Probably not.
She would have never set foot in The Velvet Throne if she hadn’t been as angry and hurt as she’d been over Alex’s betrayal. She glanced over at Steve, the thought making her suddenly need to reassure herself that he was here. She leaned into his side refusing to think any more on it. She didn’t want to entertain any chain events that didn’t lead to Steve standing in her apartment this morning.
Jordyn shifted her eyes over to Laurence with a shrug. “You live and you learn,” she said.
“That’s the truth.” Laurence smiled and then gestured at them with the wrench he had been holding. “Well, I’ll let you and your beau get back to enjoying a lazy Sunday. See you around, Jordyn.”
Jordyn froze when Laurence called Steve her beau, but Steve didn’t. Instead, he pulled her closer to him and lifted a hand in a wave. “Catch you later, Laurence,” Steve called to the handyman, who raised the wrench in a departing wave before disappearing around the corner. Jordyn swallowed hard, deciding against bringing up what Laurence had said. If Steve didn’t seem bothered by it then there was no reason to make a big deal about it.
Not that she could tell anyway...
Crossing her arms, she looked up at Steve with a grin. “Glasses, huh?” she asked, and he nodded before pushing them up onto his head.
“I think I’m getting a little farsighted. Glasses help me focus on small stuff, which is pretty important for my job, and also for keeping track of screws that I’m trying not to lose.” He held up a hand, showing her a few screws from the old doorknob.
“Ah, well. I like them,” she told him, and turned, drifting back into the apartment. “I like them a lot,” she added over her shoulder.
Steve closed the door and locked it with appreciative hum before following her into the kitchen. When he appeared, she looked up at him with a tense smile, opening her mouth to ask him the question that was on the tip of her tongue. She wanted to ask him to stay for breakfast, but she hesitated.Was offering breakfast on par for what was now a two-night stand? Whatever they had blossoming between them felt new and fragile, like delicate eggshells she was worried of crushing underfoot if she tread too heavily. What if she asked him to stay and he told her no? Yes, it wasn’t the end of the world but...no? “No” from Steve would feel pretty damn big.
“What?” Steve asked, trying not to laugh at her sudden case of fidgets.
Jordyn bounced on the balls of her feet and sighed loudly before asking the question she wanted to. Fortune favored the bold. She’d come this far, gone into The Velvet Throne for this man, now was not the time to lose her nerve.
“Do you want to stay for breakfast?” She winced at how quickly her question came out and hastily added, “I mean, only if you want to. I can make us something to eat—coffee, eggs, bacon. It’s the least I can do for your changing the locks.”
“I’d love to,” he answered without skipping a beat.
Jordyn looked up from where she had been twisting her fingers in her sweater with a bright smile. “Really? I’ll...get started on breakfast then,” she said and began to bustle around the kitchen, pulling eggs and bacon from the fridge and turning on her coffee maker. “This is going to be the best Sunday breakfast ever, you’ll see.”
Chapter Thirteen
Steve slidinto a seat to watch her prepare breakfast. His eyes stayed on her, drinking up the way she moved in the kitchen. The scene was domestic, achingly familiar though he had never had breakfast in this place before. He had never eaten a single meal with Jordyn, but that didn’t matter.
Jordyn felt steady, warm, and comfortingly normal—the way Steve’s life had been for the first 19 years, and right now, there was no place he’d rather be than watching her at the stove making breakfast. There were moments like this when everything seemed normal, and it was almost like the accident had never happened. Steve had learned to grab onto those moments, stay around those people that made him feel normal, and never, ever, did he take either for granted.
“Earlier, you said that glasses were important to your job… Can I ask what you do?” Jordyn looked at him over her shoulder as she added bread to the toaster.
“Have you heard of Ink and Bone?” he asked, watching her face to see what her reaction was. It was important for him to know what she thought about how he made his living. Why? He had zero idea other than he liked being around her, wanted her comfortable and that would have something to do with her thoughts on how he chose to make his money.
“The tattoo place on Sixth?” she asked, flipping the bacon and taking two plates out of the cupboard.
“That’s the one. I own it with a friend. Have you ever been there?” His eyes followed her intently as she put the eggs on a plate and poured a cup of coffee for him. She met his eyes, and he knew she was aware he was paying closer attention now.
She shook her head. “No, I’ve been by it, but I’ve never gone inside. You know, I actually work around the corner at the veterinarian clinic. I walk by there a lot on my lunch breaks, on the way to the coffee shop next door,” she told him, setting the plate of food and the coffee in front of him. “That’s kind of funny, isn’t it?” She handed him a set of silverware.
“Yeah, it is.” He took the silverware she offered with a smile, but all Steve could think about was: how had he never noticed her before? How had he not seen Jordyn through the large glass front of the shop on her breaks? Would she really have gone on working just a few minutes away and taking her breaks next door without meeting him if she hadn’t gone into the club? Steve hated that the answer was most likely yes. They would have gone onjuston the outskirts of the other’s world, never really looking hard enough to notice that they were right there.
“Creamer, or are you one of those purists?” she asked him, and Steve forced his attention back to her pretty face. She was smiling at him, dangling a bottle of hazelnut creamer in front of him. It was best to concentrate on the now, and the “now” was him in Jordyn’s kitchen, having breakfast with her.
“Purist in public, but I love my coffee sweet in private,” he admitted. Jordyn laughed and poured a generous amount of creamer into his cup.
“I won’t tell anyone,” she promised and returned to the stove to prepare her own eggs. “So you’re a business owner and an artist, then?” She shot a glance over her shoulder at his ink-covered arms. “Did you draw those?” She looked interested. Steve could work with interested.
“Most of them,” he replied, taking a bite of bacon. He chewed it and then looked up at her with searching eyes. “You really think I’m an artist?”
“Well, you make art, so yes.”
Steve smiled at her answer. He wanted to kiss her all day for it.“Not a lot of people would consider this art," he told her, gesturing down his arms with a piece of toast.
