“You’re terrible,” I said. “But also, thank you.” It occurred to me that Logan would probably ask for more details about Chris, all of which were humiliating, so I blurted: “I still have a lot to say about education. Don’t think you’re getting off the hook.”
He studied me, forked poised over his pasta. In the candlelight, his eyes were rich as melted chocolate. His mouth quirked. “By all means. Change the subject.”
Over dinner we fell so deep into conversation about how I’d like to see the school system change that I forgot to notice the curious stares from other diners. I forgot everything, including that Chris was in the room, until the waiter handed Logan and me dessert menus and I looked over to find Chris’s table empty. At one point in the conversation, when I’d started to get on a bit of a roll, Logan had thrown up a hand to pause me, rooted in his jacket, and pulled out his phone, asking if it was okay to record what I was saying. I’d never had anyone ask to memorialize my thoughts before, and it loosened my tongue: if Logan and his team actually thought what I had to say was worth listening to, I wanted to make sure it was good.
Logan insisted on ordering chocolate cake and coffee so I could keep talking. When the waiter placed the thick slice between us, he leaned close, dipping the tines of his fork into the icing. “If you could start campaigning anywhere, where would you go? Who’s the core constituency we need to rally first?”
I watched the fork as he brought it to his lips. I knew the answer to the question, but it was hard to remember at the moment. “The, uh...”
He waited patiently, fork still in his mouth. Mentally, I shook myself. “The Texas Library Council’s conference is next week, right here in Austin. Thousands of librarians from all over the state come every year. It would be the perfect place to talk to a bunch of sympathetic ears. I was thinking we could put up a booth. I can look up how to do that.”
His fork clattered to the plate. “Brilliant. But leave the logistics to me.”
“Deal.” I took a bite of cake and almost groaned. This was better than a thousand grocery store candy bars. Why had I spent my life settling for inferior imitations when something this good had been out there waiting for me this whole time?
Logan’s eyes were fixed on my mouth. “Do you—” He cleared his throat. “Think we should set some ground rules?”
I finished swallowing and sat straighter. Unlike Lee, I loved rules. They existed to make you safe and comfortable. “Yes. Rules. What were you thinking?”
“I think the first has to be the obvious one: no dating other people until we’re past election day so we don’t blow our cover. Will that be a problem?”
Right. Because of my robust dating life. “I think I can manage.” I quirked a brow. “Can you?”
“I’m assuming that’s a playboy dig. In which case I’m gracefully ignoring it.”
“What about touching?” I asked, and rushed to clarify when Logan’s grin grew wicked. “Guidelinesaround touching. If we’re out in public, people are going to expect us to act like a couple.”
“Well.” He dragged a finger over the tablecloth. “What are you comfortable with?”
The memory of that exact finger tracing against my lips made me wrench my eyes away. But the image haunted: Logan holding me up against the elevator rail, my legs wrapped around him, shoulders to the wall, his finger brushing my lip before he bit it softly. A mix of tender and rough, like Logan himself.
His quiet voice filled the silence. “We’ll probably need to hold hands.”
I nodded, trying to regain my composure. “Holding hands, putting our arms around each other, kissing on the cheek. I think those are...safe. But obviously no real kissing.”
“Obviously,” he said. “I can’t imagine a scenario that would require...”
Our gazes locked. And we both had to be remembering the same moment, when I’d spun him around in the lobby, catching his face in my hands. We had to be, because Logan’s eyes had darkened into pools of ink, his expression so intense, eyes searching. It was the look he’d given me right before he’d seized me and kissed me back.
“Maybe—” I cleared my throat. “We should just agree to run all campaign decisions by each other first. And leave it at that.”
“Right,” he said, voice thick. “Sounds smart.”
“Your check,” the waiter trilled, and without missing a beat or even moving his eyes off me, Logan held up his credit card, already at the ready. The waiter seized it, eyebrows raised, and whirled away.
“Hey,” I said. “You finally saw him coming.”
Logan winked. “Finally saw him coming.”
There was a slight, pleasant chill to the air when we stepped out of Apex onto the sidewalk. The neighborhood lights twinkled around us.
“I think that’s your car,” Logan said, pulling his blazer tighter and nodding to the sleek black Town Car waiting at the curb.
“Thanks again for—”
High-speed shutter clicks cut me off. Logan and I spun to find a short man in a slubby jacket with camera, ducking in the restaurant’s flowerbeds.
Logan groaned. “I told NoranoPR. Oi, Larry,” he called. “You know you don’t have to hide in the bushes like a creep, right, man?” The photographer only shrugged, and Logan turned back to face me. “Sorry.”
