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She looked away, staring at a spot on the wall behind my head. “All right, time for a new topic.”
I propped myself up on my elbows and debated pushing, but I knew it would only end in one of two ways and neither of them were good. I needed to keep things the way they were with Sierra. No extra feelings or complications.
“What’s your favorite food?” I asked instead, letting the conversation slip back into safe territory.
“Coffee?”
“That’s not a food,” I said dryly.
“Chickpea piccata,” she answered. “Though only because I’m operating under the assumption that cheesecake doesn’t count as food either.”
“Thought you didn’t eat cheese.”
“You can make vegan cheesecake. It’s not health food, but it’s delicious.”
“How long have you been vegan?” I’d been curious about her diet since I first noticed the lack of animal products in the apartment along with the dairy-free ice cream tucked in the back of the freezer.
“Since I was sixteen.”
I had so many questions, but something about her expression stopped me from asking any more of them. There was something fragile about the way she was looking at me, and it scared the shit out of me. Sierra was the strongest human I’d ever met. She didn’t back down from demons and took having a live-in angel bodyguard in stride. I didn’t know what could make her look so breakable, but I didn’t want to pry her open to find out.
I got to my feet and held out a hand to her. “Get up, baby girl. You’re teaching me how to make this favorite meal of yours.”
Her eyes narrowed slightly in what I was starting to think of as her stubborn look. “Oh, I am?”
“Yep. And if you don’t get your ass in the kitchen right now, I’m going to make lunch without you and your annoying supervision.”
“Are you making threats?”
“To make myself lunch? Yes, that’s exactly what I’m threatening to do.” But I wasn’t moving an inch. My hand was still outstretched, ready to help her up.
I knew she was going to take it. Sierra hated me being in her kitchen without her. She was the type of person who planned out all her meals before she went food shopping, and I messed up her plans every time I entered the room.
She didn’t disappoint. Her hand slipped into mine, and she let me pull her to her feet.
“Have I mentioned that you’re a pain in the neck?”
“I’ve heard most roommates are.”
She ignored that, slipping her fingers from my grasp and heading for the kitchen. I flexed my hand, where the imprint of her palm felt burned into my skin, while my eyes strayed to her ass without my permission. Her jeans hugged her figure, hinting at what was hiding beneath the denim.
I gritted my teeth. We were cooking lunch. There wasn’t supposed to be anything sexy about this. I just needed to start avoiding standing behind her apparently.
She opened a cabinet and stretched to reach something on the top shelf, as if she knew I was watching and wanted to make my life as difficult as possible. She turned back to face me, completely oblivious to the way my jeans suddenly didn’t have quite enough room in the crotch area.
She held out the box to me. “Start the pasta?”
“Yeah.” My voice sounded strained, and judging by the way her brows pinched together for a second, Sierra noticed.
We moved around the tiny kitchen, making the vegan piccata, which was actually really easy and mostly involved putting ingredients in a pot and letting it cook. The hard part was resisting the urge to wrap my arms around her waist while she stirred the sauce on the stove or to run my fingers through her wine-red waves every time she pushed them back from her face.
I leaned against the counter, watching Sierra cook and telling myself that I was just going stir-crazy. I wasn’t used to being stuck in such a small space with someone for days on end. I needed to be training, exercising like I had every morning up until I got pushed out of Heaven to play babysitter. Only it didn’t feel so much like babysitting anymore. Sierra was far from a little girl. I couldn’t believe I’d once thought she barely looked legal. How had I missed those curves or the way her hips swayed when she walked or the wisdom in her emerald eyes?
“Do you have a favorite meal?” Sierra asked, glancing over at me.
I shrugged. “Not really. I always ate to live. Food isn’t a divine experience for me like everyone treats it down here.”
“Divine experience? I don’t think anyone thinks of eating that way.”
