Page 76 of Lost Love on 6th Street

I sigh happily, and let my eyes flutter shut.

“Of course, it will feel more like home when you actually have furniture, but . . .”

“Isn’t that picking nits? All I’d need is a sleeping bag and—”

“Okay, wise guy,” he says. He reaches into my bag, hanging off my shoulder, and pulls out a bottle of champagne he snagged from the venue before we left. “In all the excitement, I forgot we don’t have cups.”

I step away to face him and shrug my shoulders. “What the hey, we’ll drink from the bottle.”

“Who are you and what have you done with Eleanor?” Luke says.

I giggle and fish my camera out of my bag before tossing it on the floor.

Luke strips the champagne bottle of its foil and cage with his long fingers, and I get a funny feeling in my belly, wishing his fingers were tangled up in my panties rather than the metal wrapped around the cork.

I shake it off and frame the shot.

Luke lifts his eyes. It’s dark in here, the room only lit by the streetlight outside the windows. But my eyes have adjusted enough to be able to be struck by his baby blues as I always am.

I snap the shot. He smiles and drops his head bashfully. “You don’t like having your photo taken?” I ask, glancing down at the small screen to check out the photo. For a tall guy, he looks so small in the empty room. His hand is wrapped around the neck of the bottle so tenderly it makes my insides melt.

“I’m not used to it. Not since I was a kid. Plus, I’m a behind-the-scenes kind of guy.”

“Says the guy who hasn’t worn the same hat twice the entire time I’ve known him.”

He guffaws, the noise echoing off the bare walls. “That’s not true.”

“Admit it, you like the attention.”

Luke shakes his head and smiles the kind of smile that looks like it could drip from one side of his face. “I like your attention, Nor.”

My mouth gets hot.

Luke wraps his hand around the cork of the bottle and twists until the effervescent pop erupts, his hand following the trajectory of the pressure.

“Damn, you’re good at that.”

“The cork can sense fear,” he says, holding the bottle out to me. “You get the first swig.”

“Ah, what a gentleman.”

“Southern hospitality.”

I laugh and swipe the bottle from him before taking a big gulp of champagne. I haven’t done something like this since college. Drinking directly from a bottle, standing in an under-furnished apartment. All that’s missing is loud music that I don’t know the words to and the smell of sweat and saliva.

The champagne pops and burns down my throat, invigorating and delicious.

“That my girl,” he says.

I wipe my mouth off with the back of my hand, and hand him the bottle. I like being his girl.

Luke swigs the bottle too, then takes in the size of the room. “Couch can go here,” he says, gesturing to the spot where he stands. “You’ll need a credenza. You a television person?”

“I like watching some television from time to time.”

“Okay, well that could go against that wall. A couple of chairs . . . you’ll need some good lighting, none of that overhead shit.”

His excitement is palpable. Totally adorable.

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