“I know, I know,” she says. I can practically picture her holding up her hands to placate me. “But this one feels special.”
His laughing brown eyes pop into my head. “Yeah, he is.”
Dorian picksme up after the store closes, and we drive along the 40. We chat, so I don’t pay attention to where we’re going until we reach a quiet little row of houses with one streetlamp and very middle-class cars. He pulls into a driveway and puts the car in park.
“Is this where you grew up?”
He shoots me a look. “It’s where I live now.”
My stomach swoops. Dorian brought me to hishouse?
He comes around the car and opens my door, then stands directly in front of me. “Is this weird? I wanted to cook you dinner, but now I’m thinking it was forward of me.”
“So forward,” I tease. “How bold of you to make me food.”
The look he gives me dives straight to my belly. “Okay.”
We walk up the path and he unlocks the door, letting me in. The smell of his house is much like him—sharp and clean, butit’s quickly overtaken by the aroma of food. Something savory and rich.
“Tuscan chicken with sun-dried tomatoes and a cream sauce over pasta,” he explains. “With asparagus.”
“Sounds amazing.”
“This meal is my only flex. Don’t start thinking I know how to cook. I can make this one thing.”
“I’m almost positive you’re being humble, but I’ll take it at face value and let you prove me wrong later.”
“True. I make a mean waffle.” Dorian’s smile is warm, making my toes curl. “It’s all finished. I just need to make the sauce, but that’ll only take a few minutes.”
I take my coat off and hang it by the door, then leave my shoes next to his. It makes the sweetest domestic picture, and my brain takes off a mile a minute. I have to shut it down.
Dorian’s house is simple. The furniture is mostly neutrals—browns, blues, tan, stone gray. He has green accents and art on the walls that looks like real paintings, not the knockoffs I picked up at Hobby Lobby. His rug is lush beneath my feet, and I can tell that, while Dorian doesn’t have a lot of belongings, the ones he does have are carefully selected.
His kitchen is updated, with the deep wooden cabinets looking freshly stained. I pull out a barstool and get comfortable. “So, where does all the magic happen?”
He glances at me over his shoulder. “My writing?”
I love that he knows what I meant. “Yeah.”
“I have an office around the corner there.” He nods in that direction, since he’s sprinkling flour over melted butter. “Actually…I haven’t left that room pretty much all week.”
“Dorian.” I try not to make a big deal out of this. “Are you writing again?”
I can sense his grin, even though his back is to me. “Maybe.”
My squeal is loud and jarring, but he doesn’t even flinch. I hop down from the stool and race around the island, throwing my arms around Dorian’s waist. He never stops stirring his roux, but his other arm clamps around me, and I inhale his spicy scent. My eyelids drift closed, every nerve ending on fire where my body is touching his. “I’m happy for you.”
“Thanks,” he murmurs into my hair.
We stand like that for a while, and I don’t know exactly when he wraps me in both arms, but soon he’s rubbing my back, his fingers are trailing over my neck, and volleys of shivers are washing over my skin. I’m warming from the inside out. My heart beats furiously, pounding in rhythm with the popping on the stove.
When his hand slides into my hair at the base of my neck, lifting it, his thumb drawing lazy circles on my skin, I think I might lose control.
It’s only a hug. The most supercharged, electric hug I’ve ever felt, but still…just a hug. I want to live in it forever.
My fingers splay on his back, dying to keep him close but conscious of the sizzling roux on the stove beside us.
“Sorry,” I mutter, trying to pull away.
