“Are they now?” I pulled a corner of the bagel off and shoved it into my mouth, hoping it would be enough to quiet my stomach but immediately knowing it was nowhere near enough.
“Yeah. Different backgrounds, some a little rougher around the edges, but I know a diamond when I see one.”
Damon grinned at me, and I gave up, finally lifting the bagel off the crinkled white paper wrapper and taking a bite.
“And I know you only have room for one or two right now, but I think we could consolidate your sprawling mess and get three in easy.”
I glanced at my station.
It took up most of the shop because it was my shop, and I liked it that way.
“Don’t get ahead of yourself,” I warned. “You’re lucky I’m not going to cancel the interviews.”
“You’relucky,” he shot back. “Ev would never have wanted you to do this alone.”
I swallowed hard, a particularly thick piece of bagel lodging in my throat. I chased it down with some room-temperature coffee, some of the fight going out of me at the reminder Ev would have hated to know how long I’d been alone. Pleasure for us had gone both ways, in different ways, and he wouldn’t have…
That didn’t matter.
“Thank you for taking the time to do this,” I conceded, and Damon grinned at me like he’d won the lottery.
“You’re welcome. So, did you do anything fun last night?” he asked, finishing off his own bagel with a happy and satisfied little moan of approval. “I ran into Athena at The Cathouse. She showed me her new piece.”
I nodded, doing everything possible to not even think about the fact Smith was upstairs and asleep on my couch because my face might give away the answer to Damon’s question before my mouth ever could.
“It was fun,” I said.
“Her tattoo or last night?”
Before I could answer, the back stairs creaked under someone’s weight, and Damon’s head jerked toward me, his eyes wide and his mouth ready to tease.
“Don’t,” I warned, desperate to keep the conversation off of me. “Did you go home with her?”
“She has her hands full with Wes and Grant.”
“That wasn’t what I asked.”
“Of course I went home with her.” He rolled his eyes like the answer should have been obvious. “Then I went home and set analarm to make sure I was here in time to rouse you with tea and snacks before your big day.”
“Of course you did,” I grumbled.
My complaint was not loud enough to smother the sound of Smith tentatively calling out my name from the top of the staircase. I sighed, looking down at the counter. I could feel Damon’s stare on me, the question and the accusation ready. There was no way I was getting out of this meeting, no matter what I said.
“Down here,” I called. “With company.”
“I don’t…”
He didn’t have a shirt. His clothes were folded on a chair in my bedroom, but I’d put him to bed in my clothes without a shirt, and part of me loved that he hadn’t bothered to look for his things.
“Hold on.”
I gave Damon the finger and met Smith on the stairs, tugging off my hoodie and offering it to him. He looked amazing, rumpled from sleep and the ease from the night before still sketched across every muscle of his body. He shrugged into my hoodie, and I fidgeted with the hem of the threadbare shirt I’d slept in.
“Did you have an appointment?” he asked.
“No. My best friend showed up.”
“Oh.” Smith’s cheeks darkened and he took a step back toward the apartment. “I’m sorry. I wasn’t thinking.”
