Chloe:
WE ALREADY KNEW THAT!!!
YOU’RE GIVING US NOTHING!
Sutton:
Idk wtf is going on, but blink twice if you’re being held hostage by his dimples.
Willa:
I’m fine. Everything’s fine. Totally fine.
Sutton:
That’s too much fine for it to actually be fine.
Chloe:
We need a night filled with tequila to get the whole sordid story.
Sutton:
I’m free tonight
Chloe:
Same
Willa:
Can’t, sorry. Berry season really keeps me busy. But soon.
Sutton:
I hope you know we’re holding you to that.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
WILLA
Whoever decidedlibrary chairs should be made of wood clearly had a vendetta against bookworms. These things were about as comfortable as sitting on a pile of rocks, and my back had been screaming as much after only ten minutes.
Wincing, I shifted and glanced down at the grant paperwork spread across the table. This was taking far longer than I’d anticipated. It didn’t help that the Wi-Fi stuttered along at the speed of molasses, my laptop fan wheezed like a dying cow, and every time I tried to focus, all I saw was Lincoln Steele’s mouth.
Not the mouth that cracked jokes across the bar or the mouth that had been teasing and taunting me for decades. No. Instead, I saw the mouth that had kissed me last night like it had a lifetime of catching up to do.
Practice. It was supposed to be practice.
But somehow, my body hadn’t gotten that message. Worse, it had leaned into him like a greedy, reckless idiot. And look where that had gotten me—in the library, inching up on hour two, with not much to show for my time here except explicit fantasies about my fake husband’s tongue.
“Get it together, Willa,” I muttered, shifting in my seat and trying to alleviate some of the nerve pain running down my legs.
Since my once-quiet house was now also the home of the loudest man in existence who could scream without saying a word, I’d figured the library was the best escape. The peace, the quiet hum of turning pages and shifting papers, the order of it all, should’ve grounded me.
But the silence only pressed in until all I could hear was my own heartbeat and recall exactly how easily Lincoln had made it race with a simple kiss.
True, it was a kiss that had been better than even the best sex of my life, but still. It wasjusta kiss.
