Page 37 of The Best Parts of Him
Damn it. Dabbs was a sucker for guys who were nice to his dogs.
“I’m guessing you guys don’t use the kitchen table,” Ryland said.
“What gave it away?”
“Oh, I don’t know. Maybe the fact that I can’t see the surface? What is all this?” There was a rustle—Ryland going through the random crap on the table, no doubt. “A bill? Who gets paper bills anymore?” he muttered, seemingly to himself. “You have receipts from . . . this one’s a month old. Why not toss it? Or if you’re keeping it for expenses . . . where do you keep your receipts for expenses?”
“You’re looking at it.”
Silence. Then, “The kitchen table is your organizational system? I think we can do better than that, boys.”
The dogs yipped in agreement.
“Can I check out upstairs?”
“Of course,” Dabbs said. “Yours is the bedroom on the right, at the back of the apartment. Bellamy put fresh sheets on the bed for you before he left. Actually, speaking of bedrooms . . . is that backpack all you brought?”
“No, I left my suitcase on the front porch so I didn’t accidentally let the dogs out when I came in.”
Ryland reappeared from the kitchen, told the dogs to stay, opened the front door, and yanked his carry-on suitcase into the house with his good arm. “I’m going to bring this upstairs,” he told the dogs. “You guys coming?”
They followed him upstairs, excited about their new guest.
“Don’t freak out if Minnie darts out from under Bellamy’s bed to find a new hiding place once you get up there,” Dabbs called after Ryland.
“Noted!”
Unlike Dabbs’ dogs, Minnie, Bellamy’s kitten, wasn’t the extroverted sort.
When Bellamy had suggested Ryland come stay with him for a few days until he was back on his feet, Dabbs hadn’t exactly hated the idea. He’d protested anyway—Ryland was recently injured and probably not in any condition to travel. But Ryland had readily agreed. Hell, he’d practically begged.
“You’d be doing me a favor,” Ryland had said when they’d spoken on the phone after Dabbs’ surgery. “I’m bored out of my mind. At least this way we can convalesce together. Puh-lease let me come stay with you.”
Dabbs had heard his pout from several states away.
So here Ryland was, not looking any worse for wear after traveling from Columbus to Burlington for five hours with a two-hour layover in Detroit. He looked as scrumptious as he always did with his messy dark hair and dark stubble and wearing cozy joggers, a hoodie, and a Columbus Pilots hat.
And that goddamn nose ring that was way sexier than it had any right to be.
“Were you recognized at the airport?” Dabbs asked him when he came back downstairs with the dogs.
“In Columbus, yeah.” Ryland sat in the armchair. “I went live from my gate before boarding, which you’d know if you installed the app on your phone.”
Dabbs had installed Instagram on his phone—not that he’d tell Ryland—but when Ryland had been live, Dabbs had probably been trying to change out of the hospital gown and into his sweats without pulling his stitches.
His phone dinged on the coffee table and he glanced at it briefly. Zanetti texting to let him know that Deeley had gotten airsick again.
“So.” Ryland looked around, like he was awaiting direction. “What’s my first job as your nursemaid? And what kind of nursemaid do you want? Patient and gentle and spoon-feeding you soup? Or naked and naughty and feeding you . . . ” He looked down at his own lap, his smile a heady mix of gentle teasing and banked desire. “Something else?”
“Christ.” Dabbs half laughed, half groaned, picturing Ryland wearing a lab coat, a stethoscope . . .
And nothing else.
Either Dabbs was high off pain meds or he was secretly into doctor porn.
He passed a hand down his face and banished that image to a corner of his brain labeled shit to ponder later.
“You’re not my nursemaid,” he muttered, desperate to get the conversation back on track.
