“1976.”
“Wow. That is old.”
“Too old for you?”
The question feels loaded, but he’s younger than me, so I ignore the skip in my pulse and find an album my grandparents had on vinyl in their attic. “Pick a track number.”
“Five.”
“Not going to think about it?”
His gaze heats before he looks away. “Thinking gets me in trouble.”
Okay. That was definitely loaded. Unless it’s wishful thinking on my part. Is it weird that I want something to be different between us? That his easy grin and chill demeanor is getting under my skin more than if he couldn’t look me in the fuckin’ face?
I cue up the track without looking at it. Then die as sexy lyrics and a soulful beat fill the kitchen.Holy shit, fate. Give me a chance.
Joss laughs. “What is this?”
“Uh. ‘So Into You.’ Atlanta Rhythm Section.”
He bobs his head, getting into it, the way he does every random track and album we play each other. His taste is eclectic. Mine is what I was raised on: hot as hell soft rock with sultry lyrics that should make things awkward as shit, but don’t, because Joss doesn’t have an awkward bone in his body.
Don’t think about bones.
Too late.
Sometimes I get flashbacks of flames in my face and bloodcurdling screams. Sometimes my lips heat with a different inferno. It’s as unpredictable as Joss when it’s his turn to pick the music, but this time I’m lucky. Instead of a night where my breath mists the air as I run towards death, I find myself in the afternoon sun, green grass at my feet, blue skies overhead. He smells of herbs and summer. Botanical and beautiful. Kissing him is so fuckin’ easy. Sensation buffets me from every direction, but I don’t bend.
I don’t break.
Standing there, with him in my arms, it’s not an experiment, it’s an epiphany. I just didn’t know I needed it until I met him.
A skittering clatter brings me back to the present.
“Shit.” Joss has somehow flung his knife halfway across the room. It lands in a way that poses no danger to him or to me, but the cringe that creases his face is bone deep. “Bollocks.”
He steps back and scrubs a hand down his face. For a moment, he looks distraught. Then he blinks and jerks around. “I need beer for that fish batter.”
“Do you—”
He’s gone before I can finish the sentence. I put his phone down and cross the kitchen to where the knife landed. I pick it up and wash it.
I’m still at the sink when he comes back with a glass of beer. Seems to change his mind and leaves again.
Bemused, I set the knife back on the counter where he was working and wait.
He comes back with the beer in a plastic bottle. “In case I brain you with it.”
No smile. It shouldn’t shock me how much I miss it, but it does.
Joss bustles away. He returns with a bowl and a bag of flour as big as a newfoundland.
I watch him make batter with the skill and precision I’ve come to expect. I’ve never seen him google anything or follow a recipe. He just puts shit together and it works. Like music. Like art. “What are you using this for?”
“Fish and chips. Haddock. And halloumi, but I didn’t get that yet.”
“Thought Tanner did this morning?”
