Wes lingered in the living room while Ashleigh changed. His eyes swept slowly over the surroundings, admiring as he studied. You could learn a lot about a person by their living environment. This place was more than home to Ashleigh. It was a safe haven. She filled it with all the things she loved, all that made her most content, like a queen sequestering herself away in a tower. Here she was safe. Here she had everything she could ever truly need. Smiling, he ran fingers along the spine of a book and his blue gaze continued its perusal of the room.
Ashleigh’s touch could be seen in every corner of the room. In the warmly painted walls, in the sparse decorations upon the walls, in the old couch, and in every single book--She was there. Wes could even smell her. It was tantalizing and he felt hundreds of year’s worth of practiced control waver. It wouldn’t do to make advances upon her on their first date. Such an act showed no respect. Yes, he wanted her. God, he wanted her so badly that his dead heart ached. But want alone was…it was empty. He wanted something deeper than that. He craved to know everything about her. He wanted to know her soul. Treating her otherwise--treating her as if what he wanted most from her was her body--was demeaning. It debased his feelings for her into something ugly and he would not have that.
Wes moved out of the living room and went into the tiny kitchen. The walls were bright here too but blue and white instead of yellow and, for a moment, he was reminded of the daytime sky. Ashleigh’s touch and smell was here too, almost like a signature. He stood in the middle of the small room a moment as unmoving as a statue. He soaked it all in. The smell and the warmth and that feeling of her that permeated from everything around him. He smiled again and then turned away, going back into the living room to wait for his date.