Her Billionaire Toy Boy

Chapter 9

Several hours later, the cabin and those inside it were beginning to wake up properly. It was still crashing down rain, so any ideas they had had of going outside and kayaking were definitely not going to come to pass.

Mira stumbled into the kitchen—it was about 11:30—smiling at Lisa as she passed. Lisa had already made some coffee, and she gestured to the pot, but Mira decided to make a whole new, fresh pot, for at the very least it would give her something to do before she went in to wake up Sam.

As it turned out, she didn’t have to. Midway through her brewing the fresh coffee, she felt a strong pair of arms envelop her and a warm, scruffy head of hair burrow itself down in her shoulder. She reached down and felt Sam’s forearms before turning her head slightly and whispering, “Hey, this had better be Sam.”

“Damien wouldn’t do anything like that,” Lisa said, and then she stumped out of the room. Sam squeezed Mira a little tighter and then released her. Mira turned around and leaned on the counter, grinning up at Sam. The rain pounded on the roof and there was a silvery gray tint to the air all around them.

“It’s definitely a fuzzy socks kind of day,” Sam said. He was wearing pajama pants and a white undershirt, and they were both rumpled as if he had literally just rolled out of bed. His hair was likewise sticking straight up on just one side. Mira smiled.

“Sounds like a good idea, but I didn’t bring any fuzzy socks.”

“Oh, well, now, we have to remedy this,” said Sam very seriously. He took Mira’s hand and pulled her, gently, after him, down the hallway.

“But—Sam—the coffee,” Mira protested.

“It’s brewing, isn’t it? We’ll go get you socks and then the coffee will be made and everything will be lovely,” said Sam. They went through a small door sitting in its own tiny wooden corridor and came into a very small bedroom. It was about the size of Mira’s bathroom upstairs, and there was just room in it for a twin-size bed, a wooden dresser which looked as though it might have been handmade, and a pile of suitcases which was apparently doubling as a desk, as Sam’s laptop was perched atop them.

Sam whirled Mira onto the bed, where she sat and watched him curiously as he pulled open the top drawer of the dresser and began rummaging inside of it.

After a moment, he began tossing candidates for socks back on his bed.

“I’ve got several pairs, ranked in levels of fuzziness,” he finally said, coming back to sit on the bed by Mira. “This one’s probably your best bet, they’re really small on me so they probably won’t be hideously large on you…”

Mira smiled and took them from him, then looked at him, her hands in her lap. “You sleep in here,” she said.

Sam looked around at the corners of the room and then smiled at her, his entire face crinkling up. “Yeah,” he said, leaning back on the bed. “You know how I said last night—or, well, earlier this morning—that I didn’t remember the first time that I came here?”

“Yeah, of course,” said Mira. “This place is an intrinsic part of who you are.”

“That it is,” said Sam seriously. “Well—in that same vein—this room is part of who I am. It’s been my bedroom for my entire life, even as I’ve moved around in my ‘real’ homes, even as I’ve transmogrified from being a child into the adult you see sitting before you today. I quite literally cannot imagine sleeping in any other room.”

“It’s a bit small,” Mira couldn’t help but saying.”

“Yeah, well, it felt a lot bigger when I was smaller,” Sam said, laughing. “But I don’t spend much time in it, to be honest. Usually, when I’m up here I’m playing games with people in the great room, or cooking, or tromping around outside.”

“Right,” said Mira. “So—I am sleeping in the master, then.”

“Yeah,” said Sam. “You are.” But then he smiled. “But, seriously, you’re doing me a favor, don’t feel weird about it. I certainly could never sleep in my parents’ room, you know?”

He shuddered, and Mira laughed. She looked around the room. “So—tell me about this room, then,” realizing that she was sitting in a place where a boyish Sam had played and did his homework and probably sat in for punishments.

“Well, I did deface most of this back wall,” said Sam, jumping off the bed and moving the stack of suitcases. Mira gasped and moved to kneel next to him. All over the wall were a series of stick people in black marker. Efforts had obviously been made to scrub the wall, but it had not worked.

“You must have gotten in so much trouble,” Mira said.

“Yeah, well,” said Sam. “Now it’s one of my favorite things about the house. Never painting that over,” he said, smiling broadly.

“Thanks for showing me,” Mira said, quietly.

“Of course,” said Sam. “I like that you know things about me.”

Mira felt an overwhelming urge to lean in and kiss him at this, so boyish and charming and vulnerable as he seemed; so she did, and when he seemed to like it, she did it some more.

Some time later, they emerged from Sam’s small room, pink-faced and ready for the coffee. Mira reheated it and poured them both mugs, padding around in Sam’s thick socks.

“You know, I’m honestly just feeling a lazy movie day,” Damien said laconically as he lay on one of the couches. Lisa was curled up on his feet.

“Right, okay,” said Sam. “How about we take in a movie and then drive over to the winery to do some quality control?”

“For dinner?”

“Sounds good to me,” said Sam.

“Sam’s winery has the best macaroni and cheese,” said Damien, winking.

“There’s a pairing,” said Sam, shaking his head. “Fine wines and macaroni and cheese—”

“Well, the way you have it is super classy,” said Damien. “Mira, you’re going to love it.”

“I can’t wait to try it,” Mira said, politely.

“Sure, okay then,” said Sam. “It sounds like we have a plan. What movie do we want to watch?”

The four of them bickered pleasantly for several minutes about the relative pros and cons of watching thrillers or comedies in a rainstorm in a cabin in the woods before deciding on one of Sam’s favorites, The Usual Suspects. He was very surprised to hear that Mira had never seen it.

“Well, then, we’re practically doing you a favor,” he said, very seriously. “Let’s get this one rolling then.”

They watched the movie, Damien, Lisa and Sam reacting properly to all of the best parts of it. Mira had a good time drinking her coffee and snuggling with Sam, but the movie wasn’t really her thing, as she admitted to Sam a little while later. Unperturbed, he merely laughed.

“We’ll keep working on you, that’s all,” said Sam. “It’s an acquired taste. You’ll like it the tenth time you see it.”