Page 55 of Hot Zone

“Good morning, Kitten.”

“You’re still in bed. I don’t ever get to wake up next to you. You always wake up so early.”

“Or maybe you wake up too late.” I leaned over and gave him a kiss. “But it is time for me to get up. What do you want for breakfast?”

“It’s too early to make decisions. I’ll eat whatever you fix.”

“Okay, eggs and toast it is then.”

He sat up in bed and stretched. “Eggs and toast sound good.”

My gaze moved over the half-naked man sitting in the middle of the bed, and I almost said screw it and stayed in bed with him. But if I did, neither of us would make it to work on time.

I leaned down and gave him another kiss. “I’ll see you in the kitchen.”

A few hours later, I was sitting behind my desk at work, still trying to decide what we should do on our date. I wasn’t happy with any of my ideas so far, and was running out of time, so I gave up and called Danni.

She answered right away. “What’s up, Sam?”

“Hey, Danni, you gotta minute?”

“For you? Of course I do.”

I smiled. Danni was the best. When we made the decision to get divorced, I wasn’t worried about losing my wife. I was terrified I would lose my friend, and I was thankful every day that hadn’t happened.

“I assume this has something to do with Mars.”

“Steven told you?”

“Of course he did, and I told him I thought Mars would be good for you.”

“Well, thank you for that. He was less than thrilled when we told him.”

“I know, but he’ll come around. He’s a little bit like his father and doesn’t like change. It takes him a minute to wrap his brain around things when they do. Now, what can I do for you?”

“I want to take Mars on a date, but I haven’t been on an official date in years. I don’t have any idea what people do nowadays. Keith and Robert suggested the play the local community theater is putting on, and I could do that, but I’d rather go somewhere where we can talk.”

“So you want suggestions?”

“I do. You’re good at that. What do you think we should do?”

“Hmm. Well, I guess, start with dinner, someplace where you will both be comfortable, not somewhere fancy.”

“Okay, I can do that.”

“And, afterwards, do something special for him. Take him somewhere that will show him you pay attention to what matters to him.”

“I’m not really sure that I’ve done a great job of that.”

“I don’t believe that for a second. If there was one thing you were always good at, it was paying attention.”

“He puts pretty much all his energy into the shop. I haven’t seen him do anything just for fun.”

“Well, that’s a shame. He’s such a sweet young man. Have you been in his shop? It’s adorable.”

“I haven’t. I should probably fix that.”

“Yeah, you should. Now I have an idea for your date. Have you ever heard of a supermoon?”

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