“I was so mad on your behalf,” he said quietly. “By the time that qualifier came around, I was already crushing on you pretty hard, and I couldn’t figure out why anyone would want to hurt you like that.”
I hugged him tighter, listening to his heartbeat thrum in his chest.
“And then when I saw you here…I wanted to tell you again. I could see how much you were still hurting over him, and I knew that you had no idea, but how do you explain to the girl that’s been occupying all your thoughts, who doesn’t know you exist, that you know her boyfriend was cheating on her?”
A surprised laugh bubbled out of me, and Lukas pressed a kiss to the top of my head.
“I think that’s why I said all the stuff I did. I couldn’t tell you the one thing I wanted to tell you, so everything else I knew just kind of spewed out…making me look like I stalked you for a living.”
Another laugh bubbled up, my body shaking with it.
“It’s not funny,” he said, but I could hear the smile in his voice. “That was not my finest moment. I thought I’d blown any chance at getting to know you.”
“Well, you didn’t really give her the chance to make up her mind…showing up at seven in the morning at our hotel room,” Eloise quipped from her slumped position on the couch.
I leaned back, so I could stare up at his face. “She doesn’t have a leg to stand on. Her alarm started going off before seven, and thenshe ignored it.”
“Be glad it went off! Otherwise, you wouldn’t have shown Lukas what he was missing out on.”
Heat bloomed in my cheeks when I remembered what I’d opened the door wearing.
“I can’t say I didn’t mind the view.” He grinned.
“Okay, that’s enough. I’m not talking about any more feelings or emotions in front of the peanut gallery,” I said.
“Oh, shush. I want to be here for when you two finally break the sexual tension and make out,” Eloise said, “It’s like one of my favorite rivals-to-lovers romance books, especially since we now know that Lukas was there that day. And now would be the part where you two crash together in a drunken tangle of limbs and eat each other’s faces off.”
“You have to let me borrow that book,” Annalise said.
Lukas arched a brow at me, a smirk creeping onto his lips, “Do you read these romance books?”
Heat suffused my cheeks, and his gaze went molten, and the alcohol seemed to reenter my body at full force. Suddenly, I felt hot and slightly dizzy and more than willing to crash into him and let him kiss me senseless. It would be such an easy way to turn my mind off—to get lost in him. The feel of him, the taste of him. Do all the things I’ve only ever read about.
“Oh, she does,” Eloise chimed in.
“You should have heard her earlier,” Annalise said.
I crossed my arms and pouted. I had terrible, awful people in my corner.They sucked.
“And have you read this book that Eloise mentioned?” Lukas asked, a full grin on his face.
Is he closer to me now? I swear he moved closer.
I felt my heart rate kick up in my chest. My tears were long forgotten, my body was hot and if Lukas touched me right now—if his skin made contact with mine, I wasn’t sure I’d be able to control myself. Heat was pooling low in my stomach, and I wanted more.
“Maybe,” I said, my voice too breathy to sound remotely normal.
“Mmmhh.” He hummed.
He definitely had moved closer, and it didn’t matter that Eloise and Annalise were still in the room with us—he reached out and trailed the tip of his fingers down my cheek, over my jaw and down the column of my throat. My eyelashes fluttered, my pulse jumped and my breath shook as I inhaled—his scent mixed with the alcohol in my veins and if I hadn’t already been drunk, I would be now. My eyes fell shut as his touch skimmed feather light across my collar bone.
“As much as I would love to play out this scene from Eloise’s favorite book, I’m not going to kiss you tonight, Aimee Bryant.”
Oh my god. That should not be as hot as it was. Fuck.
My eyes snapped open, and I wasn’t prepared for how close he’d gotten. A whine was just barely trapped behind my lips and maybe it was pathetic but I didn’t want him leaving here without having tasted him. He was right there. If I came up on my tiptoes, our lips would meet.
“You’re drunk, and I won’t have our first kiss be something you won’t remember,” he breathed across my lips.
