Page 54 of Songbird
The back of my neck grows hot as, beside me, Rosie covers her mouth to stifle a giggle.
“How old are you, little brother?” I ask dryly.
Dylan hoots again. “Young enough to know our sisters are going to flip out over this. Does your date know she’s the first girl you’ve ever brought home?”
Rosie grows still at my side.
“Just set an extra place at the table, okay?” I say into the phone.
“Sure, sure.” The grin on Dylan’s face is obvious in his voice. “Can’t wait to meet the first woman who finally made it through your front door.”
“Great,” I say. “That’s awesome.”
My voice is flat, a knee-jerk defense to my brother’s good-natured ribbing, but there’s more to it than that. He’s right. I’ve never been serious with anyone. Not as a teenager. Not when I was home between deployments. Not in the year and more since I’ve been discharged. Sex is simple. I’m good at sex. Relationships are complicated and I don’t do complicated.
But the thought of Rosie sitting at my family’s table, the one where my mom and dad served their kids breakfast every morning and dinner every night, fills me with a rising kind of satisfaction and joy, but also grief and sorrow. I swallow down a confused swirl of emotions for all the things I can’t share with my parents. The things I don’t have and will never have. The things I want but can’t keep.
I can’t look at Rosie in case she reads the torment in my eyes, and from his restaurant all the way on the other side of Silver Leaf, Dylan’s got no idea what he’s just stirred up.
“Oh, and the theme for this month is tacos and tunes,” Dylan tosses out as an afterthought. “So let me know if your girlfriend has any dietary restrictions. Poppy rented a karaoke machine, and Izzy asked if you could bring your guitar. She’s been practicing that damn trumpet morning and night so she can perform with you. Heads up: her tune of choice is ‘Mary Had A Little Lamb.’” He pauses, then adds, “I think.”
“Noted,” I reply. “And not a problem. See you tomorrow.”
As soon as I end the call, I spin to Rosie to offer her an out. “I’ll tell them you’re sick. We’re sick. We got food poisoning or something.”
She laughs lightly. “That’s so not necessary. Let’s do karaoke. It’ll be fun.”
I pinch the bridge of my nose and take a deep breath, imagining Rosie with a ratty rented microphone in my parents’ old house singing along to a static “Total Eclipse of the Heart” backing track while my siblings play itreallyuncool.
“You do not have to sing in my family’s old living room,” I say.
Rosie takes my hand and gently pulls it from my face. “I’m the first girl you’ve brought home, huh?”
I play dumb. “You heard that?”
She drops her head to the side. “Yes, I heard it, but if you don’t want to talk about it, we don’t have to.”
Rosie brushes my lips with a quick kiss, then collects our bowls and takes them to the kitchen sink. I watch her walk away, flannel shirt fluttering around her thighs, smooth calves lithe and lean, and her hair a natural tangle of curls.
I’m still watching when she gets to the foot of the ladder, ready to ascend for bed, and pauses with her hand on a rung. I dragmy eyes up her body, and she’s watching me with a smile that confirms she can read my mind.
“About our sleeping arrangements, Mr. Morals. I’m wondering, after what we did this afternoon, if we can forget this whole sleeping-on-the-couch thing?”
I launch myself over the back of the couch, smooth enough to barely disturb my sleeping Labrador, and I’m across the room in half a dozen strides.
I loop my arms around her waist. “Hell, yeah, we can do that.”
After a kiss that makes her moan, I follow her up the ladder. My bedroom is cloaked in shadow and tinted with the moon glow seeping through the windows, and soon we’re naked under the covers, Rosie with her head on my chest. She cranes her neck to kiss me, breasts pressed against my side, hips nudging mine, our legs tangled beneath the sheets. I’m hard and ready to go when she whispers against my chest.
“Can we stay like this for a while?” She reaches down to stroke my rock-hard dick, and I drop my head back with a groan. “I know that probably isn’t what you had in mind for tonight, but I feel so happy and so safe right now. In my whole life, I’ve never gone to sleep feeling like this.”
She slips her hand up my stomach, tucks it between her cheek and my pec, and watches me closely for an answer. I tighten my arm around her body and kiss her again. Softly. A silent promise to be the man she needs tonight, whoever and whatever that might be.
“We can do that,” I tell her, and we do. We sleep twisted around each other without waking once. All night long.
I wake up with a soft, slender hand on my abs, temptingly close to my morning hard-on. I turn my head toward the blonde, rose-petal scented locks fanned out over my shoulder and inhale deeply, moaning and flexing my thighs as that same hand flutters lower.
I push the covers down over my hips, exposing Rosie’s naked form beside me and her hand edging closer to my dick.
