Third Life - Noelle Adams Page 0,54
head just enough to find his lips so we can kiss again.
It’s a long time before either one of us can move, despite the wetness we’ve made between us. I finally find the energy to get up, collect my clothes and Richard’s shirt (since I want to wear it), and go to the bathroom to clean up a little.
When I return, Richard has pulled on his underwear and stretched out on the couch. I join him, grabbing a big, soft throw blanket to cover us with. I settle against him, tucked between his body and the back of the couch.
Maybe we should talk. Maybe there are things we should discuss and sort out. I think about what I want to say. What I want to hear from him.
As I’m thinking, my body is relaxing even more. I’m warm and safe and content and sated. Richard is feeling the same way. I know he is. He occasionally releases long sighs of pure satisfaction.
There’s really nothing else right now I need to be different than it is, so I let myself go to sleep.
WE BOTH SLEEP ON THE couch for a couple of hours until I’m roused by Richard’s pulling away from me so he can sit up.
“Sorry,” he murmurs, reaching down to stroke some hair off my face in that particularly gentle way he has. “My back is killing me.”
I giggle sleepily. “Let’s move to the bed then. Not sure why we couldn’t make it there earlier.”
So we go to my bedroom, climb into my bed, and fall asleep almost immediately.
The next morning, I wake up earlier than I would have expected. At just after eight. Richard is still asleep. I watch him for a few minutes, and he makes no sign of opening his eyes. Smiling with a fondness I hadn’t realized was part of me before, I carefully get out of bed so as not to wake him.
I’m wide awake and don’t feel like sitting around, so I make coffee in my small french press and then mix up some cranberry-and-orange muffins. While they’re baking, I do some light housework—things I let slide during the week because I was feeling so down about Richard. I’m more of a morning person than a late-night person, but I’m not usually so active on Saturday mornings.
But I feel far more alive than normal. More than happy. Energized. Last night feels like a miracle to me, but it wasn’t. Richard’s still sleeping there in my bed. I didn’t imagine it or make it up or misunderstand what happened.
He wants a relationship with me, and that’s obviously what I want too.
Nothing is guaranteed, of course, but maybe we can make it work.
It’s a possibility now when it never was before.
I’m leaning over to sweep a little pile of dust and debris into my dustpan when I hear Richard’s voice from the bedroom door. “It smells good in here.”
Straightening up, I turn around and smile at him. “Cranberry-and-orange muffins. If you don’t like them, you’re out of luck because that’s the only kind of muffin I had the ingredients for.”
“Sounds great to me.” He comes into the kitchen, looking rumpled, slightly debauched, and sexy as hell in nothing but his underwear and mussed hair. “How long have you been up?”
“Not even an hour.”
“You should have woken me up.” He wraps his arms around me, which is an impressive feat since I’m still holding the broom.
“No, I shouldn’t have. I should have let you sleep, which is what I did.”
He kisses me in a slow, lazy way that makes me smile and shiver at the same time. I’m still wearing nothing but his shirt—half-buttoned and with the sleeves rolled up so they don’t hang over my hands. His fingers stray under the hem of it and slide up my bare skin. He makes a humming sound of pleasure.
“You must have used my toothpaste,” I say, pulling away briefly so I can grin up at him.
“Of course I did. I wasn’t going to ruin what could be a very good day with morning breath.” There’s a playful glint in his blue eyes. When I first met him, I never would have guessed he was capable of looking that particular way.
“To tell you the truth, I’m not sure that would have ruined it.”
He leans down to kiss me again, but I put a hand on his chest to hold him back. “What?” he demands with a faint scowl at my preventing him from reaching me. “Are you not