ten miles this morning. I can carbo load all I want.”
The waitress comes back quickly with our beers and an order of bread and we dig in. The beer is nice and frothy, the bread hot and cheese melty. I nod, voicing my appreciation.
“You're right. This is pretty much heaven after exercising so much.”
His lips twitch. “I'm glad. It seems like it's been a really long time since we have had a chance to catch up. It's been what, almost six weeks?”
I nod. “Ja. At the same time though, it seems like it's only been a week or something. It's funny how life becomes so busy.”
He slides me a sly glance. “Ja, I bet it has. I heard that you moved in with your new fiancée.”
My head bobs. “She moved in this week. It's been… Well, a lot of fucking, frankly.”
He snorts into his beer. “That I am sure of. Things are going well for you two otherwise, I guess? I mean, at least neither of you has Queen Ida on your back. I'll tell you this right now, she really caused a lot of tension in the early days of me and Nika.”
“Truth be told, I don't think that I would've asked Pippa to marry me if it wasn't for my grandmother butting her nose in. It was that or I would probably be engaged to some older minister’s granddaughter. Take your pick.”
That seems to have been the wrong thing to say. Erik shoots me a look that isn't happy. “Wait, you asked Pippa to marry you because your grandmother put pressure on you? That isn't very romantic.”
I purse my lips. Taking a second to have a swig of my beer, I shrug one shoulder. “My reason for the engagement really has nothing to do with my relationship with Pippa. The engagement is really just for show.”
His eyes narrow on my face. “Are you trying to tell me that you and Pippa are not an item?"
I shake my head. “No, we are an item. Or… we are something. But we definitely got engaged just to pacify my grandmother. Without Momse, we would probably still just be two very attractive people, not looking to settle down at all.”
He squints at me. “I thought you had been in love with Pippa for a thousand years or something.”
I shoot him a glare. “It's a lot more complicated than that. Besides, I've never said that I was in love with anybody at any point.”
Erik pulls off another piece of bread, pointing it at me. “No, you'd never admitted it. But if you think I didn't know what was going on, you're crazy. That's why I kept bugging you about getting together with her.”
I roll my eyes. Looking around, I wave the waitress down. “Two more beers?”
I turn back to the conversation, sighing aloud. “I'll admit to you, Erik. I'm as unlikely now as I was then to listen to you tell me about how perfect Pippa is for me.”
He raises his brows. “Really? Name one way in which she is lacking.”
I shoot him a glare. “Don't say it like that. She's not lacking. It's just… You know, I'm supposed to go to space at some point…” I purse my lips. “And there's… There's this wall that she has...”
He tilts his head. “You're gonna have to be more specific. You mean like Hadrian's Wall or related Great Wall of China or…”
I wave off his silly answers. “No, no. Like there is this wall between me and her. This like wall that blocks off a certain part of her from… I don't know, being intimate I guess.”
He frowns. “How does that happen exactly?”
I suck in a breath, finishing the last of my beer. “Well, it's like… We will be lying in bed, just after we finished fucking. And will be like… looking in each other's eyes or whatever. And then I suddenly will see a little bit of fear run across her face. And then I just like come up against this wall. It's like one second she's there, the next second she's rolling over and burying her head under the pillows. She just doesn't want to be that close to me, I guess.”
He looks thoughtful. “I see. I mean, I don't really see? But I can imagine. I've never gotten that close to Pippa, honestly. But I can see that you are frustrated.”
The waitress brings a fresh round of beers and I take a sip of the refreshing brew. I nod my head a