What He Craves(3)

I started pulling on Noah’s boxers, wondering if they were going to fit. I could never borrow Dan, my college boyfriend’s, clothes because I’d always had to worry about them being too small. I had big boobs, a big butt, curvy hips. But Noah’s t-shirt and boxers were baggy on me. I breathed in his scent and then shut the light off and went to find him in the kitchen.

When I got there, he was peering into the refrigerator.

“Are you hungry?” he asked.

“Starving.” I sat down at one of the stools that was in front of the marble breakfast bar. Everything in Noah’s kitchen was sleek and modern– marble countertops, gleaming stainless steel refrigerator, a double wall oven. It looked like it could be in a magazine spread, with Noah as the model.

I should have been tired, because I’d only gotten a couple hours of sleep before Josh had called about getting down to campus. But I wasn’t. I was wide awake. More than wide awake – full of energy, wired on… I wasn’t sure what. Lust? Passion? The afterglow of amazing sex?

“Right.” Noah started pulling containers out of the refrigerator. His back was just as built as his front, his shoulders broad and strong, the muscles sharply defined.

I shivered.

He turned around. “Are you cold, Charlotte?”

“No.” I shook my head. “I’m not cold.”

He set down an assortment of food on the breakfast bar– blueberry bagels, apple Danish, maple croissants, cinnamon butter, cream cheese, and tiny cheesecakes swirled with chocolate. There was a French press sitting on the counter, and he brought me over some coffee in a tiny white cup.

“I don’t drink coffee,” I said.

“Nonsense,” he said, setting it down in front of me. “Every lawyer drinks coffee, Charlotte. It’s good for you.”

“No, it isn’t.”

“Yes, it is.”

“Caffeine can lead to adrenal fatigue,” I reported. I reached over and grabbed a croissant.

“Oh, yeah?” He seemed amused. “And where did you hear that?”

“I read it in the American Journal of Medicine.”

“And do you routinely read the American Journal of Medicine?”

I shrugged. “I used to read it a lot. Back when…” Back when I wanted to be a doctor. But I didn’t want to get into that, didn’t want to talk about it with him or anyone else.

“’Back when?’” Noah repeated. He seemed amused by this, too. “Are you even old enough to have a ‘back when’?”

“I’m twenty-one.”

“So no, then.” He pushed my cup of coffee over to me. “The study you’re talking about involved high levels of caffeine, the kind that no normal person would ever be able to ingest. And the same study also proved that coffee is the biggest source of antioxidants in the human diet, and as long as you don’t have any underlying health problems, you should be able to drink it without consequence.”

I tried to remember if any of that was true, but I couldn’t. So I took a sip. “Ugh,” I said, forcing myself to swallow. “That’s disgusting. It’s so bitter. It needs sugar.” I glanced around for a sugar bowl, but I didn’t see one.

“That is a premium French roast,” Noah said. “You can’t ruin it with sugar. And besides, sugar isn’t good for you.”

“Says the man whose idea of breakfast is pastries.”

“Sometimes you need to replenish your energy stores.” He grinned at me and I blushed. He leaned back against the counter, his cut abs flexing as he moved.

I wondered again how someone who looked like him wanted to sleep with someone who looked like me. Not that I thought I was ugly – I knew I wasn’t. I was cute, maybe even pretty, in that girl next door kind of way. But Noah.. Noah could have been a model.

Or a murderer, a voice in my head oh-so-helpfully reminded me.

“Would you like to go out for a proper breakfast?” he asked me.

“Right now?”

“Yes, right now. There’s a twenty-four hour diner downstairs.”

I looked at him. “You eat diner food?”

“Yes, Charlotte. I eat diner food. I’m not a total snob.”

“I don’t have any clothes here,” I said.

“What’s wrong with what you’re wearing?”

“Your t-shirt and a pair boxer shorts? I really don’t think that’s appropriate, even for a diner.”

He looked at me and pretended to nod seriously, like he could see my point. He set his coffee down on the counter and walked over to where I was sitting. He stood behind me and brushed my hair to the side, then kissed the back of my neck softly. His hands slid down my shoulders, down my arms, stopping at the bottom of my t-shirt.