When I'm with You (Hope Town #3)(38)

“Right, so you’re making dinner?” he questions, moving his hand to adjust himself. I watch his long fingers work the raised denim with a groan deep in his throat. “Let’s go inside, Em, and please let me go first. I’m not sure I can handle seeing those shorts going up the stairs.”

I follow mutely, not really sure what just happened.

Nate walks in and follows Bam as he excitedly rushes through the house and into the kitchen, his nails tinkering across the wooden floors as he leaps and jumps in front of Nate.

I watch his ass.

He freely admitted he would have done it to me, so it’s only fair.

And what an ass it is.

He moves around my space as if he’s spent every day here. He grabs Bam’s food bowl, filling it up, and then repeating the process with his water. He moves to the stove and lifts the lids, stirring the pasta sauce before grabbing the spaghetti noodles I had been waiting to put in until the water boiled. I just stand there mutely as he makes himself at home.

He turns after the putting the noodles in and leans against the counter with a sigh. My eyes move from the stove, to Bam, and back to the huge man making my kitchen seem like it had shrunk in size.

“I’m guessing spaghetti is good with you?” I question.

“I love spaghetti.”

And he does. He especially loves my mom’s sauce, something I had spent the whole day cooking at a low simmer.

“That’s good.”

My fingers twist together as my nerves get the best of me, and I look down at the floor. I’ve always wanted to see him moving in my space with me, but I never in a million years thought it would actually happen. It’s one thing for us to be together for family dinners or even when the gang got together to go out as a big group but never have we been alone in our own homes.

“Why are you nervous?” he inquires, pushing off the counter with a shove and walking forward until his booted feet meet my vision.

“You’re here,” I weakly exhale.

“I am.”

“I’m just trying to figure out why. Why now.” And it’s the truth. Even with the knowledge that I would open my heart to whatever was happening between us, I would be an idiot not to have a little bubble of nerves about it.

I close my eyes when I feel his fingers brush my hair behind my ear. His warm palm slides down from my cheek until he’s cupping my neck with his thumb resting just under my chin. My head is pushed up gently and his fingers tense and flex where they rest at the back of my neck.

“I’m a smart man, but not always a bright one. I have a lot to prove to you, but I’m here because it’s where you are.”

I shake my head while he speaks, but he smiles, and without saying another word, he bends down to kiss my lips soft and quick.

“Dinner first, then we get to the heavy stuff, okay?”

I nod, not really trusting my voice, and move around him to stir the noodles. We work together as if we’ve been doing it forever, and in no time, everything is done and we’re sitting at the table with huge plates full of spaghetti.

“God, I forgot how much I loved this sauce,” he moans, with his mouth full of his first big bite.

“It’s just store sauce,” I lie, twisting my fork in the sauced coated noodles. Inside, I love that he realized, with his first bite, that it wasn’t just any sauce.

“Store bought, my ass. I would recognize this sauce anywhere. I used to beg your mom to come over and make it for my mom, but she would just smile and give me another huge helping. I think she thought I was joking, but let me tell you, my mom could never get it right.”

I feel my nerves recede some and smile at him. “It’s a tricky one. You have to cook it for hours, but I loved smelling it all day when I was living there, so it’s nice when I cook it myself and have a little of my childhood memories filling my own home.”

He drops his fork, his mouth red from the sauce, and just gapes at me. “You made this?”

I tilt my head, chuckling to myself as I swallow my bite. “Of course, I did. How else would it have gotten here?”

He mumbles something about a ring before shoving another huge forkful between his lips. I watch him chew, his eyes closed in bliss and his moans deep. I mutely hand him a napkin before the sauce that had been trailing down his chin could fall.

“I figured you had just heated up some frozen shit you had from your mom.”

I gasp. “Uh, no. The first thing my mom did when I was old enough to walk was pull a chair to the counter while she cooked to teach me everything she knew. I can make her chicken fried steak and mashed potatoes better than she can.”

His fork falls on his plate and he looks at me with awe.

“What?”

“Good God, woman, don’t tease me.”

“Promise, even my dad says so. I’ll make it for you tomorrow, er … I mean some other time. If you want, that is.”

He reaches out his hand, his face going soft and his smile growing big. “Tomorrow sounds good, baby, but you’ll have to bring it by Dirty. I need to get some paperwork done, and Shane won’t be there to cover for the night.”

Baby?

Oh.My.God.

“I can do that,” I squeak.

“Good, it’s a date.”

“A d-date,” I stutter.

He just continues to smile, and even when he picks up his fork and continues to eat, that smile never leaves his lips.