Page 26 of Mornings By the Linden Tree
“That is not at all true.” I offered him my right hand just as the playlist moved to the next song. “For Emily, Wherever I May Find Her” floated out over the soft, cool air blowing up from the floor vents. “I just wish to set the matter straight.”
He placed his hand, still toasty from holding a hot mug, into mine and took a step out. His chest brushed mine. I delicately put my left hand on his hip to lead him back and away from the cupboards. We then waltzed. To my great surprise, he was not stepping all over my toes as many young men would have. I’d found over the years that very few men took the time to learn how to dance. Dance in a manner that wasn’t all head tossing and pelvis thrusting. The kind of dance a couple could get lost in, a dance filled with grace, beauty, and sweeping twirls. A dance that allowed a couple to speak and flirt in a genteel manner. My mother always said, mostly with humor laced with a touch of honesty, that I had been born in the wrong era. I’d have been much better suited to the Regency era as a fine lord of amanor who practiced law when he wished, then spent his days partaking in elegant games such as croquet or shuttlecock.
“You’re here in body, but your mind is a thousand miles away,” Lennon said, slipping with ease into my dreams of a world that was far removed from this modern one.
I moved him around the island, his gaze now holding mine, neither of us looking down at our feet as we glided about in circles.
“I was thinking of how often I feel like a man out of time,” I confessed, lost in the blue eyes staring up at me. “There are days I wonder if I’m a man at all. The urges that drive most males seem lost to me as I try to work up a lather for indiscriminate sexual encounters in some dark club or seedy hotel. One ex once called me sexless.”
I clamped my lips shut tightly, my left foot coming down just shy of his toes. Lennon stalled the dance, then rose to his toes to kiss me on the mouth. I inhaled sharply at the press of his soft lips to mine. A shudder coursed through me, a tsunami of lust that shook me soundly even as I moved my hand from his hip to the small of his back. I tumbled into the kiss wholeheartedly, eager…no rabid, to taste more of Lennon. He licked into my mouth with ease, his tongue carrying the hint of strong coffee. A taste I adored. Our tongues tangled. I snuggled him into me with a soft pull. His soft whimper doused my already raging fire with gasoline. The press of him to me, the rush of feeling his desire hard on my hip was the match needed to ignite a wildfire that raced over me like nothing ever had before.
My fingers applied more pressure to his lower back to get him even closer. That was when the first small howl of fear erupted from the monitor on the counter. That cry of terror was akin to partaking in the ALS ice bucket challenge. We both jerked violently away from each other, lips puffy, cocks aching, lungs working like bellows.
“That was…” I found myself at a lack for words. Something that didn’t happen often. “I had no plans to kiss you.”
He reached up to touch my lips with his rough fingertips. “Did you enjoy it?”
I wished I could lie to the man. Perhaps I should have, but I simply could not. “Yes, very much.” The impetus to stay was strong, but he didn’t need to know that I had never felt the world shimmy as I had while I’d been holding him to me.
“I did, very much.” Valeria’s scream shattered the night. A wild, terrified wail that slammed down the very real lust coursing through me. “I need to go to her.”
“Do you want me to stay?”
“No, you should go but thank you for offering. And for the dance and the ballgame and…”
“The kiss?”
“Yes, and for that.”
He pushed his bangs from his brow. “I knew there was a fire under all that legal ice. You should go to her. I’ll let myself out.” I nodded, my fingers itching to return to him but knowing that one moment—that lone impetuous slowing of time with his mouth under mine—was over. For now. Lennon winced at the peals of a terrified child above us as he reached for his bucket cap resting on the table. “Can I call and check on how you two made out tomorrow?”
“That would be lovely. I…Lennon…thank you.” I knew he had no clue as to what I was thanking him for. To be honest, there were too many things to list, but I wanted him to know even an uptight man with a stick up his ass was feeling all kinds of things he rarely felt with other men. “We’ll talk tomorrow.”
He smiled sadly, then walked out of the kitchen. I drew in a calming breath, shook off the fissures of longing, and made my way up to Valeria just as the front door closed with a click.
Chapter Eleven
The following week, on a bright, shiny Monday morning, I arrived at work precisely forty minutes early, as was my routine, freshly pressed, neatly shaved, and in possession of all the required notes for the day ahead.
Pfft. No, I was not. I was late because Valeria had eaten a tube of cookie dough overnight when I had passed out on the sofa, and she, the stinker, had awoken but didnotshake me as she was supposed to. I’d been in the middle of running the carpet shampooer on the imported Bohemian-inspired design Giavetti Italian carpet when Mrs. Polkowski arrived at eight on the dot.
“Oh dear,” she’d said as she stood staring at me in a pair of thin lounge pants and a plain tee while Valeria sat on the steps hugging a bunny, looking quite washed out. “Did we have a spill?”
“We had raw cookie dough eaten on the sly come back up,” I had explained after turning off the shampooer.
“Uncle Wes is mad at me,” Valeria had whimpered. I’d exhaled softly. “He said I could not have more cookies today.”
Mrs. Polkowski nodded in agreement. Valeria had looked stymied at the adults joining ranks. “Well, first off, there is no more dough to make cookies,” Mrs. Polkowski said as she looked directly at the empty tube lying on the coffee table. “Secondly, you don’t want to get sick again, do you?”
“A cookie won’t never make no one sick,” Valeria whispered into the long ear of Mr. Green Bunny.
And while there was some truth to that statement, the ruling had to be adhered to. “Why don’t you let me finish up here? You’re due at the office at eight-thirty, yes?”
“Well shit,” I moaned. The doorbell rang. Valeria had then begun whispering “well shit” to her rabbit.
“That’s not a nice word for a child,” I reminded her while Mrs. Polkowski went to answer the doorbell. Lennon arrived in the living room a moment later, looking incredibly beautiful in a white shirt, dark jeans, and bright red suspenders. His sneakers were worn pink high tops. The man was a vision. I’d never been happier to see another man in my life, and that was no exaggeration. There was something about Lennon Cole that just did it for me. He stirred up passions and emotions I’d rarely felt for anyone.
“Did someone spill their chocolate milk?” Lennon asked. Valeria bolted to him—her new temporary childcare provider—to lament to him about the no cookies today dictate. I was indeed a cruel overlord.
