Total pages in book: 115
Estimated words: 111980 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 560(@200wpm)___ 448(@250wpm)___ 373(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 111980 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 560(@200wpm)___ 448(@250wpm)___ 373(@300wpm)
It says there’s no place she’d rather be than right here. But when my eyes take a full and proper tour of my woman, I blink. Do a double take as I read her shirt twice.
She was not wearing that T-shirt when we drove over here together. I try to fight off a smile. It’s not fucking working. Because…Chloe’s wearing a shirt that says Sam Silversmith Makes Me Hit the High Notes across her chest. It has to be from one of those while-you-wait print shops. Bet she made it today. That thought revs me up.
And feeds my own damn enthusiasm to sing. There’s just something special about crooning to someone who wants to be here. Someone who’s as into this as I am. I belt out the chorus to the whole crowd, but it feels different tonight.
Because I’m sharing my secret with someone who wants to know it.
At the end of the song, I lock eyes with her.
No, I’m not simply sharing Sam with someone who wants to know—Chloe’s the one I want to share this part of me with.
* * *
Chloe flops down on her bed, sweaty, cheeks red, lips bruised, smelling like sex and cinnamon.
“I just fucked a rock star,” she says, still panting and murmuring after coming hard not long after we arrived at her home post-show.
I drag her close. “Sweetheart, the rock star fucked you.”
She rolls her eyes. “Please. Let me have my moment.”
“Whatever you want,” I say, then drop a quick kiss to her neck, inhaling her once more and letting her scent go to my head.
And my heart.
“I want…to go again. To Pour Decisions,” she says, propping her cheek in her palm as she shifts to her side, looking at me with hopeful eyes.
Like she thinks I might say no.
I tap my chin. “Hmm. Let me consider it.”
She sighs, over the top, then swats my shoulder. “Sawyer.”
“That’s Sam to you, groupie.”
“Sam would say yes to his favorite fangirl,” she says, a tease in her tone.
I roam a hand down her arm, and she trembles the slightest bit. Even after an orgasm. She’s so responsive, and I fucking love it. No, I’m addicted to it. “Sam would say yes…under one condition.”
Her eyes pop. “You’re going to blackmail me now?”
“It’s not blackmail. More like a performance request. A theatrical superstition if you will.”
“Fine, fine. I’ll blow you before each performance.”
A laugh bursts from me. “How’d you know I was going to say that?”
She blows on her fingernails. “Let’s just say I’m good too.”
“You sure are,” I say, then furrow my brow. “I’m not performing next week though.”
“Oh, you’re not?” She sounds so disappointed I almost want to tell Duke to add me to the schedule. But it’s not feasible.
“Can’t. I’m going to rest my voice that night. Gotta save it for this fundraiser I’m doing for a ball-busting piano accompanist.”
“She does drive a hard bargain,” she says.
“Speaking of hard bargains, I believe you owe me some duck juggling.”
After we straighten up and pull on clothes—boxer briefs for me and a loose T-shirt for her—we head into the living room where Captain’s curled up in his dog bed. He lifts his snout when we arrive in his domain.
“A show for a show,” she says, picking up some ducks.
“A coping skill for a coping skill,” I add, since that’s karaoke for me, juggling for her.
Captain cocks his head, his ears pricked. Chloe tosses the first duck, the second, the third, and then holy shit, she adds a fourth that I didn’t even know she was holding. A fifth now.
I can’t look away. My Chloe is juggling five rubber ducks in the living room, and I’m not sure I’ve ever been happier. It’s weird, this feeling. But not unwelcome at all.
It feels like…like Darling Springs is becoming home. And so is Chloe.
When she sets down the ducks, I clap loudly. She takes a bow, then I pat my thigh. “Come here, you multi-talented goddess.”
She parks her sweet ass on my lap.
Yes. Home. I nuzzle her neck, thinking about that word. “I’m going to adopt a dog this weekend. Want to come with me?”
“I thought you’d never ask,” she says, then lets out a shriek of excitement that’s the loudest thing I’ve ever heard.
32
WHEN YOU KNOW
CHLOE
I always thought it was a lie in books—the idea that you have a spring in your step. Now I know where the spring comes from.
Great sex.
No surprise that I’m practically bouncing the next morning. After an early-morning rehearsal at the community theater—where Captain hung out in the auditorium like the goodest boy in the world (well, he is a theater dog, and he knows it well)—we leave and walk toward Dog Tails.
He’ll spend the day there. Why would I not take advantage of free dog daycare? It’s the best benefit ever. As I walk to work, I’m practically whistling a happy tune. I pass the gourmet market, waving to Salma, who is outside arranging a flower display.