Chapter 29
Athena
Savoring the taste, I close my eyes.
I didn’t just moan, did I?
Popping open an eyelid, I find Liam looking at me, his fingers stroking his beard. “I could watch you eat cake all night.”
A smile teases my lips, but I fight it off. “You haven’t touched your piece yet.”
“I’m not in the mood for cake.” He pushes the plate holding a large slice of the decadent treat to the side. “Take your time eating dessert. I’m enjoying the show.”
I drop the fork onto the plate. “I can’t eat if you’re staring at me.”
“I can’t not stare at you,” he counters.
I pick up the white linen napkin we’ve shared throughout dinner. He searched every drawer in his kitchen for its twin, but I told him I only needed a corner of it, so we agreed to make do with just one.
Our hands met on it a few times. He was always the gentleman, offering it to me first.
“I had enough.” I eye the half-eaten piece of cake. “For now.”
“For now?” He pushes his index finger into the icing before he drags it over the tip of his tongue. “Maybe later we can share a piece.”
Later. After we get into his bed.
I knew what this night would entail. I didn’t come to Liam’s apartment thinking that we’d eat dinner and hang out.
The unspoken part of the invitation was that we’d have sex.
He wants to fuck me.
I don’t just see it in the way he’s looking at me. I felt it in his touch every time our fingers brushed against each other on the napkin.
“What’s running through that mind?” He leans back in his chair. “Does it involve flowers?”
Until I met him, it did.
My store was my life. I spent every spare moment I had there and poured all of myself into its success.
Stepping away, even if it was just to have dinner with a man, felt wrong.
It doesn’t feel that way with him. Being here is right. Tonight feels perfect.
I need a few more minutes to steady myself before we go to his bedroom, so I lean back in my chair too, crossing my legs at the knee. “Dinner was delicious.”
“I’ll tell my mom you said so.”
His mom. I know that she has to be the woman with the brown curls in the picture hanging on the wall behind him.
She’s in the center of a large group of people. Liam is standing to her left. Two men with jet black hair are on either side of her, and an older man with the same dark shade of hair, but peppered with gray is hugging her from behind.
There are three women in the picture too. They’re almost as beautiful as the two little girls.
That’s Liam’s family.
I dart my eyes from the silver frame when I realize I was staring.