I turn back to Eloise with a look of feigned hurt. “I can’t believe you’re embarrassed to tell people about our love, Eloise.”
She smacks my knee. “I can’t believe you told her we were dating!”
“Well, aren’t we?”
Eloise freezes, her eyes going wide as I stare into hers. “I… no?”
“Do you want to?”
Her breath hitches, the vein in the side of her neck thrumming rapidly. “What?”
“The question was fairly simple, Eloise,” I murmur, reaching up and cupping her cheek. “I don’t need an answer now. Just think about it.”
“Okay…”
I release her, using my free hand to push the plate of sugar-filled food toward her. “You should eat. It’ll get cold.”
She nods, her cheeks flaming, hands shaking ever so slightly as she reaches for her fork. As soon as she takes a bite of her food, she lets out the cutest little moan, and my cock strains—clearly misreading the room.
I watch Eloise out of the corner of my eye, enamored by every aspect of her being. Just being in her presence is invigorating, inspiring. It makes me want to write, to put into words how being in her orbit makes me feel.
As she takes her second bite, I slide out of the booth and head toward the hostess stand, returning to the table with a pen in hand.
“What’s that for?” Eloise asks, placing her fork between her crumb-coated lips.
“A surprise.” I slide in next to her and grab a napkin, doing my best to cover what I’m writing from Eloise’s prying gaze until it’s ready. When I’m satisfied, I straighten, pushing the napkin toward her, strangely nervous.
Her eyes move over the lines, her lips tipping upward as she reads. “Song lyrics?”
“Mm-hmm.”
“They’re beautiful,” she murmurs, brushing the corner of the napkin with her forefinger. “You just thought of these?”
“Just now, yeah.” I stare at her profile, unblinking, my heart thudding wildly against its cage. “I had to get it out, get it down on paper.”
“Get what out?”
“Feelings,” I say. “Too many feelings.”
She nods, her finger hovering over the first line briefly before tapping down on a word. “This one, here… What if it said, ‘spark in the haze’ instead of ‘light’?”
I draw the napkin back toward me, scratching out the line and adding the lyrics she suggested.
I see you in the crowd, like a spark in the haze,
A smile cuts through, sets my nights all ablaze.
Your love’s out of reach, but it lingers in my veins,
A fleeting kind of fire that I’m chasing through the rain.
Damn. Thatisbetter.
I look over at her, my pulse spiking when I find her eyes already on me. “Thank you, Eloise.”
“For what?”
“For being you. Wonderfully, magnificentlyyou.For filling my heart with sound, when it had been so horribly silent. For inspiring me.”
