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THEO
The restof my work day was a bust but I could hardly keep the smile off my face after admitting my feelings to Sara. Well, not all of my feelings. The big one would come later, but I didn’t want to scare her off so I had to bide my time.
We still hadn’t heard anything from the lab about the DNA results from the tongue, and Dane was working on his report for the latest fire, but it too, was looking like arson. I felt trapped in some kind of waiting game. Nothing really to go on, aside from a half-baked theory about the Coastal League.
I’d tried to reach out to Derek, but he wasn’t in town. Apparently he’d been back in Bar Harbor for the past week. If that was true, it would rule him out as a suspect, but I still hadn’t confirmed the alibi so I wasn’t ready to take my eyes off him yet.
We were able to trace the call that Sara got at work, but it ended up being a burner phone. It wasn’t all that surprising, but pissed me off that once again, we had nothing to go on.
The department knew to keep an eye out for bikers, specifically Devil’s Rain members, but so far, no one had seen any. Which was a good thing, but something about the whole thing made me itch. We were missing something. I just didn’t know what.
At six o’clock, I packed up and gave a SitRep to Miller, who had the late shift tonight. Then I ran to the grocery store and picked up some supplies.
When I pulled up at The Witch’s Brew a half hour later, Sara hopped up into my truck, smiling wide for the first time in weeks. And damn, it made my heart pound.
“Hey beautiful.” I pressed a kiss against her full lips, desperate to deepen it. She gave a little moan and my dick stirred in my pants in response. This was going to be a long dinner.
“What’s all this?” She asked, looking at the paper bags of groceries in the back seat. I checked the mirrors and pulled out onto the street.
“Oh, just a little something.”
“A little something?”
“Mmmhmm.”
“You don’t care to elaborate?”
“I’m cooking for you tonight.”
“Really?”
“Yep. You can put your feet up and drink a glass of wine like the queen you are.”
“Ah, you’re a quick learner.”
She laughed and scooted over to me. I put my arm around her shoulders and held her close, and it felt like heaven. For a second I wondered why I’d been so resistant to relationships. But I dismissed that, as I didn’t want to even think about this kind of familiarity and ease with anyone else. I guess I really was just waiting for Sara this whole time.
We pulled up to the curb in front of her little black house. And damn, if it wasn’t starting to feel a bit like home for me too. She hopped out and grabbed a bag from the back. I took the other, and met her around the side of the truck, where we walked up the front sidewalk together. This little slice of domestic bliss felt damn right.
Once inside, I unloaded the groceries and got started prepping dinner. Sara fed Raven and then poured us some wine.
“You like salmon, right?” I asked, already cutting it into filets. I’d gotten pasta to make as a backup, but I didn’t really think I’d need it.
“I sure do.”
“Good.”
She came up behind me, wrapping her arms around my middle and leaning her head against my back. It occurred to me then, no one had ever held me like that before. And damn did it feel incredible.
“What can I do to help?” She asked behind me.
“You can take that glass of wine and go put your feet up like I said.”
“I thought you were kidding about that.”
I turned to her, careful not to touch her with my salmon hands, and placed a chaste kiss on her forehead.
“You deserve to be waited on tonight.”
“Well if you insist.”
“I do. Go relax. Dinner won’t be long.”
After she left down the hall to the living room, I put the fish on a cedar plank, adding salt and pepper. I whisked together some maple syrup, mustard, rosemary, and then drizzled it on top.
I popped outside to turn the grill on, then while it was heating up, I cleaned some asparagus and cherry tomatoes to toss in olive oil and made a foil packet for them. I got the rice going on the stove, and then went outside to grill everything else.
It was still nice and bright out, and I enjoyed the view from Sara’s back porch. Her yard was a modest size, but it was surrounded by lots of trees, giving it the illusion of privacy. Her prized garden had now taken over most of the yard, and it looked incredible. She had a vegetable patch out in the center of the property. It was too early in the season to harvest anything, but it was well-planted.
I knew that in the summer, she used the bed closest to the porch steps for medicinal herbs. Lining the porch itself were beds of flowers. I remembered that first day I kissed her. She was planting in those beds. I looked down closer and saw all the little sprouts that had emerged since then.
Over on the right side of the yard, she had a huge archway trellis that grew vines of climbing roses. I remembered walking through it when she hosted a barbecue last summer. She even put a bench inside it, like out of a damn fairytale. I didn’t take the time to appreciate it then. But now, all I saw was her hard work and beautiful vision.
I didn’t know much about gardening. What to grow when, how to harvest it, what kind of weather each thing liked best. It was all foreign to me. But I loved that Sara knew it. And I loved the idea of learning and helping her with it all.
At a sizzle on the grill, I turned back to see that the food was ready. I put it all on a platter and went back inside to plate it.
“Babe, dinner is served.” I called.
Sara came down the hall looking like goddamn perfection. She’d let her hair down and had taken off her cardigan. Now in just a tank top and yoga pants, with each step she took toward me, my heartbeat got stronger in my chest. And my dick took notice too. But it was dinner now. So I took a deep breath and calmed the fuck down.
“Oh heavens, this looks amazing, Theo.” Her eyes lit up and her smile grew wider as she looked at the food and then me.
“I told you I could cook. Pancakes were not a one-off.”
“Apparently not.” She walked over and stood before me, tilting her head back and rising on her tiptoes. “Thank you for this. You’re amazing.”
She wrapped her arms around my shoulders, and planted the sweetest kiss on my lips. I could have left it there, but I made the mistake of feeling my way down her waist, to her hips, and then her ass. A growl erupted from my chest and I squeezed each cheek.
“This ass is gonna be the death of me, baby.”
“You said you wanted to worship it.”
“I did and I do.”
“Well maybe it’s your lucky night.”
Before my dick exploded with excitement, I dropped my hands and served her dinner. Because she was going to need the fuel for what I was about to do to her all night long.
