Page 79 of Midnight Enemy

“Mmm.” She nuzzles my neck. “You smell so good.”

“So do you.”

“I didn’t expect this.”

“What do you mean?”

She shrugs. “I thought you’d get up and call me an Uber afterward.”

“Jesus. You really don’t have a very good view of men, do you? Or is it just me you think of as a Neanderthal?”

“Kinda just you.”

“Well, thanks for being honest.”

She giggles. Then she kisses my chest. “I was wrong, Orson. I’m happy to admit it.”

I tuck a finger under her chin and lift it. “Me too.”

She looks into my eyes. “Don’t do that.”

“Do what?”

“Whatever you’re doing. You make my stomach flip.”

So she feels it, too? We study each other for a moment, lit by the light of the city and the soft silver glow of the rising moon.

She leans her chin on her hand, resting on my chest. “Tell me one line of your poetry.”

I narrow my eyes. “I told you, I don’t share.”

“Not even one line? For me?”

I purse my lips, thinking. I don’t want her to make fun of me. But equally she’s asked, which no other girl has done.

“Okay, I wrote this last June.

A midwinter toast

To the return of the sun

Marks lengthening days

And the first, sweet, fleeting glimpse

Of summer in my cold heart.”

She surveys me with wide eyes. “You wrote that?”

“I did. It’s a tanka—an extended version of the Japanese haiku.”

“What were you feeling when you wrote it?”

I play with a strand of her hair. “I’d broken up with my girlfriend a month before.”

“You were sad?”

“A little. The winter solstice felt like a turning point.”

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