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When it would have been so easy for her to pout or push for more, Iris didn’t do that. She was willing to let melead this at the pace I wanted. The more time I spent with her, the more opportunity I had to experience different scenarios with her, the faster I was learning that the Iris I’d built an attraction to for months before was the same person I was getting now. She was still just as soft and openhearted and sweet as ever.
“I’m glad, Iris. I enjoyed myself immensely with you today, too.”
Her hand drifted down to the side of my face, where her thumb stroked along my cheek. “I already can’t wait for Monday morning.”
I laughed. “I think you’ve always liked Mondays, so that’s nothing new.”
“That’s fair,” she acquiesced, a smile on her face. “But at least now I can add being able to kiss and touch you to my reasons for being so motivated and ready to hop out of bed.”
“You’ve touched me before at the gym.”
Biting her lip, she shook her head. “Nowhere near as often as I’ve wanted to.”
I groaned again. “You’re killing me, you know that?”
She beamed at me.
After kissing her one more time, I reached out and opened the door. “Goodnight, sunshine.”
“Goodnight, Landen.”
The entire drive home, I had to fight the urge to turn around and give in to what we both wanted.
But I’d remain patient. Because what we had today was great, and I felt really good about where things were headed.
TWENTY-ONE
Iris
It was after I’d gotten out of bed and had breakfast the next day when I decided to make a call.
No matter how much I wanted to reach out to Landen and spend my day talking to him on the phone, I couldn’t.
I had to get some work done.
And before I could do that, I needed to clear my head of the one thing dragging me down lately. I needed to talk to Flora.
Landen had done a phenomenal job of keeping me distracted from all the things weighing heavily on me. It wasn’t until I woke this morning and spent my first waking hour relishing in the memories of the previous day that any of it really returned.
I still hadn’t received a return call from Eleni. She hadn’t even bothered with a measly text message. So, itwas time to call Flora and find out if she had gotten any explanations from our sister.
Snatching up my phone, I settled myself on the couch. The same couch I’d spent hours on with Landen. How we hadn’t managed to take things beyond the kissing was a mystery to me. The man had such restraint where I was undoubtedly lacking.
But I liked it.
I liked that he wanted to take things slow and give us time to get to know each other better. It had been a long time since I’d been kissed, and I couldn’t recall a time when anyone had ever kissed me for as long as Landen had without expecting more. That he was enjoying the buildup to something much bigger only made me want him more than I already did. Just sitting on this couch now, convinced I could still smell his scent lingering, was a challenge. My mind was tossed right back into those moments from last night.
I gave myself just a few minutes, but ultimately, I shook those thoughts off. Back to the task at hand.
Before I had the chance to allow my thoughts to drift again, I made the call. A moment later, my sister’s voice came through the line. “Hello?”
“Hi, Flora.”
“How are you doing? How was your date on Friday?”
Though I expected the level of curiosity in her questions, it was her tone that caught me off guard. She sounded so despondent. I had a feeling she wasn’t going to have good news to relay to me when we broached the subject of Eleni.
Unwilling to presume the worst until I had confirmation, and wanting my sister to know just how wonderfulmy time with Landen had been, I was honest. “We had such a great time that we wound up spending the day together yesterday, too.”
