Aurora was getting lost in his eyes – in his aura. In the club, she could control the room. Out here, with him, control wasfleeting, turning into eddies at her feet and vaporizing into the air.
“You said lamb chops,” she replied. “I haven’t had roasted duck since Sunday dinners ended at my grandparents’ house. But lamb chops sound amazing.”
“Help me with the sides while the lamb chops thaw out? Duck means I get to keep you all night.”
“And lamb chops aren’t going to take all night,” Aurora spoke with a slight laugh. “Are you trying to kidnap me?”
“You came willingly and there’s a cellar full of wine to pass the time.”
Aurora toyed with the idea, knowing she was going to say yes regardless of whether her brain was telling her to leave, go home, mind her business, and return to her uneventful life. “Dinner and then I’m gone. Deal?”
There was a glint in his eyes that verified that she wasn’t going home tonight. She knew it by the simultaneous thump of her heart and the throb at the apex of her thighs. Khalif licked his lips and smirked an assuring smirk.
“Deal.”
The first stop was the cellar with wall-to-wall wine bottles – whites, blushes, reds, and bubblies.
“You just keep the cellar stocked for entertainment purposes?” Aurora asked as she wandered around the space looking for a particular blend.
“I invested in a winery a year after I got into the league; Herman Hills.”
Aurora heard the name just as she found the blend, branded with the elegant HH seal stamped in gold wax. “Do you know who owned Herman Hills?”
Khalif swayed his head. “Mm mm, educate me.”
She turned to him, holding the bottle she had seen her entire childhood at all the parties, the same bottle her grandmotherpulled out when she graduated from undergrad and had another on hand for when she passed the bar.
“Johnny Walker Wilson. Herman was his father, my late grandfather. He bought the vineyard in Oakridge, and of course, when everything ended, everything ended.”
“Can I ask you a question?” Khalif asked, with the intention of learning her and the things that came along with her.
“Yeah.”
“Why didn’t anyone try to save any parts of his legacy?”
Aurora shrugged. “My grandparents didn’t know where to start or what to do. So they laid down and took it. My dad was the first one with some money, and some insight to do anything other than working a good job with insurance. We had a house because he paid for it in full and put their name on the deed. Trust me, there’s not a day I don’t ask that question or play it over and over again.”
“I feel like you’re owed something, though.”
It was Aurora’s turn for her eyes to glint. “Don’t worry, I’m going to get everything owed to me and then some. Until then, there’s this to open and lamb chops to sear. So if you’re going to feed me, you should start before I decide to put a fork in this.”
“Aight, come on,” Khalif chuckled, grabbing two bottles of the red blend as he trailed her to the stairs leading back to the kitchen. “You can cook in that?”
“I’m making sides, you’re doing the real work. I’ll be fine.”
In the kitchen, Aurora and Khalif moved around each other as if they’d been together longer, as if they’d known each other longer. Perhaps, in another life, their souls knew each other. Bodies finding a way to brush against the other. Lingering touches and prolonged glances, both trying to control the uncontrollable. Aurora finished mixing the salad and moved over to drop the potatoes in the boiling water, attempting not toreach out and touch his muscles and run her fingers down the center of his sculpted back.
She watched as Khalif’s brows knitted as he whipped the marinade vigorously. He was trying to whisk images of her out of his mind. He was trying to play this game by her rules. Feeling her eyes on him, he slightly looked at her.
“Why you lookin’ at me like that?” he asked.
Aurora poured another glass of wine and shrugged. “I don’t get to watch often, always focused on what to do next, what to say next.”
“You’re working me? Again?”
“Again?” Aurora feigned innocence. “No idea what you’re talking about. I’ve never worked you a day in my life.”
“You too damn beautiful to be a liar,” Khalif replied with no restraint. “I’ve told you already.”
