Chapter 40

My little Cozy Up extends far past the time that I thought it would. Honestly, I thought it was going to be a glass of wine, a couple of cookies, one a nostalgic old movie and then Christian would kick me out, shooing me along to my room like he always does.

But when the first movie ends, he puts on another.

And when the first bottle of wine ends, he grabs another. And then another.

When we get sick of the taste of sweets, he orders what seems like a restaurant’s worth of Chinese and we dig into that until I’ve had so much to eat that I’m stroking my hand over the little food baby in my belly and groaning.

Chris, on the other hand, wants to keep going. “Is there more chocolate cake out there?” he murmurs, peering interestedly in the dark towards the door.

I laugh, shaking my head at him. “You and Frankie are going to get so fat living with me,” I murmur, snuggling down into the pillows with my glass of wine cradled in my hands. “Nico’s the only one who’s going to stay trim.”

“How do you stay trim,” Christian mutters back, giving up on the cake and leaning back against the pillows next to me. “Honestly, do you even eat what you cook?”

“Sometimes,” I say with a shrug. “Though honestly the pleasure is mostly in cooking it and watching others enjoy.”

Christian turns to smile at me, shaking his head. “Little Wendy,” he murmurs, “to all of us lost boys here.”

I grin at him, pleased very much by the reference, because it’s kind of perfect, isn’t it?

“Does that make you Peter, or Hook?” I murmur, reaching out a hand to passively tuck his newly messy hair back behind his ears. He grins at me, leaning into the touch incrementally.

“Hook, definitely,” he says, decided, making my smile grow. “Much more badass.”

I laugh at this and take a long sip from my wine. “You are kind of badass now,” I murmur, a little sarcastic. “Or, at least you’re bad, and kind of an ass.”

He bursts out laughing at this, shaking his head at me. “Ass, I will confront. But bad…” he shrugs, looking down into his own wine glass before drinking down the rest of it and reaching for the bottle, pouring a little more. “That, I won’t contend.”

“Really?” I ask, feeling a little guilty, because…I mean, it was a joke. But is this really how he sees himself?

“Really, Iris,” Christian murmurs, his eyes a little more than half-lidded now as he settles himself back against the pillows next to me. “I’m one of the bad guys now. Don’t you forget it.”

“Hmmm,” I say, narrowing my eyes at him, “I’m not sure I believe it.”

He grins at me. “Iris, your ex boyfriend got the shit beat out of him in my dad’s office this morning, what more proof do you need?”

“Well, you didn’t do the beating,” I point out.

“You saw me perform the same act a few nights ago,” he says, a little hesitant. Because, I mean, we’re talking about this now, aren’t we? Which puts our very pleasant, very cozy night at risk.

But, considering how much wine we’ve had, and how much delicious food is in my belly…I don’t know. I still feel cozy, and ready. This feels right.

And I’m not sure precisely what feels more right about it – the calm, quiet moment we’re having together? Or the way Christian is looking at me through his eyelashes, leaning close enough that I can smell his aftershave.

“How do you do it,” I murmur, lifting my hand to again tuck his hair back – it keeps falling into his face. I let my palm slip down his cheek after I’ve put the hair back in place.

“Do what?”

“Handle it,” I clarify, looking up into his blue-grey eyes. “The violence, of your new life. I’m not sure I could.”

He stares down into my face. “I don’t want you to have to handle it. I want you as far away from it as possible.”

“That’s not what I asked, Chris,” I murmur, coy. “I asked how you handle it.”

He sighs, ducking his head a little before we both take a sip of our wine, each of us, I think, intuiting that we need it.

“I think just…time,” he says, still looking down. “Seeing it over and over again helps you to become…inured to it. Becomes a normal part of your everyday world.”

“Is that what your life has been like?” I whisper, horrified. “So much…so much violence that you’ve just grown used to it?”

Christian sighs and lifts his head to meet my gaze. “My teenage years, Iris…yes, my father ensured that I grew up used to it. He brought me along every time he needed to put the heat on a man, made me do some of it. I saw my first man murdered before I was sixteen.”

My eyes go wide as I freeze, staring at him.

“See?” he says, smirking a little, though there’s a sadness in the turn of his lips. “Bad guy. Can’t get away from it.”

“No,” I counter, instant, shaking my head at him. “Christian, if you were a bad guy…it would bother you less.”

He sighs, almost as if…well, almost as if he wants me to see and understand him as bad – as if my continual faith in him is exhausting. It breaks my heart to see him so tired. So, I do my best to inject a little joy into the conversation.

“Besides,” I say, giving him my own little smirk. “You’re way too pretty to be a bad boy.”

“What?” he says, his shoulders straightening as he smiles at me, for real this time. “I’m pretty?”

“Oh, you’re a total pretty boy,” I say, nodding fervently, which makes him laugh harder, tilting his head back. I grin, watching him, pleasure thrumming through me to see him happy. God, I could watch him laugh like that all day. “What?” I ask, laughing along with him, “nobody’s ever told you that before?”

“Well, no,” he says, tilting his face to look back at me now and – am I imagining it? Or is he…a couple of inches closer? “I’ve gotten handsome, rugged, powerful, but…never pretty boy.”

“And who is it that’s giving you these compliments?” I take a sip of my wine, finishing the glass before putting it on the bedside table.

“My step-mom,” he says, and he laughs when I quirk an eyebrow. “Also, women! The girls I date!”

“Oh, cool,” I say, rolling my eyes as I turn back to him, “so, your mom and the women you pay to date you, no biases there –“

He laughs harder, smacking me on the leg to punish me for the truth as I grin widely at him.

“A pretty boy,” he murmurs, shaking his head with a deep sigh. “And here I was, thinking I was cultivating this whole dark mafia persona…”

“Nah,” I say, crossing my arms and settling my head back against the pillows, basically laying down now. “You need way more scars for that.”

“Scars,” he murmurs, turning his head at me. “Well, scars I’ve got.”

And then, to my shock - and okay, I admit it, my delight – Christian leans back and starts to tug up his shirt.