Page 80 of The Weight Of It All
Graham almost smiled. “Yeah, I guess I deserved that.”
My “hell yes you did” went unsaid. I turned to Reed and put my hand on his side. “We should get going, yeah?” He gave a nod, so I looked at Graham. “It was good to see you.”
“Same,” he replied. “And you really do look good, Henry.”
We left him there in the middle of the cold aisle?the irony of that was not lost on me?and Reed put his arm around my shoulders. I had no doubt Graham was still watching us, so I put my arm around Reed’s waist as we headed for the checkouts. “You okay?” Reed asked.
I gave him a bit of a squeeze. “Never better.”
We loaded the few groceries into my car and went back to my place. Reed was a little quiet, and I knew there was something we needed to address. I put the grocery bags on the counter and wasted no time. “I’m sorry you met him,” I said. “And I’m sorry if it made you feel uncomfortable.”
“No, it’s not that,” he said. “I kinda behaved like a jerk. Sorry.”
“No you didn’t.”
“Well yeah, I did. You were mature about it, and all I could think was that he’s been with you, and he knows things about you that I don’t.” He frowned. “That sounds really bad, doesn’t it?”
I closed the distance between us and leaned up on my toes in an attempt to kiss him. I still couldn’t reach, so I slid my hand around his neck and pulled him down to meet me. It made him smile. “It doesn’t sound bad. It sounds honest. And yes, I have a history with him. I can’t change that. But seeing him tonight made me realise he’s the last person on the planetthat I want to be with. What I had with him is well and truly over.”
He finally smiled. “He’s not what I pictured him to be like,” Reed mused. “I wasn’t expecting black hair.”
“Did you see the hair dye? I can assure you, he didn’t have that when we were together. Dark hair, yes. A little grey even, but that dye job was bad.” I put my hand to Reed’s chest. “Jokes aside, I want him to be happy. I don’t want anyone to beunhappy. But my happiness isn’t with him, it’s with you.”
He put his hand under my chin and lifted my face so he could softly press his lips to mine. “I wasn’t kidding when I said we were working on the boyfriend thing. Was that okay? Or too much?”
I laughed and put his hand to my chest. “Definitely not too much.”
His eye-crinkling smile made my stomach somersault. “Good.”
“And just so you know, if we happen to run into your cheating ex-bastard, I won’t be as civil as you were with Graham.” Reed laughed, but then his stomach growled. “Okay, okay, I’ll start cooking.”
I filled a pot with water and set it to boil, then added baking paper to my bamboo steamer. I placed the fish inside, and as I chopped the chilli and ginger and got the sauce cooking, Reed sorted out the rice in the microwave cooker and steamed some bok choy and button squash. We worked well as a team in the kitchen, and while I made sure everything was cooking to perfection, Reed stood behind me and pressed his lips to the back of my neck.
“We won’t be eating tonight if you keep doing that,” I warned, though I’m sure the tone of my voice spurred him on to keep doing it. “Well, there might be shots of protein…”
He chuckled against my neck and pressed himself against my back, his hands on my hips, and his groin firm against myarse. I’m not sure which of us groaned the loudest, and I contemplated leaving all the food to burn while I took him into my bedroom. The microwaved beeped, and he growled in frustration and shivered with disappointment.
“Rice is done,” he said. When I glanced over at him, he was standing at the far end of the kitchen, leaning against the counter, his eyes were a little dark and there was a bulge in his jeans. “I’m staying over here or dinner will be ruined.”
I chuckled, but the static in the kitchen bloomed to almost-suffocating levels. I adjusted my cock, which made his nostrils flare. I had to swallow my desire so I could speak. “Plates are just to your left.”
I served up two plates of fish, rice, and steamed veggies, while Reed found the cutlery and two bottles of water. Sitting at the table opposite him seemed to quell the sexual tension a little, until he took a bite and made a noise that went straight to my cock.
“Oh my God, Henry. This is so good.”
And it was. With each bite, a burst of flavour hit my tongue. “I didn’t know healthy could taste so good.”
He chuckled and savoured his mouthful. And just like that, the tension between us simmered a little. Enough for us to eat, anyway. When he pushed his plate away, he patted his belly and sighed contentedly. “Absolute perfection. Though my lips are tingling from the chilli.”
They did look a little pinker than normal, and my mind fell to the gutter when his tongue peeked out and ran across his top lip. By the look in his eye, he did it deliberately. “Here, let me take these,” he said with a smirk, collecting the empty plates. He just happened to stand really close to me, so the fly of his jeans was level with my face.
Bastard.
He laughed as he walked into the kitchen, which made me believe I might have said that out loud.
When he didn’t return straight away, I followed him in to find him stacking things into the dishwasher. “You didn’t have to do that.”
“It’s done now.” He closed the dishwasher door and stood up straight. “Gelato in front of the TV?”
