He stood, his bare back facing me, and I could see every perfect muscle in his shoulders flex and work as he scraped a pan of what looked to be eggs. Those broad shoulders tapered to a narrow waist, where low-slung black pajama bottoms hung.
Lord have mercy, the man had a fine ass. I could also see the faintest remnants of scratch marks from a few days ago when I had clawed him. Something about seeing him this way: tousled hair, relaxed, with my marks on him, made me…
Happy.
I cleared my throat.
He turned around, and my saliva glands went to double time, because the front, if possible, was better than the back.
“Good morning,” he said, then frowned hard at me. “What are you doing?” He stared at my purse, looking me over like I was wearing an “I support Satan” T-shirt.
“I was going to head out?” It was supposed to be a statement, but came out more like a question, because he was still looking at me like I was crazy.
“You’d like to leave?”
That was a loaded question. Would I like to leave? No. I’d like to crawl back into bed with the man in front of me and forget everything but his warmth. Instead, I went with, “Isn’t that protocol?”
“Protocol?” he stepped toward me. “You insult me and yourself when you say that.”
“What?” I exhaled a heavy breath. “I was just trying to give you space. Don’t women usually leave after they stay the night? Or do the women you have over stay for breakfast? How am I supposed to know? I didn’t want to assume anything, and just figured—”
“I don’t have women stay over.”
That stopped my speech dead in its tracks. “Really?”
“And I was hoping you’d stay for breakfast.” He looked me up and down again. “Actually, I was hoping you’d walk out here naked and I’d eat you for breakfast.”
I swallowed hard. “Sooo, not the protocol I was thinking.”
“No, baby,” he said, and turned back to take the eggs off the burner and put them on a plate. “There’s no protocol when it comes to us.”
Us. That word was even better than “more.” Or “boyfriend.” Or “arrangement.”
Us.
I bit my bottom lip to keep from smiling. Jack turned and held two plates in his hands. Apparently, he’d been cooking longer than I realized.
“Lana,” he said in a raspy voice with just a hint of softness. “Will you stay for breakfast?”
Nothing prepared me for that. Jack Powell just asked me to stay.
“I’d love to.”
He lifted his chin at the table behind me, but I didn’t miss the grin that lined his face. “Then, go sit.”
I put my purse on the counter and went to sit at the table.
“Wow,” I said, when I looked at the spread. Literally, everything imaginable you could think to spread on bread was in the middle of the table.
“I didn’t know what you liked,” he muttered. He set my plate in front of me, then sat next to me. I looked at him for a long moment. He was incredibly thoughtful. This was the Jack that was ratcheting his way into my heart. Because, he may not think so, but it was the exact thing that made him more. In every way.
I looked at the plethora of options in the middle of the table. Everything from an assortment of jams to apple butter, to Nutella, to…was that jalapeno spread?
I’d never seen so many options. “Did you have all this lying around?”
“No.”
I looked at him. “You went and bought it?”