Rowan’s eye cut to him again. “Because snuggles?”
Had his ears deceived him or had that line actually held a hint of teasing? Milo’s reaction to the possibility was obviously to egg it on. He leaned farther toward Rowan’s broad side, utterly shameless, batting his lashes at the man. “You’re seriously amazing at interpreting me. It’s quite thrilling, y’know. Makes me want to flirt with you.”
Rowan’s voice turned dry. “Oh? I’m your type, then? Meaning I’m an asshole?”
“Nooo, I said I was trying to do better! You’re my new type. No assholes allowed.” Milo was working on dating better men, after all, and Rowan absolutely hit the mark.
“Milo. You have a very low bar.”
“Admittedly, I do. But the bar is higher than it was six months ago! In my defense, I’m making progress.”
He didn’t see it, but he could feel the jerk of Rowan’s chest as he snorted/laughed. A sense of pride filled Milo at having gotten his resting bitch face to relax enough to show humor. Which, honestly, the man shouldn’t have let on he’d found Milo funny. Because now Milo was really going to up the antics until he got this man belly laughing. See if he didn’t. First, though, time to get to know him better. For all they had talked throughout the afternoon, Milo didn’t actually know much about him.
“So when you’re not fighting, what do you do?”
“Read” was the unexpected answer.
Hot damn. This man couldn’t get sexier right now if he tried. “Read what?”
“Anything I can get my hands on.” Milo felt the slight shrug. “In the winters, there’s not much to do except read, eat, and sleep. Well, we do play games with each other and do some crafting as well. Except for rare attacks, the Drachifel hibernate during the winter, but with the snowdrifts, it’s hard to go out. We train indoors, but it leaves a lot of leisure time.”
“Because you’re locked inside, basically?”
“Yeah.”
“I brought books with me.”
“Did you really? How many?” Milo could practically hear the greed in his voice.
“About twenty.” Milo thought about it, but he hadn’t actually counted how many books he’d put into his trunks. He’d basically put in anything helpful and some favorites. “Three, no four, of the books won’t be of much interest to you. They’re resourcebooks for me, all magicky and stuff, but the others might be something you’d like. I’ve got a mix of romance, fantasy, mystery, and a few adventure stories. Grand quests, y’know.” Milo lifted his head once more.
Rowan was definitely smiling, even if it was faint, more sensed than seen beneath the ginger beard. The failing light was likely to blame for that, as all they really had to see by now was the campfire. “I’ll borrow some of those from you.”
“Sure! I also like to read, so let’s swap books.”
Rowan definitely looked happy at the idea. Then he inhaled deeply. “I think it’s done.”
What was? Milo’s restraint? Yeah, it was basically done in at this point.
Oh, he meant the food.
Rowan untangled himself from Milo, then shifted off the log to pull the pot out of the embers, lifting the lid to check it. He grunted in satisfaction, gesturing for Milo to grab a wooden bowl, which he promptly did because the food smelledamazing.
Milo could, and had, eaten everything in the house. His great-aunt used to despair of him as she could never keep enough food stocked, and she’d teased him mercilessly about her lowered food cost when he’d been old enough to attend the magical academy. He’d never gained weight to show it, but he was the definition of a bottomless pit. Thus snacks. So he mounded his bowl over, intent on eating it all, already drooling at the idea of seconds.
Then he took a bite and moaned. Scratch that, he’d need at least three bowls.
Rowan cast him an amused glance. “Good?”
“You can cook too.” Milo whimpered between bites. “Gods, it’s unfair. You need some kind of flaw to make up for all of this.”
Rowan pointed to his face. “Flaw.”
“Shut up. You’re handsome, so that’s not a flaw. Oh, you mean the resting bitch face. Eh, I don’t really consider that a flaw.”
“Eat.”
“I am, I am!”
