a proper cocktail?” He clapped a hand to his chest. “I’m in love.”
I knew he was teasing me, but my heart stopped just the same, and I nearly dropped my drink. “I’m glad you like it. I’ll admit, I had to look it up,” I said, hoping he couldn’t tell how flustered I was by his words. “Is that cheating?”
“Not at all.” He came closer and kissed my forehead. “You’re a very good student.”
“Especially when the subject is you. Guess what else I did?”
“What?” He took another drink and licked his lips.
“Rented The Shawshank Redemption so we could have our movie date.”
“Did you?” He set down his glass and opened up the bag of greens. “Hey, can you grab two dinner plates for me?”
“I think I have the movie for twenty-four hours,” I said, reaching for two plates in the cupboard. “But if we don’t get to it tonight, we can always rent it another time.”
“We might have to.” He took the plates from me and set them down. “Because it’s after seven already, I told my sitter I’d be home around eleven, and I want to give you at least two more orgasms before I go.”
I giggled. “You’re going to spoil me.”
He picked up his drink again, tapped it against mine, and took a sip. “As much as fucking possible.”
“I’ll help you with the dishes,” I said, bringing our plates and silverware over to the sink. There was hardly a crumb left—Jillian’s appetite at the dinner table was just as voracious as it was in the bedroom, which I found delightfully sexy. It was almost funny watching her devour everything on her plate, given how thin she was.
“Don’t you dare.” She poured the rest of the wine in our glasses. “You cooked the entire meal. The least I can do is the dishes.”
I laughed. “I’m used to doing both.”
“Too bad. I’ll get them done later. Come sit with me for our movie date.” She set our wine on the coffee table, turned off the lights, and got on the couch, tucking her legs beneath her.
I knew what was going to happen if we got on the couch in the dark, and it didn’t involve Tim Robbins and Morgan Freeman. But she looked so excited about watching my favorite movie with me, I figured I’d humor her.
We lasted ten minutes.
At that point, my hand was up her shirt, her hand was down my pants, our tongues were tangled up, I was hard, she was wet, and the only prison we gave a fuck about was our clothing. We broke free of it a lot faster than Andy and Red, whipping off shirts and dragging down jeans and flinging underwear to the floor. I brought her to orgasm with my fingers first, even though she begged me to fuck her, because I couldn’t get enough of the sounds she made, the way she moved against my hand, the shape of her mouth when she came.
And it was something I could give her…there was so much I couldn’t.