Page 101 of Attached At Heart
I bit down on a teasing retort about how I had no desire to claim a different undergrad, considering mine was already the best, and took his shirt with a sigh, retreating to the bathroom to swap tops. I put my stained one in the sink and threw Blake’s on. It was soft and smelled like him, like a musky, woody vanilla. Despite the U of M connections, I felt upgraded from the shirt I’d been wearing.
“Thanks,” I said, walking back out to the kitchen. “Hopefully my shirt is salvageable, but I think I might like yours better.”
Blake blinked up at me. His eyes grew round before they lowered to his plate of spaghetti.
“Looks good.” He cleared his throat. “Glad you like it.”
Blake barely looked at me for the rest of the meal.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
delaney
WALKING ONTO OUR FLIGHT this time around felt completely different. We were immediately directed to the first-class cabin, which was even more luxurious than our other flight. We settled into our seats, which had curved walls on the outside for privacy and a collapsible divider between us that Blake immediately took down.
The seats weren’t what felt different. It was Blake. It was us. It was the way he held my hand through the airport and let his gaze drift to my mouth every time he looked at me. It caused heat to simmer just beneath my skin. A want like I’d never known before burned inside me. All I could think about was last night. All I could picture was Blake between my legs, watching me with molten desire in his gaze. All I could hear was Blake rasping my name. All I could feel was the brush of his lips across my skin.
I could still feel it, a ghostly touch, taunting me. Reigniting my need for more. But there hadn’t been time for more this morning, and now, I wasn’t sure what was going to happen.
There hadn’t even been time to talk. I’d been tangled in Blake when I woke up, his warm body encompassing mine, making me feel things I didn’t understand. But then he quickly extracted himself and shuffled out of bed, returning a moment later with a cup of coffee. He placed it next to the bed for me and leaned down to press a kiss on my temple. And then he’d gotten busy—packing, arranging transportation to the train station, tidying the rental home.
We didn’t talk about what happened. The things we’d said. The things we did.
I wasn’t sure how Ishouldfeel about everything that transpired, but I knew the entire night made me feel shamelessly good. I’d never in my thirty-three years had a sexual experience like what I’d just experienced, and knowing that, of all people, it was withBlake? It was both shocking and weirdly sensical. We’d always understood each other in a way that no one else had; why wouldn’t that extend to the bedroom?
This trip had been our catalyst. We’d left for this honeymoon as friends and returned as something entirely new. Blake didn’t mean more to me than when we’d left, and I doubted I meant more to him. He’d always occupied such a big space in my life, but the way he occupied it now hadchanged.
That fact was exhilarating. But also terrifying. Because despite the stint of time when he’d moved to Boston without me, Blake had been the one constant in my life for so many years now. And what happened when something so solid suddenly morphed in front of your eyes, became something different, something you didn’t quite understand yet? Even if Ireallyliked this new version of him—of us—it still made my stomach flip when I thought about the uncertainty that accompanied it.
“You’re wearing your compression socks, right?” Blake asked, his eyes sweeping down to my feet as though he could see through my sweatpants.
“Yes, I am,” I answered, and Blake gave the kind of perfunctory nod he would at the hospital.
“That’s my girl,” he muttered—something he absolutely wouldnothave said at the hospital—before tugging my seat belt tighter.
My chest ached as I wondered if Blake had always been this attentive and I’d just missed it or if this was new.
It felt new.
But it also felt comforting.
Like it was just Blake.
And Blake was a form of home I’d always relied on. And maybe just the understanding of how deep that ran was new.
After all the passengers boarded, the plane took off, and I curled up in my plushy seat, pulling one of the blankets they provided over me. Blake tugged on the corner of it like he wanted to be included in my cozy setup, and I draped the blanket over him, too.
For some reason, it made me excited to get back to Boston. I liked imagining this same scenario on the couch in Blake’s apartment. I wanted to spend my weekends like this, watching movies and cuddling under blankets. I had no idea if that was whatBlakewanted, though. We might have shared a bed the past couple of nights and done other unspeakable things, but maybe that wasn’t the direction he wanted to go with this. DidIwant to go in this direction?
A flight attendant came down the aisle as soon as we got to cruising altitude, taking our drink orders and giving us a rundown of the menu options for the flight. She didn’t give an indication that she knew who we were until she came back with our beverages a bit later and smiled.
“Tell your brother good luck at training camps for us,” she said and then continued to sweep her gaze over Blake as if to quickly compare him to his brother. And when she apparentlydecided she liked what she saw, she did it a second time, this time so blatant that I acted without thinking, slipping the hand with my wedding ring onto Blake’s thigh possessively.
“We’ll be sure to tell him,” I said with a tight-lipped smile. “We’re all really excited for this upcoming season. I was just making plans with Noah’s girlfriend to go to his first preseason game together. It should be so much fun.”
Blake stayed silent. Or nearly silent. Just as the attendant gave a placating grin and walked back down the aisle, I heard him swallow a throaty noise.
“Jesus fuck, Delaney,” he groaned before shifting in his seat.
