a gallon of that stuff for your birthday. When is it?”
Amusement shaded her voice. “Not until January.”
“And you’ll be thirty-two?”
“Yes.”
“My birthday is next Friday.”
“Oh.”
“It’s my big three-oh. I’m catching up to you.”
Her giggle escaped this time. “You obviously weren’t a math major.”
He smiled against her hair. “Come on. You’re thirty-one. I’ll be thirty. Only a year apart now.”
He felt her silent laughter again.
“You don’t have to get me a present,” he added.
“Okay.”
“But you know when someone says that, it really means, if you don’t get me a present I’ll be hurt.”
She laughed out loud. “Ooookay.”
“My friends all want to go out that night,” he said. “Will you come with us?”
He sensed her hesitation, but then she said, “I’d love to.”
Warmth spread through his chest. “Okay. Good.”
He snuggled her even closer against him. Goddamn, she felt so good in his arms. In his bed. In his life.
Jesus. He’d never thought that about any woman. A few dates and women started talking relationship and he was done and moving on. But the idea of not having Sloane in his life made him want to hurl. He should be terrified. Running. He waited for that urge to come.
Nope.
Not only was she the hottest thing ever in bed, she entertained him and made him laugh out of bed too. He liked women a lot, but he’d never had so much fun with anyone. She also made him feel weirdly all protective, like when she’d been afraid of the Ferris wheel. Not like that was particularly dangerous, not like he’d had to beat off a herd of ferocious attacking wild beasts to defend her, but still, it made him feel all big and strong to reassure her and tell her she was safe with him.
And she was. Always. He wanted to look after her and make her happy. Usually for him, making a woman happy equated to making her come. Done. He could do that, easy. This was so much more than that.
He fell asleep with a smile on his face and Sloane in his arms.
They spent most of the weekend together. He was determined to show her that what they had was more than sex. They took Chuck for a long walk by the lake on Saturday, then she went home to change. He picked her up and took her to his favorite blues club, Indigo, where they ate hamburgers and onion rings and listened to some fantastic music. Then they had sex.
He’d gone nearly a week without sex to prove his point to her. No need to belabor the point. Heh. And he fucking loved how sweet she was, how she let him take the lead, take control and feel like a fucking sex god, but she was an amazing sex goddess who gave him so much back in return. The way she responded and trusted him made him feel…honored. Respected. Grateful.
Christ only knew he hadn’t been feeling very respected at work. Which only made him appreciate her even more.
They talked about so many things, discovering little oddities about each other, like that when she ate Bits & Bites, she only ate the pretzels and the cheese bits. “What’s wrong with the other bits?”
She shrugged. “I don’t know. I just don’t like them as much.”
They had a mutual love of Garrett’s Chicago Mix popcorn and brownies, a mutual hate of cucumbers. And he revealed to her his utter disgust for yogurt, which made her laugh so hard. “And tofu,” he added. “I fucking hate tofu.”
“I’m going to make you a tofu stir-fry and you’re going to love it.”
“I didn’t know you could cook.”
“Please.” She gave him a look over her glasses, which made her appear so cute and smart. “We would have starved after my mom disappeared if I hadn’t figured out how to cook.”
“True.” As always, being reminded of how she’d stepped up and looked after her family made his heart shift in his chest.
When they watched TV and a commercial came on, Levi said, “When I watch TV with the guys, they get up and leave when a commercial comes on. Or if it’s DVRed, they fast forward through the commercials.”
She gave him a wide-eyed look. “No!”
“Yes.”
“They’re the best part of some shows!”
“I know, right?”
And then they critiqued the commercials, praising them for their brilliance or snorting at how lame they were.