“But you’re my heart-stopper.” He winks before changing my name then tossing his phone next to him on the floor like he didn’t just blow my mind and make me feel all kinds of special. “Make sure you save me as ‘Yours.’”
I look up at him through my lashes and laugh. “So smug.”
“Damn right.”
CHAPTER
TWENTY-SIX
Ambrosia.
Before we get back to our pumpkins, Dawson asks, “So you’ve done these things in past relationships?”
“No one has ever wanted to carve pumpkins with me, but I think it’s because I talked a lot of shit and scared them off.” That has him barking with laughter, and I smile widely. “And I’ve never gone with one to a pumpkin patch since I always did that with family.”
“Until me.”
“Until you,” I agree as my chest warms. “I tend to date very goal-driven guys, so no one really made the time to do things like this.”
I feel his gaze on me, and I hope he knows how much it means to me that he has. “They should have made time. That’s not goal-driven, that’s selfish. You should have been one of their goals—not that I’m complaining since they were stupid and didn’t make you a goal, and now you’re mine.”
I give him a come-on expression, and he grins like he isn’t using the bricks of my walls as pucks and sending them to the back of the goal.
I blow out a breath, trying to will my heart to calm down. “Not everyone is like you.”
“No wonder you dumped them.”
I snort. “They dumped me. Well, except for the last one.”
“They dumped you? Wow, you picked some real D1s, huh?”
I laugh a little louder as I nod. “Totally,” I snort. “They all just wanted to get in my pants, and then as soon as I assumed we were in a relationship, they’d quickly remind me we weren’t or just ghost me.”
I glance up to find him still watching me. I want to tell myself that his pumpkin will suck with how much he’s been watching me instead of his work, but again, he brought power tools.
“Man, good thing I came after you, because you don’t know how to pick them.”
I throw more guts at him, and he dodges out of the way like I’m a defensive end coming in for the tackle. He is so quick and athletic. It’s sexy, but the look he flashes me, like he can’t believe I threw guts at him, has me giggling so hard I can’t breathe.
His laughter matches mine, the playfulness of the situation making me as gooey as the guts all over us. I love it. I have never laughed this much in my life. I feel like, for the last couple years, I’ve been just like Dawson. Focused on everything but what makes me truly happy.
Dawson makes me happy.
Which, while scary, I’ve come to realize I can’t fight anymore.
As our laughter subsides and we get back to our pumpkins, Noah Kahan sings about calling your mom. I can’t help but sneak peeks of Dawson as he works, and it isn’t because he’s so gorgeous… Okay, it is, but I’m also trying to get a glimpse of his pumpkin. It’s no use; he’s practically surrounded it with himself.
I wish he’d surround me like that with his big ol’ body.
I’m not usually overly sexual, but there has been this sexual tension between Dawson and me since that night at the party.Or maybe it’s an intimate tension, because while I do want to be railed seven ways to Sunday by him, I also want him to hold me after. I bet he would whisper the dirtiest of things, and then when I was done screaming his name, he’d whisper the sweetest. I never thought he’d be one of those aftercare kinds of guys, but I think he would be with me.
As much as I fought it, I’m starting to trust that this thing between us is different.
Which, again, is petrifying.
“Why are you flushed?”
I promptly choke on my spit and start coughing like a carrot is lodged in my throat. Dawson eyes me, leaning over to pat my back. “This actually doesn’t help when you’re choking. Do you need the Heimlich?”
