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“No. I’m fine.” I was an idiot but I didn’t want to stop our date before I could find a new way to fuck it up.
“Do you understand why I’m going to question you again?” Elias finally smiled when I sighed. “Perfect. Now how about you save us from that repetition and just tell me what you were upset about.”
“Feeling stupid.” His raised eyebrow made me want to pout, but I managed not to. “Um, I remembered your first name and I’m pretty sure you put in your last name too when you added yourself to my contacts but by the time I made it home, Dally changed it in my phone, so I was worried I wouldn’t know how to find you in the restaurant if you’d already sat down.”
Elias’s lips were barely curling up on the sides, which made me feel better and ridiculous at the same time. “I didn’t realize it until I was almost here and then I couldn’t figure out how to get your last name without it looking like I wasn’t paying attention, but it wasn’t my fault.”
Dally did it.
“Dally did it.” Elias repeating what I was thinking popped the last of my probably irrational worries.
“Yeah.” But he’d thought he was being cute, not giving me a heart attack, so I couldn’t complain too much. “Um, hi. It’s good to see you again.”
Maybe if I pretended everything was fine, we could start over?
Elias turned into Daddy Elias in the blink of an eye. “Would you like to try that again?”
No.
Shoving my hands in my pockets and making sure my feet were planted firmly on the ground so I wouldn’t rock or wiggle, I did my best to channel Dally as I widened my eyes. “I’ve been looking forward to our date. But I’m not nervous anymore.”
He snorted.
“I’m a good boy?” It was a last-ditch effort but it made him laugh. “Um, how about if I explain that I just want to pretend I haven’t already made this weird?”
“You haven’t made it weird.” He sounded like he actually believed that, which either meant he was a really good liar or his dates had been worse than mine. “You had a very rational worrythat got a bit out of hand, but you were honest when I asked what the problem was.”
Letting out a slow breath had him almost smiling at me again. “You did a very good job and now that we’ve handled it, we’re going to have a nice dinner. We’re going to chat and have a delicious meal, and then we’re going to find some things we have in common so I can quietmyirrational fears.”
“I panicked over that this morning.” I couldn’t let him think he was alone with that one. “Dally said we could find some new things to have in common if we couldn’t think of ones we have already.”
Elias’s eyes widened and it was good to see he hadn’t figured that one out either. “Um, he suggested hiking if you don’t already do that. I haven’t done it much but I’m kind of a dork about birds, but we don’t have a lot of them in the city. Well, we’ve got hawks and pigeons near my apartment but they’re living out World War III in front of my building and it’s kind of bloody some days. So I’d like less homicidal birds?”
Elias cocked his head but he didn’t look like the idea was stupid. “I think that’s a very good idea. There are a lot of things we could try if we don’t already have enough in common. Oh, and do you know that we domesticated pigeons so long ago that’s why they don’t have any natural instincts any longer?”
“Yeah.” I couldn’t decide if it was fascinating or creepy. “One day they were important to us and the next we discarded them like a bad relationship.”
Huffing, he shook his head. “We treat exes that cheated better.”
He knew his pigeons.
“Do you like birds?” I managed not to sound little when I asked, but I had to work at pushing that side of me back.
Shaking his head, Elias didn’t make me guess at the real answer as he reached out and put a hand on my back. “No, but I like documentaries. I’m not big on war ones, so I end up watching a lot of animal ones and general history stuff.”
“Me too.” Mostly the animal ones, though. “What kind of history ones do you like?”
If we had the area where birds and documentaries overlapped, then we had to have other things in common too. But even if it was just the bird documentaries and the age play stuff, that was a really good start.
Chapter 6
Elias
“You’ve pissed a lot of people off, haven’t you, Daddy?” Milo’s eyes went wide as he studied something over my shoulder.
“Yes. There’s something else I’m going to have to apologize to you about, isn’t there?” Turning around wouldn’t stop whatever tornado was coming at us, but the one bright spot was that I was Daddy again.
So clearly our date wasn’t going too badly.
