a pair of navy blue nylon pants and another plain white shirt. His feet were bare.
He had nice feet.
“Soda for breakfast?” he commented as he strolled past me, catching my hand and gently tugging it away from my mouth.
I sighed. “This is dessert.”
“Nice.” He made his way to the fridge. The wintery scent that always clung to Zayne lingered. Was it some kind of bath wash? I didn’t think so, because I’d already scoped out the bottles in the shower.
I swiveled around. “Do I need to remind you of our water conversation yesterday?”
“Please, God, no.” He opened the fridge. “Want some eggs?”
“Sure. Can I help?”
He looked up as he placed a carton of eggs and a tub of butter on the island. “Aren’t you the person who almost burned down Thierry’s house trying to make fried chicken?”
I snorted. “Aren’t you the person who said you’d teach me to make grilled cheese?”
“You know, you’re right.” He picked up an egg and pointed it at me. “But I need to feed myself first.”
“Priorities.”
“And I really don’t want you to do the eggs. Even though they’re hard to mess up, I have a suspicion you might do just that, and then I’ll be embarrassed for you.”
“Really?” I muttered dryly.
He grinned, and I was sure I got a little goofy in the face as I watched him. “Scrambled okay?”
“Sure thing, Chef Zayne.”
That got me a low chuckle. “You know, you can sit on the couch. Got to be more comfortable than the stool.”
“I know.” And it probably was, but Zayne slept there, and for some reason, I felt like that was his space.
How long could we keep this up? Zayne sleeping on the couch, us sharing a shower? Where would we go, though? We had to stay in the city. There was his clan’s compound, which had room for us, but besides Nicolai and Dez, his clan didn’t know what I was, and it had to stay that way. Also, I had a feeling Zayne wouldn’t be down with that idea.
“I figured after breakfast we could do some training,” Zayne said, drawing my attention back to him. “I haven’t come up with anything in particular to help with the vision thing, but if you and Misha practiced daily, we should be doing that.”
I glanced down at myself. My leggings and loose shirt were perfect for training.
“Unless you got anything better planned?”
I pinned him with a dry look. “Yeah, I made plans with that demon who impaled himself on my dagger. He’s coming back to life and we’re going to hang out.”
Zayne grinned. “Then how about you unroll the mats.” A pause. “If you can handle it?”
“I can handle it,” I mimicked, hopping off the stool, “if you can handle the epic ass kicking you’re going to receive.”
He laughed at that, so loudly that I turned to look at him.
“You’re so going to regret that laugh,” I muttered, and stalked to the mats.
As Zayne got down to scrambling, I hefted the surprisingly heavy mats and dropped them to the floor with a loud thunk. After unrolling them and pushing the two large sections together, I wiped the sweat off my forehead and joined Zayne back at the island. Once we’d finished the buttery eggs, I felt a lot more energized, as if I actually had gotten some real rest last night.
We cleaned up, and then I followed Zayne to the mats, stretching out my arms.
“Normally I’d do some warm-ups first.” As he stepped onto the mat, Zayne tugged an elastic hair tie off his wrist, scooped up his hair and secured it in a half-finished ponytail that looked a thousand times better on him than when I tried to do it. “Definitely run a bit at least.”
I frowned as I grabbed my bent elbow and pulled it across my chest until I felt the stretch in my shoulder. “I don’t like running.”
Zayne faced me. “That’s a shocker.”
“Ha. Ha.”
“I figured we’d start with block techniques and takedowns.” Standing there, arms crossed and feet planted with his hips lined up with his shoulders, he reminded me so much of Misha that I had to look away. “Then move on to defensive—”
“So, the basics?” Mimicking Zayne, I crossed my arms. “The stuff I learned when I first begin training?”
He nodded. “Stuff that can always be improved, no matter how much training you have.”
“Huh. And you continue to practice basic blocking techniques?” I raised my brows.
Zayne said nothing.
“I’m going to take that as a no. What makes you think