“Get it together, Davenport,” I muttered, and went to find dry clothes.
The problem was that Samuel was taller than me. Broader in the shoulders. More... everything. My clothes were going to look ridiculous on him.
I grabbed my largest sweatpants—a pair I’d bought specifically for lounging and never wore in public—and a Yale sweatshirt that had been oversized on me when I’d bought it during a moment of optimistic athleticism that never materialized. A towel. Thick socks. This was crisis management, nothing more.
I was absolutely not thinking about Samuel naked in my shower.
I knocked on the bathroom door. “I’m leaving clothes outside. There’s a first aid kit under the sink for your hand.”
“Thanks!” His voice was muffled by the door and the sound of running water.
I retreated to the living room, where Purrsephone had claimed the spot closest to the fire and was watching me, her mismatched eyes radiating judgment.
“Don’t look at me like that,” I told her.
She blinked slowly, which in cat language probably meant something obscene.
“I did the right thing. Earlier, I mean. With the whole... friends’ conversation.” I was explaining myself to a cat. This was fine. Totally normal behavior. “He deserves someone who isn’t an emotional disaster. Someone who can actually be with him without having a panic attack about whether they’re being manipulated or used or—”
Purrsephone made a sound that was distinctly unimpressed.
“You don’t understand. Ollie seemed perfect too. For three years, I thought I’d found my forever man. And then I found that man with his tongue down my assistant’s throat.” I sat down heavily on the couch. “How am I supposed to trust my judgment after that?”
Purrsephone stretched luxuriously, then fixed me with a look that seemed to say: And yet you ran through a blizzard the moment you thought Samuel might be hurt.
“That’s different,” I said. “That’s basic human decency. Anyone would have done that.”
The cat’s expression suggested she wasn’t buying it.
The bathroom door opened.
“Hey, Farley?” Samuel’s voice echoed down the hallway. “Slight problem.”
I stood up, my heart doing something complicated in my chest. “What’s wrong?”
“The sweatpants situation is... not ideal.”
I walked toward the bathroom, telling myself this was fine. I was simply being a good host. There was nothing sexually charged about helping a guest with a clothing emergency,
Samuel stepped out of the bathroom.
He was wearing the Yale sweatshirt, which was indeed too small—stretched across his shoulders and chest in a way that made my mouth go dry. His hair was damp and tousled. And from the waist down, he was wrapped in nothing but a towel, my sweatpants dangling from one hand.
“They don’t fit,” he said, holding them up as evidence. “I got them halfway up my thighs, and then physics was not on my side.”
“I—” My brain had stopped working. There was a half-naked man in my hallway. A half-naked, beautiful, freshly showered man, who I’d kissed hours ago and who was now standing in my home wearing my sweatshirt and a towel. “I can find something else.”
“Do you have anything with more... give?”
“More give,” I repeated, because apparently I’d been reduced to echoing his words like a malfunctioning parrot.
“Elastic waistband? Drawstring? Something that acknowledges not everyone has your extremely reasonable proportions?”
“My proportions are perfectly normal.”
“Your proportions are adorable, but they are not helping me right now.”
Did he just call me adorable?
