Chapter 10
DEAN
Icouldn’t remember the last time I’d talked for hours with someone, never bumping up against an awkward topic or something that held no interest for him or me.
Even dinner took half an age to get through, helped by the fact that I’d insisted on tiramisu after huge helpings of fettuccine Alfredo and enough garlic bread to take out a whole nest of vampires.
We ate slow, stopping to talk between every bite, so it was almost eleven by the time we left.
I might’ve felt guilty, but we weren’t quite the last table in the place.
We still weren’t far from the Crescent building, or the parking deck where I’d left my bike.
“I can take you home,” I offered once we got onto the sidewalk.
After being with him for hours, I thought I was satisfied enough to hold it together.
He’d held my hand, leaned into me—I could handle having him sit behind me.
“I’ve just got my bike—or, you know, I’m happy to get you a ride—”
Too fast, Landon shook his head, and I couldn’t help grinning.
“If you don’t mind taking me, that’d be great. It’s not too far.”
I slipped my arm around him and started off toward the garage a few blocks over. “No problem at all.”
Riding on my bike with Landon’s arms around me was something else. I’d been right to worry about getting distracted. All I wanted to do was let go of the handlebars and slide my fingers through his, guide his hand wherever it felt right.
Just . . . maybe not while we were zipping along the streets to his place.
Sure, he was in a helmet, but his first time riding, I wasn’t about to take my hands off and risk him.
By some miracle, we made it to the front of his apartment building, him tapping on my leg wherever I needed to turn, his voice muffled by the helmet and the wind around us.
I parked my bike out front and turned it off before removing my helmet. He slipped off the bike first, a little unsteady when his feet first hit the sidewalk. I steadied him with an arm on his back as I got off too.
“Thanks,” he muttered.
“You okay?”
His little laugh turned the corners of my lips up.
“Yeah, just—well, first time going that fast without a whole car between me and the pavement.”
I wished I could see his face, but he still had the helmet on, the visor down, so I had to guess whether or not it’d been too much.
I tried not to flinch. “I hope I didn’t scare you.”
“No! No, I mean—it was fun. I think it was fun? I had fun. But I’ll let you know if I, like . . . I don’t know . . . if I realize it was too much after my heart stops racing. But I think I’m good. Ten out of ten, would go again.”
I laughed. “Great.”
When he took off his helmet, his hands fluttered nervously. He hugged the helmet against his front, and his hair fell across his forehead. Once I slipped the helmet out of his hands and set it in the storage at the back of the bike, I stepped in close.
Landon stilled, blinking up at me with wide eyes. I tucked that stray lock back in place, gratified when his cheeks turned red and he turned ever-so slightly toward my touch.
He lingered there on the sidewalk, swaying a little like he was unsure if he wanted to go inside or stay with me, and in his indecision, I was trapped there too. My feet were stuck to the sidewalk. The last thing I could do while he was there in front of me was turn and walk away.
I didn’t want the night to be over.
Finally, he took a deep breath and raised his shoulders a little. “Do you . . . want to come up? For coffee or something.”
I cocked my head, trying to keep my smile from seeming too predatory. From the flush in Landon’s cheeks, I’d failed.
“If that’s okay,” I said, reaching for his hand. “I don’t want to keep you up if you’ve got a big day tomorrow though.” I rubbed the pad of my thumb across his knuckles, and he looked down at our linked fingers.
“There’s always tomorrow night,” I assured him.
Even if we parted ways right now, I didn’t want him to think I was uninterested in seeing him again. I wasn’t interested in playing games with him, leaving him wondering what I wanted to—what? Try and make him desperate and uneasy?
No, thanks.
We’d had a great time, even without a bunch of planning. We’d gotten coffee, stopped at a bookshop, gone to dinner—none of it was outside of the realm of something I’d have just done, but every second of it was better for having done it with him.
“I’m free tomorrow,” I said. “We could go out again.”
Yes, maybe being so eager myself was uncool, but right then, I didn’t care. I didn’t think Landon was the type of person to judge someone on that kind of thing.
Landon smiled. “Okay. Still, come up now?”
How the hell was I going to say no to that?
I followed him up to his apartment. The elevator made a strange groaning sound on the way up, but it was a nicer building than the one I lived in.
But when he let me inside, there was something wrong with this place. It felt—it felt off, like the walls themselves were grief-stricken.
The furniture was bland, but nicely kept up. None of it was particularly offensive. Even the pile of boxes in the corner that showed he hadn’t gotten all the way through with unpacking wasn’t enormous or unexpected.
There was nothing overtly wrong, except the smell.
There was the scent of this place—which, yes, smelled like Landon and a warm, vanilla-bourbon sweetness, but also had the acrid salt scent of tears in the air and a heavy, sticky sadness—and then there was the scent I’d gotten used to, the one that was all him.
That same sweet musk and printer toner and the coffee we’d had earlier. All night, he’d smelled happy.
Happy with me.
And now, I could see beyond that. Smell beyond it. Whatever.
“So . . . coffee?” Landon said. “Or something else. I have, uh, water? Probably orange juice.”
I didn’t know how to answer that right away.
I didn’t want anything. Not while my brain was screeching that something was wrong and I needed to pin him down and sit on his chest until I figured it out.
A panther’s instincts begged me to pursue him relentlessly, pounce and demand answers and openness that, on two legs, people didn’t get to dig for. It only came with trust and time.
But the truth was, I didn’t want anything more than I wanted him.
That sharp sadness scent that lingered in the air here was all too familiar, and I wanted to throw open the windows, turn on the fans, and drive it away.
Or really, I just wanted him to be happy.
It wasn’t like his place smelled bad. A little too clean, maybe, and the cardboard boxes piled up in the corner carried an alien presence that kept this from feeling entirely like Landon’s home, but nothing bad.
I didn’t give a damn how it smelled, so long as he was happy. So far, all evidence pointed to the fact that I made him feel that way.
At least, he’d felt that way when we were together.
And damn it all, I’d do whatever it took to make him happy.
I crossed the living room to where he stood, lingering between the carpet and the edge of the kitchen tiles. My palm slid across his cheek, and he turned into the touch.
“What are you doing?” he whispered, biting his lip and looking up at me through his golden-brown lashes.
“I was going to kiss you,” I breathed into the space between our mouths and traced my thumb against the shell of his ear. “I want to kiss you.”
“Oh.”
At first, I thought that tiny little syllable was going to be his only response, but next thing I knew, his hands were in my hair, fingers curled and pulling at it so the most delicious tingle shot down my spine. He dragged me down, and then his lips were under mine, soft and yielding.
I nipped his bottom lip, and the sound of Landon’s whimper went straight to my cock. The way he opened for me was a clear invitation, and I plunged my tongue into his mouth, determined to learn the exact shape of him.
With my fingers pressed into the small of his back, I walked him toward the kitchen island until his pert ass pressed against the side of the cabinet. Once I had him pinned there, I could feel every inch of him against me, his cock trapped against my thigh, rigid and straining.
I shifted my knee between his, and his breath caught. He looked up at me, pupils blown so wide that his eyes looked black with just a sliver of amber at the edges.
“Feels like I could fly, in the sight of your eye.”
Landon’s brow furrowed, even as he squirmed against my thigh. “Are you . . . composing lyrics?”
I snorted. “Badly.” With my hands on his hips, I pulled him close. “Forgive me. You’re distracting.”
I lowered my lips to his neck, and he tilted his head to the side to offer his skin up to me. All it took was the graze of a kiss, and I felt it—a vibrating purr in his chest.
I grinned into the crook between his neck and shoulder, and swore to myself right then and there that this was the Landon I’d do anything to keep—the one happy enough to purr for me.