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That really made me laugh. “Okay, gangsta. If it comes down to it, and he tries something stupid, you can borrow my Glock.” I was joking, and she knew it. Cass was afraid of guns and wouldn’t touch one to save her own life.
“I’m good on that, but thanks. Anyway. I have to go. I wanted to check on you to make sure I wouldn’t have to come up there to play referee.”
“No, we’re good.” I put my eggs in the pan and began to scramble them, stomach grumbling. “No need for your intervention. Oh, I sent over your chapters. Read them when you get time.”
“I saw the email this morning. I’ll call you in the next day or two when I read them. Looks like more than the four chapters you owe me.”
“It is. Now get off my phone. I’m about to eat.”
She laughed and bade me goodbye, promising to call as soon as she was finished reading.
I would never get used to the goose bumps when he came around. They didn’t shock me as they did before. They turned me on, making sweat bead on my skin, knowing he was behind me, watching me.
“Why do you have a gun?” Not the question I expected him to ask. He must have been listening to our conversation for a while.
I threw him a look over my shoulder. He was leaning against the jamb, arms crossed, an almost angry look on his face. And he looked beautiful. Shaking that thought from my head, I gave him an exasperated look. “I’m a gay Black man in the South, Lucas. Yes, I live in a large city with more open-minded people, but every city ain’t open-minded. I need to be able to protect myself.”
His look didn’t change, and I could feel the malice rolling off his body in waves. “Did someone do something to you or threaten you because you’re gay?”
I put the eggs on a plate and the pan in the sink. I turned around to face him, hoping my next comment would calm him. “No, not to me. But when I was in college, there were a few attacks on some of the smaller guys. I got my license and carried when I was out alone. My first boyfriend was a respected out baseball player, so no one bothered me or him. But I wasn’t taking any chances.”
He sighed, walked over to me, wrapped me in his arms, and kissed me lightly. “I’m glad you didn’t go through any of those attacks, but I know it was hard hearing about it. I’m grateful you had someone there for you.”
“I did. And I was there for those who couldn’t fight for themselves. I stood up for a lot of those guys, remembering what it was like to have nobody.”
He brushed his lips against mine reverently. “You’re amazing.”
“Nah.” I blushed. “I did what anyone else would do. They were good men. They just happened to like other men. There’s nothing wrong with that, and more people need to realize it.”
I stood on my tiptoes for another kiss before I extracted myself from his arms. “Come on. Breakfast will get cold.”
“I’m gonna miss this. I love waking up to the smell of breakfast in the morning.”
“We still have some time. You can still enjoy waking up to breakfast for another…” I looked at my phone and paused. Twelve days. It seemed like the days were running away from us, and we hadn’t touched on everything we wanted to do. I hadn’t touched on everything I wanted to know about him. I wanted more time. “Twelve days. That’s plenty of time for me to make you something different every day if you’d like. I have to go shopping, though.”
I made his plate and slid it over to him. I had poured him a cup of coffee I made before I started breakfast and set it in front of him, then poured him a generous amount of liquid creamer. The ease with which I got his breakfast ready and how I didn’t mind doing it scared me. It wasn’t because I was getting my feelings involved but because I wanted to get them involved. Fuck. I had just gotten out of a relationship. It took me months to fall for Devin and to realize I had deep feelings for him. With Lucas, though, I had to make an effort to keep my heart where it belonged. Because it wanted to run away with him and for him to take it with him when he left. I wouldn’t feel empty without it. The space it left behind would be filled with joy, knowing he would take care of it.
What the fuck was I thinking? We’d known each other for eighteen days. Seven of those days, we weren’t even speaking. I didn’t even like him in those seven days. But the way he was sneaking up on me, being the man he was, was undoing me.
“I was thinking…” Lucas said, wiping his mouth with his napkin. His table manners were perfect. “We could go for a hike today. There’s a trail behind the cabin. It goes to a little spot that has a sitting area.”
“Hiking? Me?” I was about to decline. It was on the tip of my tongue to decline, but I saw it. The challenge in his eyes told me he knew I would say no. I refused to back down. “That sounds like a great idea. I don’t have boots, but my running shoes are comfortable.”
The humorous gleam in his eyes almost had me changing my mind. He was looking at me like he knew a secret that I didn’t. “It’s a short hike. So eating before won’t have you getting a cramp. You wanna shower before we go?”
“It’ll probably defeat the purpose, but I need to. The way you were wrapped around me last night made me sweaty,” I joked at him and winked.
“Sorry.” He snickered and said, “I’ve never slept with anyone, so I didn’t know.”
“Never?”
“Nope. I stayed in the barracks while I was in the Army, and we had twin beds. I’m a big guy, so no one would be able to fit. Anybody I had sex with usually left after we were done. We knew what we were there for, and no one tried to push to stay.”
“I’m popping all your cherries, huh?” I quipped.
“That you are. And I’m having a good time letting you.”
The things he said. While that wasn’t the most romantic, it was sincere like everything he said to me. I tilted my head and asked, “Why do you say the things you do?”
