AllFreeNovel
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“It’s fairly new,” Noah tells me, licking his spoon clean in a move that makes me feel too warm. I blame the outdoor heaters they have set up under the pavilion. “They only started doing it a couple of months ago.”
“Careful,” I tease. “That sounds dangerously like fate.”
Noah smiles as he scoops up another bite. “And we know how you feel about that.”
“Hey, just because it doesn’t exist doesn’t mean I don’t enjoy a good coincidence.”
“So, you... like this?” I look up to catch the nervous flicker inNoah’s gaze, watching him eye me warily as if he’s unsure. “I know you said you weren’t a cheap date, but this just felt like something—”
I reach across our little table to cover his hand with mine—partly to reassure him and partly because I am quickly becoming addicted to the weight of it—giving him what I hope is a reassuring grin.
“I love it,” I tell him earnestly.
Noah’s shoulders look visibly less tense after hearing this. “Good. I would hate to end up as one of your regaling horror stories.”
“Hey, you’ve gone an entire hour without once mentioning the gym or crypto—so I’d say you’re already leagues above any of the other dates I’ve been on this year.”
“Good,” he says again. “I wanted...” He peers down into his bowl, looking a little embarrassed. “I wanted it to be perfect.”
That heavy thing in my chest that’s taken up residence ever since our time at the cabin throbs as if to make sure I haven’t forgotten about it, and I take a second to appreciate just howbeautifulNoah is—something I never thought I’d be thinking when it came to the Boogeyman of Denver General. But he is, I decide. And not only on the outside. It scares the hell out of me, but it also makes me feel warm in a way I never have before.
“It is,” I tell him. “It’s perfect.”
His smile is slow and shy, and on someone his size, it should look ridiculous. Instead, it makes my stomach flutter. I have to break eye contact before my heart beats out of my chest, focusing on the French onion I’m currently working on to distract myself.
“Does any of this feel weird to you?”
Noah cocks his head slightly. “How do you mean?”
“It’s just...” I stir my spoon aimlessly, still not looking at him. “I mean, with the whole arrangement we made, and then after all the things we’ve done...” I do look up then when the scent of him suddenly thickens, and I can see a flash in his gaze that tells me that at this very second he’s thinking aboutallof the things we’ve done. It makes me press my thighs together a little tighter under the table. “I just worry that this is all going to blow up in our faces.”
Noah doesn’t answer for a moment, looking thoughtful. Then he clears his throat. “I suppose in some ways, it is weird.”
“Oh.” I feel myself deflate a little. “Right.”
“But,” he adds quickly, letting his fingers slide against my open palm until his middle finger can trace barely-there circles on my wrist. “I’m finding I like a little weird.”
My lips curl in a grin. “Yeah?”
“Mackenzie, I—” He looks mildly embarrassed again, but he manages to hold my gaze. “I’m finding there isn’t much Idon’tlike where you’re involved.”
That hot, weighted thing inside me might as well be ballooning to fill up all the nooks and crannies of my chest now, and it feels dangerous, allowing myself to bask in it, to take even a moment to revel in the sensation. Maybe it is dangerous, but it doesn’t stop me from doing it, anyway.
“Same,” I say lamely. “I mean—you too.”
His smile really should be illegal, I think idly. I’m almost grateful that he only seems to bring it out when he’s around me; if everyone else knew how good he looks when he smiles, I might have some healthy competition gunning for me.
Wow, Mack, you might as well be writing his name in your notebook with little hearts.
“I was thinking,” Noah says, breaking through my pathetic thoughts. “We’re both off this weekend.”
My pulse picks up. “Yeah?”
“It’s just... last weekend.” He clears his throat. “We didn’t have a lot of time to just... be, I guess.”
Images flash through my mind, ones of me begging and him thoroughly giving. I press my thighs a little tighter against each other. “We didn’t.”
“I was just thinking... If you wanted, that is. No pressure if you don’t, but I was considering how much closer my place is to downtown, and I thought that if you didn’t have plans—which you might, and that’s completely okay—but if you didn’t, I thought—”
