He helped her slide off of the sex-settee, and then tenderly brushed the hair out of her eyes. “You’re beautiful, you know that?”
“You’re mushy after sex. You know that?”
Magnus grinned. “I do now.” He leaned in and pressed a firm kiss to her mouth. “Wait here and I’ll ditch the condom.”
“Sure.” With a yawn, she sagged against the settee and relaxed, waiting on him. He returned a few moments later with a damp towel for her and a blanket. After she’d cleaned up, they curled up on the couch together, Edie’s legs across Magnus’s thighs once more, and his arms around her. She snuggled against his chest as he wrapped the blanket around them.
It felt like peace. She yawned, pressing her nose against his throat. “Love you.”
“Love you, too. Sorry I don’t have anything better than a couch. You want to get a hotel?”
“Nah. I just want to stay here. Forever.”
He chuckled. “I’d like to get up and eat something in a few hours maybe.”
“If we must,” Edie said, sleepy and replete. “So how come you’re not back at the wacky art house instead of this apartment? I mean, I like this apartment, but it seems small for you, being that you’re Daddy Warbucks and all.”
“I signed the other place over to Levi. When we bought it, we went halves, and now it’s fully his. I didn’t want to be under the same roof as him anymore. Not until he grows up a little.”
She looked up at him in surprise. “Did you break up with your brother, too?” Then again, she seemed to recall Levi’s sulky expression and his split lip the last time she saw him.
“Not as badly as you and Bianca,” Magnus admitted. “I don’t think Levi’s malicious. He’s just . . . thoughtless.”
“That’s not like Bianca,” she thought sadly. Bianca was constantly calculating, wasn’t she? Always scheming about what was best for Bianca. Edie was blind to it no longer, and it made her sad.
He rubbed her shoulder. “Still not talking?”
“Still not talking,” Edie agreed. “The wound’s too new. Maybe when I’ve had more time to process and forgive. But for now? She’s on her own.”
“It’ll be good for her,” Magnus said. “We’re both too mixed up with our siblings. Have been for too long. It’s time to have our own lives, you know? Look at Levi. He’s a dreamer and I’m a doer—we’re a terrible working combination, because I’d want him to sit down and pound out some code, and he’d want to take a walk in Central Park. It would drive me fucking insane, and I’d get pissed, and he’d just put down his feet even more, and things got uglier and uglier. I should have recognized a while back that he didn’t want to work on this project. It was just me pushing so hard for him to work because I felt like I needed him for the game. Now that I’ve realized I don’t, I’ve relaxed on him a lot. It’s just time for us to start moving apart and having our own lives. I’m a lot less stressed, he’s a lot less stressed, and my fist isn’t feeling the need to connect to his face.”
Edie chuckled. “I’m glad, at least.”
“Besides, I bought this place with you in mind. Now that we’re going to have even more cats and I’m running the cafés downtown, I might look for something bigger in Manhattan proper, since I assume you’re going to want to help with the cats?”
“Of course,” she said, excited about the prospect. It would be a chance for her to make a genuine difference in the lives of so many cats—and people. She was brimming with ideas for encouraging adoptions. Christmas cat pictures with Santa, pet-food drives for the local shelters, all sorts of things. “I might end up taking over the project, actually.”
“Nothing would make me happier,” he admitted. “I’ve got a lot on my plate at the moment with the game, so you’re welcome to it.”
She rubbed her hands together, grinning.
“So you’re moving back in with me?” His tongue traced the shell of her ear, then he nibbled on her lobe. “As of tonight?”
“I can’t.” He stiffened against her, and she pressed her hand to his chest. “Your cat just had kittens. She’s feeling protective. The last thing I need to do is introduce seven more cats to a new environment, a new mommy, and a blind cat, only to turn around and move them again in a few weeks if you’re really going to look for a new apartment in Manhattan.”
Magnus groaned, tilting his head back against the couch. “So . . . new apartment first?”
“It’s less moving for the cats. Less traumatic for them to constantly keep changing their territory. I—” She frowned as he got up and she fell backward on the couch, off balance. “Where are you going?” She watched his delicious ass flex as he crossed the room.
“Getting my phone to let Hunter know I need a new place right away. Manhattan, one floor, big enough for a cat army. Needed ASAP because I want my cat lady with me.”
Edie just snorted.
“It’s true,” he told her, returning with his phone. “I thought I was going to tame the cat lady, and it seems that she’s tamed me.”
And what could she say that was sweeter than that? Nothing. But when he returned with his phone, she straddled his lap once more and showed him how much she loved him.
Magnus didn’t text Hunter for several more hours.
Chapter Twenty
Two long, torturous weeks later, Magnus had signed the papers on a West Chelsea penthouse that overlooked the Hudson River and boasted a lean, mean, seven-thousand square feet. Or, as Magnus liked to joke, a thousand feet for each of Edie’s cats. And while Edie nearly fainted at the price, she had to admit that the penthouse (and the sky pool on the terrace outside) was gorgeous. Within another week, they’d moved in and purchased even more furniture, since now they didn’t have enough. Edie liked the new place. It had several elevators, and so even though she’d been a bit leery of living in a building with more than thirty floors, so far, so good.