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THIRTY-SEVEN
"And we're really looking forward to what we might find, hidden beneath the sands of East Perth Cemeteries," Alethia finished, tapping the cursor one last time to show the final slide in her presentation before she read it aloud. "Questions?"
Usually, at least one of her cousins, if not all of them, would have squeezed into the audience and stuck their hands up to ask questions she'd rehearsed beforehand. But Tacey was working, Octavia was up north at a minesite somewhere, and Callie was at a family wedding. Someone from her dad's side of the family, not the Bell side, which was why Callie was the only one of them who'd been invited.
And while Stan would be in the audience, the only sound he made was applause as he shook his head. He had no questions for her.
"Okay, I'll change that bit in the beginning to say the first known burial, because, like you said, there were undocumented burials, as well as those that were sort of documented, but not well enough to be sure where the bodies were buried." Alethia tapped at her keyboard a moment, until she was satisfied with the new slide. "Oh, and then I need to add a bit in that slide on what we hope to find, because the records aren't complete. Which sets the scene for the empty graves we found that I can't talk about because of the nondisclosure agreement with the developer...but which I will have to include in my thesis, whether the developer likes it or not."
"Are all scholarly talks so entertaining? I could listen to you lecture for hours," Stan said.
Alethia laughed. "Hell no. I mean, I started out in medicine, because that's what my family wanted me to study and I figured seeing as I'd gotten into the course, I should at least give it a try, and then I fell asleep in a lecture on cell biology. More than one, actually. It wasn't even all that boring, but the lecturer had this monotone voice that had this almost magical power to put you to sleep after listening to him for a few minutes. Unlike your voice, which I could listen to all night."
Stan preened at the compliment. "Do you wish for me to read to you again tonight?"
All night, every night. He'd finished with the fantasy romance series, and was now working his way through Mum's extensive collection of steamy paranormal and scifi romance. Once he'd stopped stumbling over the sex scenes and really gotten into the swing of things, he had become, hands down, her favourite audiobook narrator ever. She should try to record him one day...
"Yes, please, Stan," she said, slamming her laptop shut. The presentation was tomorrow and it was ready to go. She deserved a night off.
Her pyjamas were in the wash after she'd spilled coffee down the front of them. Okay, technically she'd spat coffee down the front of them when Stan, surprised by the toaster popping, had actually jumped so high off the ground he'd clunked his head on the ceiling. Watching him flap around, trying to free his horns from the light fitting had sent her into fits of laughter, and the coffee had just been a casualty, really. Much like the poor light fitting, which now had two horn-sized holes in it that she wasn't looking forward to explaining to her parents, when they got home.
Which meant she'd be wearing one of the oversized t-shirts she used as nightgowns in summer to bed. They were also easier access, when she grew too hot and bothered by Stan's reading and had to escape for a bathroom break, where she'd only have a few minutes to take care of herself before returning to bed, and Stan's watchful gaze.
For a moment, she imagined touching herself while he watched, his gaze heating to smouldering as her pleasure grew, until he offered to...
"Are you ready for me?"
He usually gave her a moment to get changed and slide under the covers before he came in to her bedroom. Some bullshit about propriety or whatever. Well, he didn't see it as bullshit – he was protecting her, or so he said. "One sec." She stripped off her clothes, dragged on a nightie, and crawled into bed. "Okay."
In he came, book clutched to his bare chest, with an eager smile on his face as if he wanted to know what happened as much as she did. He surely wasn't hanging out for the super-sexy bits, even if he did read them so well.
Stan settled in the chair today, instead of the other side of the bed, as if he'd read her thoughts and felt it best to put a safe distance between them. One thing she'd learned in this pandemic was that social distancing sucked when you wanted to be closer to someone.
He started to read, for which he always used That Voice, and Alethia closed her eyes, savouring every word.
Surprisingly early in the book, the couple's clothes started to come off, and Stan's voice lingered on words like nipple and peak and mound, savouring phrases like wet heat and tight sheath until Alethia's lady bits ached for attention. Surely Stan wouldn't notice if she just slipped a hand between her thighs and...
