“Mm, okay.” They ate in silence for several minutes until she broke it. “My clothes should be finished washing after breakfast. I’ll dry them and then head home.”
“It’s still raining,” Elias pointed out.
Eri shrugged. “It is, but not as bad. I can make it home.”
“I’d feel better if you waited.”
“It’s fine. It won’t take me long to make it.”
“Do you have plans today?” Elias inquired, and she shook her head. “Then why are you in such a hurry to leave, Eri?”
“I’m not…I don’t feel like being punished all day.”
Punished?He wasn’t punishing her. If she was referring to what he’d said in the hall, he apologized for that. He hadn’t meant for it to come off the way it did. Elias thought for another few seconds when he realized what she meant. He reached out and tipped her chin up.
“I’m not punishing you. I don’t want to. All I want is for you to spend the day with me, Amate. Will you?”
She bit her lip as she thought about it. “Yeah, I will.”
They continued to eat, and when they finished, Elias did the dishes while Eri went to put her clothes in the dryer. He hadn’t had any plans, even without the rain, other than lounging around the house for the day. Elias didn’t care what they did as long as she was there. He could admit that he missed her even while being upset with her.
“Do you have an umbrella?” Eri asked as she returned, and he looked over his shoulder at her. “I left my phone in the car, and I was supposed to let Avian know when I made it home, though I didn’t go there.”
“There might be one in the hall closet, but you can use mine,” he told her, turning his attention back to the task at hand.
She shuffled out of the kitchen, and a few minutes later, Elias assumed she hadn’t found an umbrella as she returned to the kitchen with his phone in hand while he dried the last of the dishes. Eri made the call, placed the phone to her ear, and a few seconds later, she was pulling it away. Elias couldn’t make out what Avian was saying, but knew she was fussing at who she assumed was him.
“Avi, calm down,” Eri said, bringing the phone back to her ear.
Voice now in a normal tone, he could no longer hear Avian, and he exited the kitchen. He grabbed a throw blanket from the hall closet and went into the living room. Elias scrolled through a streaming app before settling on a new movie that had been recently added. Eri joined him several minutes later, and since he was stretched out on the couch, she went to sit on the loveseat.
“We both know you remember where your seat is,” Elias said, stopping her. “Or are you trying to punishme, Amate?” he teased.
She placed his phone on the coffee table, and he pulled her to sit between his legs, her back against his chest, before starting the movie.
“It’s a horror movie, but don’t worry. I’ll help you hide when it gets too scary for you.”
“As long as there isn’t a bunch of mutilation, and jump scares, I’ll be fine.”
Elias hummed in acknowledgement, wrapping an arm around her waist as the opening scene started.
“Can we fast forward through this?” Eri asked forty minutes into the movie as a torture scene began.
“This might be the best part, and you want to skip it?” Elias asked teasingly.
Eri glared over her shoulder at him. “You just want me to be scared.”
He chuckled as he slid his arm from around her waist. “I don’t think we should skip it, but I will distract you,” he replied, turning her to straddle him. She released a surprised gasp at being manhandled, and before she could respond, his lips were on hers.
Elias had missed kissing her. Missed the taste of her lips and the way her tongue always went pliant under his. The way it followed wherever he led.
He kissed her slowly. Savoring and reacquainting himself with her taste. For a brief second, Elias found himself irritated. Why would she deny them both this for so long? That thought, that emotion, was quickly stamped down by the soft moan she released against his lips.
Elias drank it down like he needed it to survive, and maybe he did. Maybe he’d only been going through the motions for the past two weeks. Maybe her lips, the taste of her on his tongue, were truly what fueled him to live. It was a dramatic ass thought. One he’d never say aloud and knew wasn’t physically possible. But it was the only explanation for how, while upset with her, irritated at her actions and himself for not pushing when he should have, he’d felt like he had only been going through the motions.
Eri gripped the hair at his nape, and his hand slipped under her shirt. His fingers ghosted over her side and up her back. A small shiver rolled through her, and Elias deepened the kiss, pulling another moan from her.
Her hips rolled slowly, and his hands slipped down to grip them, stopping her. He pulled away, and she followed him. Elias gave her another kiss before separating.
