She raised a brow at him, then adjusted the ring through her nose. “Uh, fine.” She jerked her chin somewhere behind him. “Tim is calling your bluff. Why are you acting weird?”
“I’m not acting weird,” Kizros argued, and if his twitching eye and whipping tail didn’t give him away, Tim did as he flicked soil out of his pot. Then Attie betrayed him too as she got up to rub against his legs and whimper.
Aofe folded her arms over the counter and leaned forward. “Kiz, if you don’t like what we did last night, we should talk about it.”
“What? No!” he blurted, then nearly tripped over Attie before he pressed both hands on the counter. “That was… incredible. I’ve never, well, I knew that was something I’d enjoy, I’ve just neverdone it, and?—”
A passing conversation drifted in through the open door, and Kizros all but sprinted to close the door and lock it behind him. When he came back, Aofe was leaned back in her chair, rubbing at her leg.
“You’re hurting.”
She glanced down, her hand pausing the rubbing motion. “Actually… no. Well, yes, but not as much as I thought I would be. Getting that gel on quickly might have been the right decision.” She shook her head. “Don’t change the subject.”
He returned to the counter, this time coming around the other side to be closer to her. “Go back to saying I was right.”
Aofe snorted a laugh, gently smacking him with the back of her hand, and that gesture—the casualness, the carefree demeanor, the friendliness—replaced all his worry. “What I’mtryingto make sure of, Kizros, is that we are both still on the same page.”
His heart climbed up his throat now with a different kind of nervousness.
“The saying?” she clarified, mistaking his hesitation for not knowing the phrase. “Where we are both in agreement?On the same page.”
“Mhmm,” he managed to mumble, suddenly anxious and excited and maybe a little bit terrified for where she was going with this.
“About that dynamic,” she pressed. “Sexual preferences?” He let out his breath as quietly as he could, all while Aofe remained clueless to his tumultuous emotions. “Kiz, I reallyenjoyed what we did. It was freeing, trusting you while being tied up, as ironic as that sounds. You never made me feel unsafe, and I just want to make sure you enjoyed that because I’d like to do other things.” She hesitated, then blurted, “With you. If you, you know, want to explore more. I feel safe. Seen. I really… I really like you.”
It didn’t matter that she mumbled the last bit, or that she turned away to avoid his gaze as her cheeks reddened, Kizros lit up at her words. It wasn’t the sex that altered his brain chemistry, butthis.
And he was done pretending he wasn’t selfish for wanting Aofe. For keeping her to himself and making plans that showed her just how much he meant what he’d said last night about taking care of her.
He reached out, hooking a finger around her chin as he tugged her gaze back to his. “I really like you too, Aofe.”
Still an understatement, but he could take his time building off of those words.
She blinked, blue eyes searching his face, lingering the longest at his wide smile before meeting his gaze. Her shoulders softened. “Yeah?”
He nodded, vowing to himself he’d find more ways to remind her every day how much he meant it. “And I hope we can explore other things. Together.” He tucked a strand of blue hair behind her ear then leaned back on the counter. “After all, I need to redeem myself for last night.”
All traces of uncertainty were gone from her face as she smirked. “You mean when you camein your pants?”
Kizros flicked her with the flat of his tail, then rolled his eyes at her laughter. “I’m never going to live that down.”
His gaze snagged on her mouth, where her tongue flashed over her lower lip before she tugged that pillowy softness between her teeth. “I don’t know why you’re embarrassed. That was hot.”
“I would have preferred fucking you.”
Her grin widened. “There’s my sexy, confident demon.”
He’d be anything she asked, as long as she called him hers again. “I cleared a table in the greenhouse this morning.”
“Oh, is that why you spent over an hour wiping down the same spot while I did all the hard labor watering the unruly plants? I thought you were just avoiding me.”
Kizros grimaced because it wasn’t untrue.
“I’m teasing,” she reassured him, reaching for her crutches. “But as lovely as that idea sounds, Zaretha is right. I’m determined to get a rune to work, and I think today is finally the day.”
19
CHARMING YOUR HUMAN COLLEAGUE
