“No.” She’d already shared enough embarrassment for at least a decade.
“You don’t dream about me at night?”
“No, not you.”Oops.
Fin pushed back from the table. “Who do you dream of?”
Hailey pressed her lips together.
“It’s Asher, isn’t it?”
She looked away, hoping he’d just drop it, but Fin fixed a stubborn stare at her.
“That’s where I met him,” she said, her eyebrows raised.
Fin gave her a look she couldn’t quite place, and when she tried to apologize, he cut in.
“Look, there’s something I want to ask you,” he said rubbing her hand and looking grave. He was going to ask her to stay away from him, she just knew it—to protect her from Cobon, but that was harebrained, and she opened her mouth to tell him so, but Fin held his hand up.
“Hailey,” he began, and she made a preemptive frown. “Would you allow me to take you out on a proper date?”
Hailey blinked.
“Yes,” she told him, but it came out sounding like, “Finally!” and she couldn’t stop her smile from spreading across her whole head. “When?”
“This weekend. There’s someplace I want to show you.”
“Where is it?”
“You’ll find out tomorrow,” he said taking a bite of his pizza, and Hailey tried to keep her leg from shaking. Asher would not be happy.
And she didn’t care.
Fin wiped his mouth and smiled at her.
“So,” he said leaning over the table, “was that your first kiss,” he asked, poking his tongue in his cheek and looking very pleased with himself.
Hailey bit her lip.
“No?”
“You left me!” she said pulling her eyebrows together. “You left me all alone, and Asher was there, and I was…” She gnashed her teeth and shook her head, tracing a scratch on the table with her finger and concentrating on not telling him about the second kiss.
“You kissed him?”
“Well, yeah.” Asher wasn’t exactly gross. Hailey flicked her eyes at Fin’s then back to the scratch in the table.
Fin leaned back, crossing his arms over his chest.
“Not like that!” she said waving her hands in front of her. “Not like…” she put her ear on her shoulder, unable to say the wordtongue.
That seemed to brighten Fin’s mood considerably. Leaning forward, he smiled at her, and she could feel her cheeks burning.
“Stop looking at me,” she said, smiling.
“Never.”
Fin walked Hailey to her door and kissed her gently. “Pick you up at noon.”
