Page 99 of Always You (A Lilac Bay Novel)

CHAPTER 18

Iwoke up the next morning convinced it would all be a dream. I could feel Andrew’s chest under my chin, could feel him breathing, could feel his body heat, but still I thought it was a dream. Because nothing in real life was this good.

He snored a little, and my eyes snapped open. It was really Andrew. In my bed. Asleep and snoring after the absolute best sex of my life.

I stretched under the blanket, wiggling my toes. I wanted to laugh or shout or—

“Are you dancing under the covers?”

“No.” Wiggling didn’t count as dancing, did it?

His eyes opened, a slow smile spreading across his face. “It’s okay. I kind of feel like dancing too.”

My grin was so big it felt like it might break my cheeks. “How’d you sleep?”

“Great.” He pulled me closer, his arm slung across my chest like this was the most normal thing in the world, the two of us in bed together. “How ’bout you?”

“Pretty damn good.”

I pressed my lips against his chest, smiling when he sighed happily. “You hungry?” I asked. “I think it’s my turn to make you eggs this time.”

“This time?” he asked and I pulled back to see his eyebrow raised. “I’m pretty sure this is thefirsttime. I think I would have remembered if we did that before.”

I laughed. “I meant the last time you slept over.”

“Oh, okay then.”

I grabbed his T-shirt from the floor next to the bed and pulled it on before jumping out of the bed.

“Completely unnecessary addition,” he murmured as I left the room.

I was actually humming while I fixed the eggs, so that should have been my first clue that I was in big trouble.

While the eggs fried I filled Gordie’s water and his food bowl, leaving both on his mat when I brought the plates back to the bedroom. Andrew was sitting up in bed, my pink paisley comforter pulled up to his waist. The sight of him there, so large he seemed to dwarf the bed, but completely at home, took my breath away.

“That smells good,” he said, reaching for the plate.

“I’ll go grab the juice.”

“I can get it—”

I kissed him to shut him up. “I think I owe you. We missed a few lunches last week.”

Something like regret passed over his eyes, but he kissed me back until I wondered if we needed the juice—or the food for that matter—after all. “One sec,” I murmured once I’d managed to pull away.

The glasses were waiting just where I had left them, but Gordie was no longer at his bowl. He was in the middle of the kitchen and it looked like he was trying to bring up a hairball. I was about to make some comment about his kitchen manners when I realized no sound was coming from his throat.

“Oh my God. Gordie?”

I didn’t realize that I had screamed it until Andrew was at my side. He took one look at the cat and scooped him up, holding him over one arm and smacking his back, just like performing the Heimlich on a baby. He did it twice more before turning him over and prying open his jaws. Gordie struggled in his arms, scratching every inch of skin he could get, clearly panicked.

“I see it,” Andrew muttered. “Riley, hold his jaws like this.” I did as he asked and Andrew shoved two fingers into the cat’s mouth, pulling out a small white object.

“Chicken bone,” he muttered, tossing it on the counter. Gordie was making a hacking noise, still scratching, and Andrew gently set him on the table. He hacked a few times, shook himself, then jumped from the table, darting from the room like a shot.

“Gordie!” I called after him.

“He’s okay, Riley.” Andrew grabbed my shoulders and turned me to face him. “He’s fine, I got it.”