“What’s wrong?” Mason’s deep voice cutting through the silent evening makes me feel even worse. I’m trying to move on, but it’s not that easy.

I swallow the lump in my throat and pull the dark gray throw over my legs and up to my shoulders. “Just having a moment,” I answer honestly, although I can’t look him in the eye. I hope he’ll just let it go.

His warm breath surrounds me as he pulls me closer to him and kisses my hair. I don’t expect the gentle touch from him. He whispers, “I get it.”

He splays his hand on my hip and runs his thumb back and forth over my bare skin. I wait for more, but he doesn’t say anything else. Only that he gets it and my treacherous heart thumps in recognition.

My laptop jostles across my legs as I try to get closer to him, loving the warmth, needing more of it. I wonder if it’s wrong to be upset over the passing of your husband while in the arms of your lover.

“Sometimes—” Mason starts to speak just as my eyes glaze over and the words on the screen start to blur. I take in a steadying breath and stop that shit. Crying never helped me. It doesn’t do any good at all.

Mason clears his throat while I wipe under my eyes.

“When my mom died, sometimes it was the oddest things that set me off.” I’m surprised by Mason’s confession and grateful to be talking about him and not me.

“I’m sorry about your mom.” My condolence is softly spoken; my voice a bit scratchier than I’d like. I stare up into his eyes which appear so much lighter than usual, maybe because it’s dark all around us. Only the glow of our laptops and the city lights beyond the large living room window to paint the room in a soft glow.

He tilts his head to the side, tucking my hair behind my ear and I push my cheek into his palm. He has such large hands, rough but warm. They’re the perfect size for this.

A coarse hum comes from deep in his chest. It’s short, but a sound of approval.

“It’s okay to hurt still.” His words are comforting. “It’s okay to cry and let it out, even if you’re already spent.”

My heart beats harder and my breathing becomes more difficult with every passing second that I absorb his statement. I search his eyes for something and he must see the panic in mine.

“Or we can do something else?” he says.

“Like what?” I ask him.

He clicks his tongue, his gaze on my face, but not my eyes. Finally, he takes his hand away and types something into the search bar on his computer.

He pulls up a book of poetry. Robert Frost.

I eye him curiously and he pets my hair before pulling my head closer to rest on his shoulder. I get comfortable as he says, “I can read to you?”

My heart hurts so much in this moment. Not the pain of what I’ve lost, but the pain that I have something so beautiful and something I’m so grateful for, and yet I still have these moments.

I nod against his shoulder and say, “Please.”

I could listen to his deep, rugged voice read poetry to me in the dark for hours.

I could rest in his warm embrace for days.

I could stay here with this man forever.

Mason

It wasn’t supposed to be like this. It wasn’t supposed to be this much more. Two weeks have passed and it’s all become more and more normal. More and more it feels like I’ve finally won her over.

I watch Jules as she licks ice cream from her spoon, her tongue flat against the bottom and mindlessly watches the news. Her notepad is in her lap with the pen on top although she was writing when I walked in here. It’s 4:00 a.m. and she can’t sleep.

My mother used to feed me ice cream every night before bed. I had to be in my room and under the sheets as soon as I was finished, but I got ice cream every night. She made sure to keep a variety of flavors on hand; I wanted something different every night. Mom always ate strawberry, though. It was her favorite.

Jules glances over at me, a flirtatious look in her eyes. “Do you want some?” she asks, maneuvering her body in catlike motions to crawl over to me.

Even though I shake my head, there’s a small smile on my lips as I wrap my arm around her and place my hand on her thigh to scoot her closer to me.

She moans softly as she scoops up a bit of cherry ice cream from the bowl. That move has to be intentional but her gaze stays on the television as if it’s not. Maneuvering on the sofa, I readjust myself in my pajama pants.

She peeks at me, blushing and then brushes her arm against my bare chest.

“You’re sweet to get me this,” she says with that look in her eyes. The look that tells me I’ve made her happier than she thought I would be. “Thank you,” she adds and plants a small kiss on my shoulder.

Staying up to distract her wasn’t my intention when I came out here, but I don’t mind. Truthfully, I couldn’t sleep either. I felt the absence of her warmth the moment she got up. For such a graceful woman, she’s not very quiet getting out of bed.

I gave her a few minutes to see what she would do, peeking in the doorway to the living room as she got lost in her words. Watching as she sat cross-legged on the sofa, leaning over her notepad and scribbling like mad. It wasn’t until she started to cry that I came into the room. I thought she needed me; I thought it was about him.

But she said they were happy tears, like the kind you cry when you’ve gotten closure. I don’t know why that hurts me more.

“No problem, I wanted to get out anyway.”

“Did you go for a run?” she asks me, eating the last of the ice cream and facing me. I shake my head no. I don’t have time for that right now. Usually she’s in bed when I run early in the morning and then shower before she’s gotten up. It’s been a week of her staying at my place and that being the routine.

“My fault?” she asks and scrunches her nose, not liking that she’s thrown off my schedule.

“It doesn’t matter,” I tell her. It truly doesn’t. “I’ll make it up later tonight.”

She hums a small sound and then adjusts on the sofa. “Will you come by my place tonight? Instead of here?”

I answer easily, not thinking twice, “Of course. I may be late; I have a lot of things to wrap up at the office.”

She straddles me then, a leg on either side of my hips until she settles into my lap. I let my hands rest on her ass as she drops the empty bowl and spoon beside us on the sofa, the spoon clinking as she shoves them farther away.

“Mr. Thatcher,” she says as she wraps her arms around my neck and squares her shoulders. “You’re going to be late. I need you to stay at the office … and help me …” Her long lashes flutter as she bites down on her lip and continues, “… to file the paperwork.”

An asymmetric grin finds its way to my lips as she laughs at her own attempt to be a sultry secretary. I can tell she’s holding it in, not taking it too seriously at all. Her straddling me though, that has nothing to do with role play.

Glancing at the clock behind her, I note that I have another hour at least before I need to get going. “I think you may be mistaken, sweetheart,” I tell her.

She rocks herself against me and gives me a smoldering look. It’s one I don’t get often, one full of confidence and determination. But damn, when she does give it to me, it drives me wild. If anything, this woman knows what she wants and with the tension gone between us, she wants me.