Except wait…hadn’t I promised him some sort of date or something? He hadn’t meant tonight, had he? Crap. I didn’t want to go anywhere with him tonight. Besides, the weather was awful.
“Look at all that snow,” I said purposefully. Quinn had opened the blinds and although it was five o’clock and getting dark, I could see it coming down like mad. I walked over to the window and looked out over white-blanketed rooftops. “It’s like a blizzard!”
“It is.” Quinn came up behind me and nudged me in the back. “You better stay here tonight. The roads will be bad.”
I smirked at him over my shoulder. “I live upstairs, remember?”
“Oh yeah.”
I faced him. “Plus I don’t do sleepovers. It’s a rule.”
His eyebrows went up. “There are rules?”
“Yes. But I agree the roads will be bad. Was your class canceled tonight or something?”
He grinned. “You know my schedule?”
“No.” My cheeks started to tingle, which meant they were getting red. “Not your whole schedule.” I moved around him, heading for the door. “I’m just very observant, and I’ve noticed when you come and go. I assumed it was a class.”
He followed me out of his room. “Aha. Well, anyway, yes, it was canceled, so I’m in for the night. What about you? Did you take the day off?”
“Yes.”
“And did you have any plans besides observing me in my natural habitat from your hidey hole in my closet?”
We’d reached the living room, and I whirled around to face him, hands on my hips. “For the last time, I wasn’t spying!”
“OK, OK.” He held up his hands in surrender. “Relax. I forgot—you were just curious.”
“Exactly.”
“So has your curiosity been satisfied, or would you like to know if I’m a good cook? I was thinking of making a pizza. Want to stay for dinner?”
I’d been planning on going up to my apartment—I wasn’t one to linger after sex, unless a repeat performance was on the immediate horizon—but pizza sounded pretty good. Quickly I weighed my love for good pizza against my dislike for post-sex chatter. At that moment, my stomach growled, making the decision slightly easier. “OK. I’ll stay for pizza.” For pizza, not for you, get it?
He smiled. “Good. We can talk about our dates.”
“Dates? As in plural? I thought it was just one.”
“Well, there’s the one first date. And then you said I could meet your friends, and then there’s the wedding. So that’s…” He counted on his fingers. “That’s like three dates.”
My eyelid twitched. “Do you have any wine?”
“No.”
I moved for the door. “I’ll be right back.”
Nine
QUINN
While Jaime ran upstairs for a bottle of wine, I opened my laptop, put on some music, and started taking out the ingredients to make pizza. When I was working a lot, I never ate things like pizza¸ but it was something I really enjoyed making and eating now that I didn’t have to be so strict about my diet. I even had a pizza peel and stone so I could do it right, and I’d grabbed my kitchen boxes out of storage last week so I could cook for myself again. Hotel living was horrible that way.
I pulled out yeast, flour, sugar, sea salt, and olive oil, setting them on the counter. Next, I found a mixing bowl and liquid measuring cup in a cupboard and ran the tap to warm up the water.
I couldn’t stop smiling.
When was the last time I’d felt this happy? Before my mom died? I couldn’t even remember. In general, I was an upbeat person who managed to find silver linings and didn’t tend to fret over things I couldn’t change, but it had been a while since I’d felt this good. Was it because I hadn’t had sex in months and had broken a rare dry spell? Or was it her?
I thought about it as I whisked together the dry ingredients, then added the water and olive oil. I’d figured sex would be good with her—not only was she smoking hot and temperamental, but we’d wanted it for so long—what I hadn’t counted on was how much fun it would be. How much I’d enjoy the challenge of her. How much I was hoping she’d want to do it again later tonight (and for fuck’s sake, let me take some time with it…there were all sorts of ways I wanted to please her), and then again in the morning before she left for work.
Of course, that was before I knew about her No Sleepover rule. I’d have to work on that, but not tonight. She’d only turn me down, and I’d learned it was better to let her come looking for things.
Shaking my head, I laughed out loud thinking about the way I’d discovered her in the closet. It was so ridiculous. No complaints about where it went after that, though.
Jaime appeared in the kitchen doorway a few minutes later, a bottle of wine in her hands and an amused expression on her face. “From the sounds coming through the floor up there, I thought maybe the ghost of Prince was down here cooking me dinner.”
“Alas. It’s only me.” I wiped my hands, crossed myself, and glanced skyward before turning the volume down. “Rest in peace, brother.”
She opened a drawer and looked in. “Oh good, you do have a corkscrew,” she said, pulling it out. “I couldn’t remember if there was one here.”
“How come so much stuff was left when the former tenant moved out?” I grabbed the biggest bowl I had and greased it with olive oil.