Page 63 of The I Do Over

“Frosting,” she repeated sleepily. “Are you opposed to it in any way?”

“Not that I’m aware of. Why?”

“Just…Lea might be sending us some the next time I’m here. Just…keep an open mind.”

And before he could question it, she was sound asleep in his arms.

When Knox woke up the next morning, he was alone. After a quick glance around, he saw Maddie’s things were all still there and wondered where she was. She was never up before him.

After a quick stretch, he got up and pulled on a pair of jeans and went in search of her. It didn’t take long before he found her down in the kitchen making pancakes.

Smiling, he moved in close behind her. “I thought I’d been permanently bancaked.” Then he kissed her throat and relished the feel of her in his arms. It was a great way to start the day.

“Mmm…I never said permanently,” she said with a soft hum. “That would just be mean.”

He took a step back and walked over to make himself a cup of coffee. “I can’t believe you got up before me.”

“You didn’t even budge, so I figured you needed the sleep.” She poured a little more batter onto the pan and smiled at him over her shoulder. “So I came down here to call Nora and check on my mom and then I called my dad.” She shrugged. “Then I realized I was hungry.”

Taking a sip of his coffee, Knox fought the feeling of annoyance that she would leave his bed to come down and talk to her parents.

Rather than comment on it, he decided to help with breakfast. “What do you need me to do? Get plates? Silverware? Do you need a fresh cup of coffee?”

“Yes to all of those things, please!” she replied, completely oblivious to his inner thoughts.

Within minutes they were sitting down to eat and for the life of him, Knox didn’t know what she did to make the pancakes so damn good, but they were seriously addictive. Maybe it was the warm syrup or the fresh blueberries, but they were just perfect.

“Any chance you made extras that I can heat up during the week?”

Maddie laughed. “They’re never as good when you reheat them. Trust me.”

“So what time do you need to head home today? I was thinking you might want to come and do a little furniture shopping with me.”

Her fork clattered loudly as it fell from her hands. “Furniture shopping?”

He nodded. “You heard everyone yesterday. They were kind of poking fun at me for keeping all of Josie’s furniture. At the time it made sense, but now I guess I should start looking for stuff of my own.” Pausing, he took another sip of coffee. “Plus, I figured you’d like some input since you’ll be here more and more.”

When he looked up, he noticed her wide-eyed expression.

“Um, Mads?”

“That’s…that’s a big step, Knox. The decision on furniture should be yours,” she said evasively.

“Maddie, come on. I realize we’re still doing the alternating weekend thing for now, but you are spending time here with me and I’d really like your input. Plus, I thought you might want to pick out a few things.”

“Me? Why?”

He fought the urge to laugh because she was adorably clueless. “Because I’d like to think that someday you’ll be living here too. I mean, eventually we can find a place of our own, but in the meantime, this place is kind of perfect. It’s a little big for one person, but the two of us would have no problem living here.”

If anything, she paled.

Was he freaking her out by talking so openly about their future? He thought after saying I love you to each other last night that it would be the next logical step. After all, he knew he didn’t want to keep going with this long-distance thing indefinitely. Did she?

Putting his fork down, he did his best to keep his tone casual. “Am I misreading things?” he asked carefully. “I just thought we were going to keep moving forward and…”

“You’re not,” she quickly interrupted. “I’m sorry. You just took me by surprise. In some ways I feel like maybe we’re moving too fast, but then I have to remind myself that it’s you and…we have a history and nothing we do is new. Not really.”

“Does that bother you? That this isn’t new or that it’s still weird in some way?”

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