Luckily, most of the stuff she’d brought didn’t go bad in one day, and the ham had been left in the cold storage room.
With hunger pains stabbing her stomach, Brenna shoved the food in her mouth. Her lip split when she tried to get more food in. With a wince, she flicked her gaze to Eric. He hadn’t noticed any of her table manners, or lack thereof—too busy stuffing food into his own face with the same frantic vigour. She laughed, and Eric paused with half a sandwich shoved in his mouth to glance at her.
“I still don’t see why we had to get dressed for this,” Eric muttered with a mouth full of food. He paused, glanced down at his bare chest, and sent her a wink. “Well, mostly dressed.”
“I don’t want our bare asses on the furniture.”
He raised a dark eyebrow.
“Well, okay. Notallthe furniture.” She grabbed a quick swig of water. “If we did, I’d have to admit the possibility my brother and his harem of harlots have done the same thing, and that’s just icky.”
“Harem of harlots?”
“He’s a bit of a player,” she said.
“He’s not playing them if they’re aware of the situation and agree to it.”
She nodded, but her thoughts kept running laps inside her head. They hadn’t had any serious conversations, at least none in the English language. They hadn’t spoken about tomorrow, or after the cabin, or what, exactly, they were doing. Was this a situation? Was she “aware” of it, and by lack of denial, agreeing to it?
She sensed their stolen moments meant as much to Eric as they did to her, but maybe she sensed wrong. Maybe that was hopeful conjecture. Maybe they were on different pages, or hell, reading entirely different books. Maybe this was only a physical thing for him, another wondrous notch in his belt as he told lies with his body.
She shook the thought away. She refused to ruin this weekend with her self-doubt. She’d already made a deal with herself to save all serious conversations for after the blizzard. That way she could escape any awkwardness caused by a second spurning. And really, could any rejection be harder to handle than the one he’d already made?
Eric repeated “harem of harlots” under his breath again and shook his head. He polished off the rest of the food.
She pulled dessert from her pocket and placed it on the table beside Eric’s plate.
“What’s this?” he asked.
“Candy hearts. They’re a Jones tradition. I brought a bunch of packages to binge on during my read-athon.”
Wow did her plans for this weekend change.
“I love these things.” He snatched the package from the table’s smooth surface. After ripping it open, he pulled out the candies, one by one, reading their messages before placing them in a pile.
“What are you doing?” she asked. “That’s not how you eat them!”
She reached out to grab the candy, but he batted her hand away playfully.
“Relax. There’s more than one way to eat something.” He waggled his brows at her.
“Pig.”
“Not what you called me last night.”
She bit her lip. “Seriously, though. That’s not—”
“Shhh.”
He continued the practice until he pulled out a pink heart, no different than any of the previous pink hearts he’d placed in the pile and smiled.
“Aha!” He held it up and glanced at her. His brows pinched together, and his mouth compressed into a thin line before he turned to her. His expression softened but remained serious.
“It’s just candy,” she said.
“Not to me,” he replied. “I want you to have this.”
He held out his hand, palm open. She plucked the candy and flipped it around in her fingers.
