“You certainly are, my lord,” I reply, biting my lip to fight the laughter attempting to slip out.
“Damn, Austin. Don’t call me that unless you want me to get bricked up.”
“What in the world does bricked up mean?”
“You know . . . worked up.Excited.”
My eyes widen, and I pretend to clutch my pearls as if I were shocked. “Don’t scandalize me with your rakish ways, my lord.”
“Would you consider this role-playing,my lady?” Carson’s aqua eyes shimmer with amusement, and his voice drips with flirtation.
Holy shit. Are we flirting? What would it be like to role-play with Carson?
“Carse? Hello? Are you there?” McKenna, thankfully, snaps me out of my delirium spiral.
Carson unmutes his phone and continues his conversation while I get up to clear our plates. When I go to reach for his, he places his hand on mine to stop me. “I may not be a Southern gentleman, but my mama raised me with manners. You baked. Let me clean up.”
“Are you sure? You don’t need to do that. You just got home after a long day,” I point out.
“I’m very sure. Go take a bath while I start a fire and make some popcorn.”
“Okay, if you’re sure?” I question.
“Positive. Now go.” He quirks his eyebrow at me and nods his head toward the stairs. “You can use my soaking tub if you’d like. There are bath oils and salts on the shelf beside it.”
“Thank you, Carson.”
“I think I liked it better when you referred to me as ‘my lord,’” he says before biting down on his plush bottom lip.
With that, I spin on my heel and practically sprint up the steps, but not before I hear McKenna begin assaulting him with questions. Questions that include my name at least twice before I disappear down the hallway and into his room.
Placing one hand on my chest and the other on my stomach, I try to calm my racing heart and the butterflies erupting in my stomach.
Carson Wilder could set my world ablaze, and I think I’d happily dance through the flames if it meant I got to be with him on the other side.
After my bath, I head downstairs wearing oversized sweatpants and one of my favorite new shirts, which reads “I closed my book, this better be worth it.”
The smell of popcorn hits me even before I enter the living room, where a fire is roaring and Carson is playing a video game on the large TV.
I sit beside him on his sectional—it’s the largest, deepest, and comfiest couch I’ve ever sat on. It’s the kind of couch you want to veg out on for days on end. Only as I reach across Carson to grab the bowl of popcorn, does he notice me.
He takes off his noise-canceling headset and gives me a sheepish smile. “Sorry about that.”
“You’ve been cleared to watch TV and play video games now, right? I don’t want to break any of the rules and set you back.”
Setting aside the controller and headset, he sits back and pulls my legs over his lap. “Yeah, I was earlier this week. We’ve just been so busy I haven’t had a chance to tell you.”
“That’s exciting. How much longer until you can play?”
“Still out for another week at least. But I did get cleared for light activity today, so that’s progress.” He squints as he takes me in. “I like your shirt. I’m glad I was worth putting your book down for.”
I give him a soft smirk. “Well, that’s only because I finished my book while I was in the bath, and I didn’t want to start a new one, or I’d probably stay up all night to finish it.”
“No self-control with you bookworms,” he teases, eyes narrowing as he looks at my legs. “Hey, are those my sweatpants?”
My cheeks heat and I bite my lip. “Oh, these? Are they? Hmm, I must have mixed them up in the wash.”
They are most definitely his. I did accidentally find them in the wash, but once I put them on, I realized I was not going to be returning them.
