I’d fully mentally prepared to remain chaste for the rest of my days.
Now, I need to pretend that when I mentioned acurriculum, I wasn’t baselessly flirting to get her mind off every step involved in eating her food. It’s a bit fast to begin booking a surgery, even if I imagine the recovery time won’t be quick, either. How exactly do I handle this new information when it feels like my heart is going to explode?
Azalea glances at me and freezes. “Is…everything all right?”
I tip my chin forward, back, forward again. “Yes. I’m just unprepared.”
“Unprepared?”
“I’d completely committed to an idea that you’d never be ready or never want me like that. I’m not sure if I’m ecstatic or grateful or hopeful or…worried.” Blinking, I snap myself back into the moment, shove whatever’s going on in my bodyfirmlyout of mind, and cover my mouth with my hand. “We’ll have to practice not just more intimate touch, but also communication. If we’re going to embrace romantic physical closeness, I’ll need to know every thought in your head throughout the process.”
Her lashes beat against her apple-red cheeks.
“The objective would be to make every moment bliss for you. I’ll need information to ascertain exactly what you crave and how I can fulfill those cravings. This is a sensitive topic, so there’s no room for error.” I drop my arm. “Should we play more of your dating sims? Perhaps we can mimic a few of your favorite romantic gestures in them as practice?”
Azalea shifts in her seat, folding her hands together in her lap. Gazing at me, her eyes wide and shining, she says, “That wouldn’t be a bad idea.”
I watch her, then I melt. “Darling dove, are you very in love with me right now?”
“Yes. Incredibly so.”
“How about you have another pancake for me, then?”
She doesn’t protest as she serves herself.
I smile, relieved and grateful and so—unequivocally—in love. “For the moment, I think we’ll get used to sharing a bed. Once you’re comfortable with proximity in any context, we’ll introduce various kisses, lips excluded. After that’s effortless, we’ll bring mouth-to-mouth into the picture, following with teeth…and tongue.”
She tenses.
“We won’t go beyond that until other matters are addressed and settled.” Leaning forward, I set my glass down and tilt her chin up—in my bare hand. “Tell me your thoughts.”
“Yuck,” she says.
I laugh. “Sorry. Maybe I should have censored the later modules for now. It’s never too late to change your mind before we get to them, though.”
“You are a confounding man, Malcolm.”
“Is that a compliment?”
Her eyes do not suggest that it’s a compliment, but she’s not nearly as fed up with me as she has been previously. “After breakfast, can we start researching possibilities?” she asks.
“May we play dating sims all day, you mean?”
She smiles.
“Of course, dove. I’d like nothing more.”
Chapter Twenty-seven
?
Farewell, my innocence.
Azalea
Malcolm loves me in a way I can’t actually comprehend. It keeps hitting me, when I least expect it. It steals my breath and quiets my brain and leaves me stunned.
Oh so casually, he just notes how, yeah, if you don’t want kids, I’llhave surgery. Orwow, you actuallydowant to be intimate someday? That’s wild. I was totally prepared to just never worry about what society and everyone in the entire world saysmen can’t stop thinking about.
