Ryan frowned. “I think she’d have told you I was right.”
“In high school? Yes. But not now.” No, she had a feeling her mom would approve of Emma dating modern-day Ryan very much.
“She’d have kicked my ass if she didn’t approve,” he said with a smile.
“This is true.” Her mom had been feisty, and opinionated, and fiercely protective of Emma and Derek.
“You know, there weren’t many parents who liked me back then, and let’s face it, they weren’t wrong. I was bad news. But your mom…she was all right. She wasn’t crazy about Derek hanging out with me, but she didn’t write me off either. In fact, she had my back a few times, tried to point me in the right direction. I’ll never forget that.”
“Really?” Hot tears splashed over her cheeks. “She never told me.”
“She was one of the good ones,” Ryan said softly, reaching up to wipe her tears away.
“Yeah, she was. Not many people know what it feels like, losing your mom when you’re still a kid.” She’d been fifteen. Ryan had been eleven. Maybe the hardest time to lose a parent, in that delicate age between childhood and adolescence.
“Hell of a thing to have in common, but there it is.” He tugged her in closer.
“Well, it’s nice somehow…to be able to talk about it with someone who understands. I don’t know, that doesn’t really make any sense, does it?”
“Makes perfect sense to me,” he said.
“I’m glad,” she whispered, holding on to him. She smiled against his chest. “Another advantage of this ‘friends with benefits’ thing…deep conversations we’d never have with someone we’d only been dating a few days.”
“Yeah.”
They lay there for a while, naked and entwined, talking about everything from her brother to his future plans at Off-the-Grid. It was nice, and comfortable, and…intimate.
“Hungry?” he asked as the sky outside her bedroom window glowed with the golden tones of sunset.
“Starved. Want to go to Rowdy’s?”
“Yeah.” Something in his expression loosened, as if it were a relief for him, too, that they could maintain the casual aspects of their friendship even while they were burning up the sheets together.
They dressed, and she tamed her sex-rumpled hair before they walked outside. “Um.” She eyed his bike, then looked down at her skirt. “How about I drive this time?”
“Deal,” he agreed. They chatted easily on the short drive into town, and she parked in the public lot beside the Town Square. “Any new ideas for the memorial?” he asked as they walked past its future site.
“I’m working on a new design that I’m kind of excited about.”Reallyexcited about, if she were being perfectly honest with herself, which made her doubly nervous to show it to the Town Planning Committee.
“That’s great,” Ryan said, giving her hand a squeeze.
“Your little detour yesterday really worked. Thank you.”
“Any time.” They walked hand-in-hand through the door into Rowdy’s, passing Ethan on his way out, carrying a to-go box.
He broke into a wide grin, his gaze passing between them. “So the rumors are true then.”
“Fuck you,” Ryan said, flipping him off.
“Nah. I’ll stick with Gabby. You two lovebirds enjoy yourselves.” With a wave, he was gone.
Emma shook her head with a smile as the hostess showed them to a table. Not their group’s usual table, but a smaller one, near the back. It felt…odd. Like this table for two made the shift in their relationship real in a way all the sex somehow hadn’t.
Ryan looked shaken by it, too. “Huh,” he said as he sat across from her.
Okay, so there was definitely going to be an adjustment phase for them. “At least we know each other well enough to just say, hey, it’s weird sitting at a different table?” She tilted her head with a smile.
“Yeah.” He looked relieved. “That is good.”
