Southern Heart, Madison, Natasha [the little red hen ebook TXT] 📗

cooking it for myself. But…" She smirks. "I do a mean maple-glazed salmon."

I don’t say anything else to her because I can’t. Just the thought of having dinner with her every night is too much for me. I don’t have time to get sidetracked with her. I can’t go there, knowing that at any minute it could be taken away from me.

She shows me step by step what she is doing, and she helps me make the dough for the apple pie. "All you have to do is knead it." She puts her hands on mine as she shows me. Our fingers link with each other. "Gently," she says. She looks up at me, and everything I told myself is out the window. Her eyes sparkle as she looks at me, and her smile fills her face, making her even more breathtaking.

"Your eyes," she says. "Your eyes go darker when you look at me." I swallow down that she knew this, that she took the time to get to know all the little parts about me. "But they are the darkest when you come close and right before you kiss me." She leans in now and kisses me ever so softly.

I stand with her in the kitchen the whole time, and when she walks away from me, I follow her. I want to pretend I’m following her to learn, but I’m following her just to be next to her. Her hands graze mine sometimes, and then she moves around me by holding my hips, and my cock is just going to explode at this point. "It smells so good," I say, watching her wash all the pots while I dry next to her.

"Why don’t you take a shower?" she says, handing me the last pot before turning off the water. "Then we can eat when you come out."

"Yeah," I say and put the pot down. "That sounds good." I lean down and kiss her on the lips, and I want to kick myself for just blatantly doing that. But the smile on her face makes me forget everything.

I walk over to the bedroom and take a shower as hot as I can stand it and then as cold as I can tolerate it. I ignore all the warnings shooting off in my head, telling me to just stop whatever this is. I can’t think about her in that way. She doesn’t need the shit I have in my closet.

I slip on a pair of boxers and sweatpants and a long-sleeved shirt. Walking out, I stop when I hear the soft music playing. The shades are all closed, and the lights are dim, and the table looks like she just set it. I watch her move around the kitchen and see she has changed. Her hair is loose, and she is wearing green pants that are loose but tight at the ankles. She wears a long-sleeved white shirt, and when she looks over at me, I see that one of her shoulders is bare. "It’s done." She smiles as she bends and takes the potpie out of the oven. I walk over to her, and I can smell her citrus smell. If I could, I would lean down and kiss her shoulder, but instead, I just think about it. "You look handsome," she says, smiling, and all the words are stuck in my throat. All. Of. Them.

She walks over to the dining room and places the pie in the middle of the table. "Do you want a beer?"

"No." I shake my head. "I’m going to stick to water."

She walks back to the fridge and takes out the jug of water and another one of sweet tea. "I didn’t make a side."

"The potpie is enough, Chelsea," I say, and she smiles at me. When I get really, really close to her, she looks up at me. Don’t kiss her, don’t touch her, my head is screaming at me. "You look beautiful," I say, putting one hand on her hip and then bending to kiss her lips.

"Thank you." She smiles shyly and sits down in the chair. I only sit when she does. She grabs my plate and scoops out some chicken potpie. She then serves herself half the portion.

"Do you say grace?" she asks, and I just shake my head.

"Do you?" I ask, and she avoids my eyes. "We can if you want."

"I usually just…" She avoids my eyes, and it kills me that she is afraid to tell me something. I put my hand on hers, and she looks at me from the side. "Thank you for keeping Mayson safe," she says and then mumbles, "Amen."

I take my hand off hers and grab the fork. The minute the food touches my tongue, I moan. "This is so good."

"Doesn’t it taste a bit better knowing that you cooked it?" she asks me and I laugh.

"Let’s be real, you tolerated me," I say, and I just look at her. "It was one of the best days in a long, long time. Being with you," I say before I can stop myself. But now that it’s out there, how do I take it back? Better yet, I don’t want to take it back. "I shouldn’t have said that."

"Why?" she asks, avoiding my eyes, and it kills me that I made her sad. It kills me that anyone can make her sad, but most of all, that it was me. But my girl doesn’t avoid anything. Instead, she folds her arms on the table in front of her, and she stares at me. "Why shouldn’t you have said that? Is it because you don’t mean it?"

"No," I say, shaking my head. "Not at all. I do mean it. I mean every single word," I say, and my hand cups her cheek. My thumb rubs her cheekbone. "I just meant that."

"Eat before it gets cold." I nod and finish my plate. She gets up and grabs the empty plate. I look up at her, and