Page 84 of Lost Love on 6th Street

Luke’s eyebrows quirk as he stirs. “What are you talking about?”

I sidle up behind him and wrap my arms around his waist. “Baby, you’ve spent almost every night here since I moved in.”

“Because I’m obsessed with you, obviously.”

I laugh. “To your detriment, Luke. Be honest.”

He smacks the spoon on the side of the pot and places it on the spoon rest. “How could it be to my detriment when I—”

“There!” I point at his eyes. “The bags. You didn’t used to have those.”

“It’s busy season,” he says.

“When isn’t it?”

“Fair point.”

Luke turns and crosses his arms over his chest. He looks sexy all the time, even when he’s bedraggled, but I know he’s been sacrificing his own wellbeing for the sake of spending time with me. If I were him, after a late-night gig, I’d want to go home to my own bed. It’s a different kind of rest.

“I was living alone before,” I say. “I am a big girl.”

He smiles sadly, grabs one of my curls, and tucks it behind my ear. “I know you are. I’m just . . . trying to help you make this place a home.”

My insides warm in an all-encompassing way. The kind that sometimes thinks about the future and knows it shouldn’t. “I can make a home here on my own,” I say, which is true. But there is something romantic about the notion of my boyfriend caring about making a home with me, a home he isn’t even supposed to be living in.

Luke looks down with a sigh. “If you want me to give you more space—”

“Slow down, cowboy. Did I say that?”

“No,” he says, unable to hide the boyish smile that comes along with that. He turns back to the stove to futz with the dinner he’s whipping up.

I sigh and lean against the counter, looking up at him. “I know you want to take care of me.”

“I do.”

And damn if it isn’t the sexiest thing in the world. “But you need to take care of you, too.”

His shoulders fall. I know he’s been pushing himself too hard to make things right for me.

“Wouldn’t it make you feel better if I wasn’t here alone?” I ask. “With a dog. And you can come over and play with it? That’s supposed to lower cortisol levels.”

Luke’s blue eyes flick over to me, twinkling. “I know of other ways to lower cortisol levels . . .”

“You dirty, dirty man,” I say.

He dips the spoon into the pot and blows on it. “Open.”

Luke guides the spoon to my lips, and I carefully taste the rich, tomato-based whatever the fuck he’s making. “Mm. So good.”

Luke wipes the underside of my lip with his thumb.

“Well, I’m going to get a dog.”

“That’s fine. It’s your choice. You don’t need my permission.”

“I know, but . . .” It’s not permission I want. It’s . . . something else. “Just tell me it’s not crazy.”

“Oh, honey, you don’t need me for that.”

---