Page 25 of Landing Her Eagle
He responds by placing the salad bowl and plates on the dining room table and turning to grab silverware from the drawer. I follow with the sliced bread and butter dish.
After dinner, we sit on the couch eating our cupcakes. Ultimate chocolate for me, and carrot cake for Logan. I swear he picks that because he knows I won’t poach it. It’s got raisins. Gross. I flip through my recordings on the DVR, knowing he’ll watch a Howlbark Channel movie with me. He’s done it dozens of times before, even though it’s not his favorite thing. They’re sappy romance movies with a shifter twist. I’ve watched all the human movies with the big city girl returning to her small town and reconnecting with her former love. These are mostly the same but the flannel-wearing hometown sweetheart may be a wolf shifter with a love of the outdoors and their conflict is she’s a cougar shifter whose idea of roughing it is drinking coffee brewed at home.
“What do you want to watch?” I look over to see him licking the cream cheese frosting off his top lip. I’ve never been envious of cream cheese before. Great, I can feel my cheeks heat, the curse of being fair-skinned—I can’t hide my blushes.
“Are you okay? You appear flushed.” Logan reaches over to feel my forehead. “Do you think you have a fever?” He tilts his head and narrows his gaze. “Your forehead is cool. Hmm…were you thinking naughty thoughts about me?” He runs his tongue slowly over his upper lip.
That jerk. He knows exactly why my face is flushed!
Just for that, we’re watching a marathon of Howlbark mystery movies. Who wouldn’t love watching actresses from favorite shows of the 90s solve murders while baking/matchmaking/walking dogs/spelunking? Okay, no spelunking yet, but it’s a matter of time. Who am I kidding? I’m not planning on actually watching the movie I’ve selected.
I have a boyfriend to cuddle with!
18
LOGAN
Thankgoodness Daphne wasn’t planning on watching the movie. She’s too darn kissable to resist.
“I can’t get enough of kissing you,” I breathe against her lips. I can’t believe I have to leave so soon. The knowledge fills me with urgency, longing, sadness. I kiss her harder, not wanting to let go, not now that I’ve got what I want after all this time. How will I be able to leave her behind? But I must. I’m committed until right before Christmas. But then I’ll be home, and we can figure out what to do next.
“I can’t get enough of being kissed,” Daphne murmurs, raining kisses along my jawline before snuggling against my side to continue watching the movie.
An hour later, I whisper, “Are you ready to call it a night? You need to get up early for work tomorrow.” I place a kiss against her crown.
I could spend countless nights here cuddling on the couch. I love holding her in my arms. If we could sleep here so I didn’t have to release her, I would, but she has to go to work in the morning, and this couch wasn’t designed for two people to sleep comfortably on. Okay, it’s not meant for one person of my size to sleep comfortably on, but I’d suffer if it meant Daphne was in my arms all night.
When she sits up, I lean to press a kiss where her shoulder meets her neck. She shivers oh-so-slightly. I love how responsive she is to my touch.
“Yeah, I guess so,” she says. “I was so comfy I was about to doze off. I love snuggling with you. You give good cuddles.” She stretches and wiggles to turn around and face me.
I’m thinking of creepy clown puppets in an attempt to keep my cock calm in my black basketball shorts. He’s been perking up in interest all night long, but I don’t need him at full attention and waving hello like he’s the Queen of England in a parade.
She kisses my chin and moves to put her feet on the floor and stand. I want to pull her back against me, but that will lead to a lot more cuddling and kissing with no sleeping. She gathers our cupcake papers and other snack trash and walks to the kitchen to take care of it. I check the locks on the doors and start turning off lights as we make our way back to the bedrooms. Daphne goes into her room, and I enter the hallway bathroom to brush my teeth.
“Where are you going?” Daphne asks, standing in her doorway. She’s ditched the yoga pants and is wearing only her oversized T-shirt and showing miles of shapely legs.
I feel like this is a trick question. “To bed?” As far as I know, that’s the right answer.
She smiles. “I moved your pillows in here. Is that okay?”
“Hell yes!” I picture myself resembling the cartoon Road Runner with my legs spinning in a circle in my rush to get into her bedroom. It’s not a very sexy look for me, but it makes my girl giggle, so it’s all good. We’ve shared beds before when we’ve fallen asleep watching TV or stayed over somewhere after a night out with limited sleeping spots. “Let me brush my teeth and I’ll be in,” I say, closing the bathroom door.
With my teeth freshly brushed, I join Daphne in her bedroom. It’s a pretty room with white furniture we bought at IKEA and spent an afternoon putting it together while reading the instructions in our version of Swedish accents. We sounded more like the Muppet chef than anyone human, but it was fun. Her queen-size bed has a green and purple floral quilt on it that her Gran made. Gran was a prolific quilter, and I’m pretty sure she has baby quilts packed away for Daphne’s future children. Our future children, I hope.
“You still sleep on the right side? That’s where I put your pillows, but we can switch…” She’s worrying her lower lip as if she’s nervous. Ah, my sweet girl.
“Right side is perfect. I’m honestly good with whatever.” I see my phone and charger on the nightstand, plugged in on that side already, and there’s a bottle of water. The only thing missing is a mint on the pillow. I walk over and turn down the covers on my side of the bed, and then stop. I normally sleep nude, but I can’t do that tonight. When we’ve shared a bed before, we fell asleep wearing what we wore. It wasn’t a pre-planned thing.
Daphne notices my hesitation. “What’s up? If you don’t want to sleep in here, that’s okay.” No, that’s not okay. I want to spend as many nights by her side as possible. There’s nowhere else I want to be.
“Of course I want to be in here.” I feel the blush color my cheeks. I’m a grown man, and I’m blushing like that time I walked in on my parents. “I was trying to figure out what to wear.”
Daphne shrugs. “Wear what you normally wear.”
“I don’t normally wear anything, honey.”
Now it’s Daph’s turn to blush. “Oh! Um…okay…”
