Page 22 of Room 1003

“Hey, it’s just a sandwich. It was no trouble.”

I held out his plate for him, and when he took it, our fingers brushed, setting off a trail of goosebumps up my arm. I expected him to pull away, but he didn’t. “It’s more than a sandwich,” he murmured, stepping closer, both of us still holding the plate between us. He tipped his chin up, his warm gaze glistening. “I don’t know what I would’ve done without you. You really saved me, saved all of us.”

“I-I couldn’t walk away from you,” I told him truthfully. “I won’t. Not until I see that you’re all okay.” I slid my finger over his in a sensual caress, and his breath stuttered.

“And what if we’re never okay?”

“Then I guess you’re stuck with me.” I leaned closer, his lips beckoning. This was it, I was going to kiss him. I could almost taste him. Moving my free hand to his waist, I squeezed gently, aching to draw him in, but the damn plate was in the way. I moved it aside, and he let me. Hooking my arm around behind him, I could finally bring him flush against me, warm and solid, soft and pliable.

I was seconds away from finally making him mine, when a tumbling of footsteps came thundering down the stairs. “Hey, Papa! Guess what!” Kit shouted before he’d even gotten into the room.

We leaped apart, and my heart was slamming against my ribs. Shane laughed shakily, rubbing his hand down his face. “What, buddy?” he asked.

“I like olives!” Kit shouted as he launched himself into the room, striking a power pose, hands on hips. “Can I have some more, please?”

“Sure, of course. Good for you for trying something new.”

When it became clear that our time alone was at an end, I made my way back to where I’d begun work patching up the living room ceiling, now that the wiring was finished. I looked back over my shoulder once and caught Shane’s eye. He bit his lip, and it was the sexiest thing I’d ever seen.

Oh, my little omega. There’s no getting rid of me now.

13

Shane

“Timeforbed,buddy,”I said, pulling back the blanket, and Kit launched himself onto the mattress, flopping around like a fish out of water until I threw the blanket over him and tucked him in, pinning him down.

“Can we read?” he asked sweetly. “Please?”

My heart melted. In a world increasingly dominated by screens, I loved that he enjoyed books. “Of course. I will never say no to that. What do you want to read tonight?”

“Hmm…” He tapped his chin in an exaggerated way, and I knew he already had something in mind. “How about… your comic!”

I barked out a surprised laugh. “You want to read my comic?”

He nodded and clapped his hands, his curls flopping. “Yeah!”

“Okay,” I said, getting up from the edge of the bed and going to grab some of my more recent work. “But you have to read some of the words too, deal?”

“Deal,” he said.

I came back with a stack of papers. The outlines and lettering were done, but I hadn’t added color yet. I would do that once I’d transferred it to my tablet. “Here, how about this one?” I asked, my lips tugging up into a smile.

“Hey! That’s me!” he squealed. “And is that Dmitri?”

“Sure is.” That particular strip didn’t have any words to read, but I knew he would love it. It told the story about their adventures together, a child’s imagination turning a living room camping trip into a safari, and Dmitri from housecat to wild panther as they prowled the backyard jungle. Kit traced his finger along the cat’s back, as though he were actually petting the cat.

When he was finished with that one, I passed him another, and Kit giggled. It was our playtime in the flooded yard, turning a disaster into a joy. “This was fun. We should do it again!”

“Um, let’s not. Next time we’ll just set up an inflatable pool, I think.” Our front yard was still a total mess from where the city’s crew had just dumped all the dirt back into the hole. I’d take care of it eventually, but it wasn’t a priority just yet.

“Ben looks silly,” Kit said, pointing to where I’d drawn him doing a belly flop in the puddle.

I smiled softly. “He sure does.” But in my mind, I thought he looked perfect. He was smiling, but more importantly, he’d made me smile that day—and every other day. In fact, I’d done more smiling these past weeks than I had in the past two years combined.

Our new house, with all its disasters, had inspired me to draw this series of comics, taking all our shenanigans and turning them into something I could laugh at. It was time to admit, though, that it wasn’t the house that had inspired me—it was Ben.

By the time we’d made it through the small stack of comics I brought, Kit’s voice was drifting off, his head lolling against my shoulder. “All right, monkey, time for lights out,” I said, moving off the bed and smoothing back his curls to plant a kiss on his forehead.

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