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“I did not insult the pizza.”
“Not even behind my back?”
“No. American pizza is better. When it’s not rubbish. It’s taken me a while to sort out which is which.”
She put her perfectly golden-brown marshmallows on her graham cracker, added thecorrectamount of chocolate and the correcttopgraham cracker, held it out, and said, “This is a properly prepared s’more. Would you like it?”
“No,” he said. “I like mine.” She rolled her eyes, and he laughed.
“So tell me,” he said, when they were sitting on the couch with their wine, their feet on the edge of the coffee table, the fire crackling away in that satisfying way wood did, and the taste of creamy milk chocolate and sugar in her mouth, “the reason for the touch-me-not thing. Going into your room at eight,” he elaborated when she looked at him with what was probably astonishment.
Touch-me-not?Hadn’t her whole body pretty much been screaming “Touch me!” this entire time? Wasn’t he supposed to be good at reading people?
“Excuse me,” she said. “What? I go to bed early. I getupearly.”
“You talked to the kids,” he said, “and not to me. You didn’t fight me about buying furniture. You fought me about carrying furniture, at least a bit, but that was the only normal moment we’ve had.”
“Well, until Bacon,” she said, and took another sip of wine. It reallywasgood, or maybe it was mixing the plum flavor with milk chocolate, or just alcohol—and Beckett’s scent, which managed to be at once arousing and relaxing—but whatever it was, her entire body seemed to be purring.
“I’ll admit,” he said, “Bacon broke the ice. I reckoned you were regretting the offer and didn’t know how to back out.”
“If I’d been regretting the offer,” she said, “wouldn’t I just have told you I’d changed my mind?”
“Well,youwould,” he said. “Most women wouldn’t.”
“Because I’m not feminine.”
“Well, no,” he said.
She jerked her head up and almost spilled her wine. “You aren’t supposed to agree with me!”
“Depends how you define ‘feminine,’ maybe. You don’t play games. That’s why I got confused when you stopped arguing with me.”
“Oh,” she said. “Well, that was my mom.”
He blinked. “Your mum?”
“She told me to leave you your pride. Not to buy furniture for Troy—even though I knew what he needed and it was going into my house, and you presumably wouldn’t be taking it with you, because you said that your own furniture was coming by boat, and you obviously had a bed for him before—or make so many, uh, suggestions. As youwouldbe living in my house, the person whose house it is has the power, and you have too much testosterone to enjoy that. She didn’t say all that, exactly, but that was the gist.”
“Ah. I should’ve known. How about this? You make the suggestion, and I fight you.”
“Youwantto fight me? No man wants to fight about power and control.”
“I’m odd, then,” he said. “I’d rather fight than guess, and I like your power. Also, I’m finding the fighting a bit … stimulating. Although your mum was right that I didn’t want you to pay for Troy’s furniture, and I definitely didn’t want you to carry it upstairs for me. I want to take turns on the cooking, too. And on chopping the wood and filling the woodbox, as we’re being honest.”
“I’m better than you at the cooking,” she pointed out. “Since wearebeing honest.”
“I’m probably better at the wood chopping,” he said, “but I’m not insisting on doing it all, am I?”
“How do you know?”
“I don’t know, but I’m guessing. And, no, we’re not going to have a contest.”
“Good,” she said. “Unwise and unsafe. A little like trying to outrun a train. I’d say ‘testosterone poisoning,’ but I’m trying not to be unfeminine.”
“Congrats on the restraint,” he said, “but I told you, you don’t have to try. And, yes, you’re better at cooking. I admit it unreservedly. I’m not going to get better if I don’t practice, though. I’ll stick to simple things, how’s that? Notice how I had steak and veg planned for tonight? I can just about manage steak and veg.”
“I could give you lessons,” she said. “Direct you, when it’s your turn.”
