When she caught my dirty look she scampered off just as Zeb tossed the package containing the sheets with a thread count no little boy would ever appreciate back on the shelf. He crammed his hands through his wavy hair and turned to me with a frustrated huff. I saw an older lady who was looking at bath mats in the same section jump and scuttle to another aisle like Zeb was the Big Bad Wolf and he was getting ready to blow the whole place down. I liked the way he looked, more than liked it. He looked like he could take on the entire world and win, but that was apparently intimidating to the average high-end shopper. I rolled my eyes and turned to him as he put a hand on my elbow and started to lead me out of the linen section.

“Don’t they have sheets with trains on them or superheroes? Who spends five hundred bucks on a pair of sheets that the kid is gonna outgrow in a few years when he needs a bigger bed?”

His frustration was kind of cute. “I would. I won’t even tell you how much the sheets on my bed cost.”

He shifted his eyes to me and moved to wrap his bulky arm across my shoulders. The same older woman gave a sniff of disdain as we walked by and it was the saleswoman’s turn to give me a dirty look as we swept by on our way back into the belly of the mall.

“I like your sheets.” There was humor and innuendo laced together in his tone. “But your bed could be covered in sandpaper, and as long as you were naked on top of it I wouldn’t even notice.”

“Ouch.” I muttered the word softly but couldn’t stop the rush of pleasure that followed his sweet statement.

He chuckled at me and let his gaze skip over the rest of the fancy stores and their modern lettering and minimalist window decor. “I’m not going to find stuff for a kid’s room anywhere in this mall, am I?”

When he texted me and asked me to go with him to find stuff to get Hyde’s room ready, I initially wanted to tell him no. It felt too intimate, too permanent. It felt like not only was he crafting a place for himself in my everyday, but was working to make a specific space for me in his very busy and complicated life as well. I was so close to the edge with him. I hovered so close to letting go and falling all the way in with him. I was hanging on to that precipice with only my fingertips and it was so scary. At the place where there was nothing and it was barren and empty, I knew I was safe even if it was aching alone. I knew if I let go of the ledge the drop could kill me, that the impact would shatter me, so I kept clawing and clinging to familiar ground to keep myself aloft. As hard as I was holding on to the cliff and not wanting to give in to every emotion he pulled from me, Zeb was constantly there below, tugging, dragging, urging me to crash into him and into every promise of love and forever I could see he wanted to give me.

When I hesitated he told me that he had already asked Beryl, but Joss was home sick and his mom had plans for dinner. He insisted he needed a woman’s touch to help him get things right for his son’s homecoming and I couldn’t resist, but the only place to shop that I was familiar with in Denver was Cherry Creek. As soon as we pulled into the parking lot it was clear his dirty Jeep didn’t fit in with the Mercedes and Audis littering the parking garage and our trip into Nordstrom’s had only solidified the fact that where I shopped wasn’t exactly Zeb’s cup of tea. Even if the girls who worked there liked the rugged eye candy he provided.

“There’s a Bed Bath & Beyond on the other side of the mall. I bet they have sheets with trains on them.” In hindsight we probably should have started there. The chain store was much more Zeb’s speed and more kid-friendly in general. “I told you I’m not good at decorating and stuff. I’m beige and pastel all the way.” Beige and simple colors weren’t offensive. If a color could be offensive. According to my father, it could be. According to him, everything was worth judging and finding fault with if that meant he could use it to make someone else feel poorly about what they liked or found pleasure in.

Zeb tugged me closer and dropped a kiss on the top of my head as several people moved out of our way. He commanded space and people seemed to automatically give it to him. It was impressive to watch and sent a little thrill down my spine knowing that I was fortunate enough to be the one he was making that space for.

“You only think you’re beige and pastel. You like color and you like things that are different and fun; you just hide them in places where you think no one will notice.”

I scowled a little and pulled away from him. He didn’t let me get very far. As soon as there was room between us he reached out and caught my hand in his. I couldn’t remember a single time in my whole life when anyone had held my hand. Not my father, not my mother, not Nathan . . . no one except Zeb, and it rattled me to my core. All at the same time I wanted to pull free and clutch him so tightly he would never let go. That hold I had on what I knew from before loosened even more. I was clinging by fingertips now.

“What are you talking about? Everything in my house is muted and neutral. Everything I own is a basic, plain color. Even my car is gray.”

He snorted at me and squeezed where our hands were locked together. “But I bet you a million bucks that your underwear is bright purple or blue and that your toes are painted some crazy color with a design on them. Your workout clothes are black and gray, but every single piece of them has some neon strip or some splash of color in the design. Not to mention you could’ve paid someone to cover up that red wall in your kitchen or you could’ve bought a new building or an updated home instead of sinking a fortune into restoring and customizing that old beauty. You have your own flare, Sayer. It’s subtle, but it’s there, and it’s beautiful if someone is smart enough to look for it.”

I almost pulled us both to a stop so that I could really process his words. I had never considered the little things in my life that I did just for me, for the little piece of joy they brought me, as “flare.” I considered them guilty pleasures, ones I still had a hard time believing I was getting away with, ones I was waiting for a dead man to tell me were frivolous and wasteful. I never noticed Zeb noticing them.

He tugged on my hand to get me to pick the pace back up and looked at me over his shoulder. “And don’t think for a second that I haven’t noticed that you can’t keep your hands off my ink. Not that I would ever complain about it, but most chicks like it at first and then get bored with it because it just becomes part of the scenery. Not you. It doesn’t matter how many times you see it or have your mouth on it, you always want to explore it, absorb it. You more than like color, Sayer. You savor it and worship it.”