The Love Coupon (Stubborn Hearts 2)

“I’m sorry I woke you,” she said. There wasn’t anything sorry about the way she looked at him.

“Uh-huh.” He’d be sorry later, because getting back to sleep was going to be a problem.

“You don’t wear proper PJs either.” He looked down to check what he was wearing. Cut-off sweats. He should’ve put a shirt on. “You could’ve rescued me naked and I wouldn’t have cared,” she said.

It didn’t take a lot to imagine her naked.

She dropped her eyes to their feet. He hoped that’s what she was looking at. “It won’t happen again.”

Goddammit if he didn’t want that to be a lie. Her hair skated across his chest as she turned and made for her bedroom. “I’ll cook dinner tonight if you’d like,” he said before she disappeared.

With most of her body sheltered behind her open bedroom door, she looked over at him. “Can you do tuna casserole?”

“If that’s what you’d like.”

She smiled, lopsided and bright. Coy and come-on. He felt it in his gut. “I’d love that.”

“Seven thirty.” That gave him time to get organized, because until the moment he spoke he’d had no intention of being home early enough to cook.

“I am sorry I woke you.”

He was stupidly keyed up about all this. “You need to put your stuff away.” Her satchel was on the countertop, her gym bag by the front door.

“You’re bothered about my stuff right now?”

He moved past her to his own door. He was bothered by her, full stop. By the way she looked, by the way she looked at him, by the fact he might be imagining some shared arc of attraction. It was all a sideshow. “Goodnight.”

She closed her door with a thump, and sixteen hours later when he was layering pasta in a casserole dish in an otherwise Flickless condo while Bowie sang “Space Oddity,” he had every expectation of eating tuna casserole for days.

Her gym bag was gone from the door and there were no trinkets around the place and if he’d wanted her company he shouldn’t have made a big deal out of nothing.

She came in after eight when he was about ready to dish his own meal up.

“Hi.” The door got closed very carefully. Flick stood with her back to it wearing a navy pantsuit. There was a flare of hot pink at her collarbones and she wore the gold hoop earrings he’d found on the hall table. He flashed back to last night when she was all flesh and curves, goose bumps and challenges. The physical equivalent to a discount coupon at a strip club and a thousand percent more distracting.

“Hi. I’m just dishing up.”

“Wasn’t sure if you’d want me here. I can make myself scarce.”

“Stay.” It wasn’t quite I’m sorry. “I’ll be eating this for days otherwise, and I’ve got the ingredients for apple and berry cobbler.”

She came across the room and dumped a bag of groceries on the counter, along with her satchel. A box of mac and cheese fell out. “Figured I’d be eating alone.”

“I was half-asleep.” That wasn’t much of an apology either.

She slipped onto a stool. “You didn’t do anything.”

“I acted like an uptight dick.” That was at least stating it.

“This is your home and those rails work for you and I promised to respect them. There is no reason why I can’t put my shit away.”

“It’s not like you emptied the contents of your bedroom all over the place. There’s no reason why I can’t get used to you living in the whole condo.”

“I think it’s baked into you.”

“God.” It was true. “I’ll try not to be such a dickhead.”

“I bet you had to be all squared away at home. Everything in its place. A place for everything.”