The screen went dark before he could respond, leaving him staring at his own reflection in the black glass of his phone. He set it face down on the desk, unwilling to spend too much time trying to figure out what changes his sister had noticed.
Riley padded over, resting his shaggy head on the arm of Corbyn’s chair. The dog looked up at him, and he was unable to resist running his fingers through Riley’s coarse fur.
“It’s not what she thinks,” Corbyn told Riley, who offered no contradiction beyond a slow blink.
Yet Ellie hadn’t been entirely wrong. He couldn’t deny that Sadie had affected his routine, work habits, and even his tolerance for technology. What he wouldn’t admit, even to his too-perceptive sister, was how he’d found himself noticing other things: the way Sadie tucked her hair behind her ear when concentrating, how her gray eyes sparked when she challenged one of his plot points, the quiet hum she made when reading a passage she particularly liked.
Small details that had no bearing on their professional relationship. Things he had no business cataloging.
Corbyn picked up the stylus again and tapped the tablet screen, bringing it back to life. The manuscript glowed up at him. It was still his words, but somehow he could see things more clearly in this format.
Time slipped away as he wrote. The words came faster than they had in months. It wasn’t the painful extraction they’d become since the accident, but something closer to the rush he remembered. Not quite the same, nothing ever would be, but better. Easier.
When he finally looked up, he realized night had truly fallen, the grounds beyond the windows no longer visible. Glancing at the clock on the mantle, he was startled to see it was past midnight. He’d worked for hours without interruption, without the usual breaks forced by pain and frustration. He had been relaxed and focused, and his chest clenched when he thought of all the time he had spent allowing his anger and fear to control his decisions. He flexed his left hand experimentally. It ached, but not with the sharp, shooting pain that typically accompanied a long writing session.
Corbyn saved the document and watched as the word count updated. He’d written more tonight than in the past three dayscombined, and that realization brought a complicated mix of emotions.
Underneath his satisfaction at having successfully spent the night writing was the knowledge that Sadie had been right. She would know it immediately when she saw the new pages tomorrow, and she would get that look on her face—the one that said she’d been correct, but was too professional to gloat. One corner of her mouth would curve upward, gray eyes twinkling as she tried to avoid eye contact, as if somehow he wouldn’t know exactly what she was thinking.
The thought didn’t irritate him as it should have. Instead, he found himself almost looking forward to it. There was a warmth that spread through him as he pictured her smile, and he had to shake his head to clear the treacherous thoughts. This was a professional arrangement and nothing more.
Still, as he pushed up from his chair, Riley following him toward the study door, he couldn’t shake the feeling that somehow he was fooling himself into thinking his heart was immune to Sadie Reed.
***
-Sadie-
Staring up at the ceiling in her room at the Roaring Stag, Sadie groaned in frustration. Once again, her mind was not focused on the manuscript she was trying to edit on the tiny screen of her phone for a freelance project. Instead, she had been thinking about Corbyn and what had transpired that afternoon, and eventhe simple act of remembering holding his hand in her own had her body responding in all sorts of inconvenient ways.
Shaking her head, she closed the manuscript file and pulled Jess’s contact information. She needed a friendly voice, and Jess was the one person who could yank her out of an overthinking spiral. Her best friend’s face lit up the screen in surprise on the second ring.
“Well, look who remembered I exist!” she exclaimed, her hair piled in a messy bun. Jess appeared to be in her apartment, and a glass of wine was visible at the edge of the frame. “The elusive Sadie Reed graces me with her presence!”
“I’m sorry, it has been way too long,” Sadie admitted, settling more comfortably against her pillows. “I’ve meant to call, but everything has been such a blur.”
“That bad, huh?” Jess asked, taking a sip of her wine. “Is Mr. Difficult still living up to his reputation?”
Sadie hesitated, unsure how to answer. The Corbyn Pearce who had greeted her on that first day—all cutting remarks and cold dismissal—seemed miles away from the man who had let her massage his scarred hand this morning.
“Actually,” she began carefully, “he’s not what I expected.”
Jess raised her eyebrows. “Meaning he’s worse? Because I can have you on the next flight home if he’s being impossible.”
“No, no, nothing like that,” Sadie said quickly. “The opposite, really. Sure, he was difficult at first, but lately things have been… different. The edits and writing are going well. We might actually hit the deadline.”
“Seriously? Thank God.” Jess looked genuinely relieved as she told Sadie, “The board hasn’t stopped asking for updates, and marketing has been hounding me daily about the launch. I’ve been running out of ways to tell them to be patient.”
“Well, you can tell them to relax,” Sadie grinned. “He’s still protective of his work but receptive to feedback now, at leastmost of the time. We’ve actually made significant progress on the structural issues.”
“Well, damn,” Jess murmured, looking impressed. “You are a miracle worker, and I may build you a shrine if you get this book to the finish line.”
Sadie laughed, shaking her head. “The book is good…reallygood. The plot just needed some untangling.”
“And the author needed someone who didn’t take his crap,” Jess added with a knowing grin. “You always were good at standing your ground.”
“Professionally, maybe,” Sadie said, her gaze flicking away as she thought of Nate. “Not always in my personal life.”
Jess’s expression sobered immediately. “Has he been bothering you again? Because I swear to God, Sadie, if that asshole is still—“
