Page 58 of Love Out Loud

Chapter 21

Lark

“What are these?” I’m standing in the doorway that separates Lennon’s en suite bathroom from his bedroom wearing nothing but one of his giant USC T-shirts and dangling from my outstretched hand a pair of tortoiseshell glasses that had been sitting on the counter next to the sink. It’s early Sunday evening, and we’ve spent all day in bed, having switched rooms because his is so much bigger. We explored each other’s bodies over and over again and finally came up for air about an hour ago to order food.

Lennon is sitting—gloriously shirtless—against the headboard. He leans his head forward and squints, confirming my suspicions that these are, in fact, his and he hasn’t been wearing them.

“I would think that should be obvious,” he says drily. “They’re glasses.”

They sway back and forth in my hand. “But are they your glasses?”

His squint turns into a narrowed gaze directed at me. Or, depending on how bad his eyesight actually is, in my general direction.

“Yes.” The word is curt and leaves no room to further broach the subject.

Too bad that’s not enough for me. I cross to the bed and climb up so I’m straddling him. He watches me with and amused lift of an eyebrow as I place the glasses on his face. “Are you resisting them because your failing eyesight is a signal of your mortality?” I tease.

“No.” By the quiver in his voice, I can tell he’s trying to hide a laugh.

“Is it because you think they make you look old?” I tilt my head and make a show of studying him. “Because I am here to say, definitively, that they make you look distinguished.”

“Every man’s dream,” he intones.

“Distinguished is professor-speak for super sexy,” I explain.

His hands land on my hips, and he holds me in place as he lifts his. “Well, Professor Caspian, in that case…” The man is insatiable.

I tip my head back and laugh, and he uses it as an excuse to kiss my throat. These little touches are as natural as breathing. We’ve fallen into them as easily as if we’ve been together in this way for years, and my insides go a little gooey. As much as I like it, though, I still haven’t gotten an answer.

“Seriously.” I lean back slightly so I can look at him again. “You should wear them, if for no other reason than to be able to fully see how good I look.”

“Songbird, I’ve been fully seeing how good you look for over twenty years. Trust me when I say I don’t need the glasses for that.”

I cross my arms and don’t miss the way his eyes dip to my chest and drag their way almost reluctantly back up to my face. “Okay, fine,” I say, pretending his compliment and subsequent gaze didn’t just heat the room by ten degrees. “So why don’t you wear them?”

He sighs and falls back against the headboard with a dull thud. “I put them on once, and I didn’t like what I saw.”

“I’ll refer you to my aforementioned comment about you looking distinguished.”

He chuckles and rolls his eyes. “No. I mean, I looked in the mirror and I could see myself. Clearly. Suddenly, there were all these lines and wrinkles I had no idea were there before. So, I stopped wearing them.” He lifts a shoulder in a half shrug. “I don’t really need them anyway. They’re barely a prescription.”

I blink a few times, trying to process what he just said. “You do know the wrinkles are there whether you can see them or not.”

“If a tree falls in the forest and no one’s there to hear it, does it still make a sound?”

I raise my eyebrows and blink at him again. “Yes.” I take the glasses off him and fold them to carefully set them on the nightstand. “And besides, I’m here, and I can see them.” I kiss the crinkly lines at one corner of his eye, then the other. “And I like them.” Then, I kiss the lines bracketing each corner of his mouth, followed by the strong line of his jaw.

“There aren’t any lines there,” he insists.

“Oh, no?” I nip at his jaw, then smooth my tongue over the spot. “I thought I saw one.”

Lennon mumbles something incoherent, even as his fingers dig into my skin.

“You can’t be expected to look like a teenager for your entire life.” I kiss the other side of his jaw for good measure.

“Says the woman who has fifteen bottles of potions lined up in my guest bathroom.” He’s being sarcastic, but it’s a gentle prod. I pull back so I can see his full face. He’s searching mine, his gaze snagging on places I know have those same lines he’s so worried about.

“I don’t look like I did in high school, either.” Not just in my face, but in my fuller hips and deflated breasts. It’s unfair those two can’t be the other way around.