His beautiful brown gaze trailed up my legs, then pinned me in place.
“Hi,” I whispered.
He sucked in a breath, then he sang to me.
49
Serenade
Zack’s brusque acoustics transformed the song into something uniquely sexy. Stylin’ Myles sang about beautiful things. But Zack sang to, about, andforme–for this song, at least.
The lyrics were so easy to believe. He put his heart into it. My dreams. This was a cover artist doing a personal performance, not some karaoke showboating.
I sighed wistfully. For a second, I was the high school girl crushing on the quarterback once again. But I wasn’t just one of the crowd anymore. I wastheone for him.
I giggled, overcome with glee.
He stumbled over the lyrics, then glanced at a janky old laptop on a desk crammed into the corner. A green indicator light shone from the camera and his phone was propped up, aimed at the doorway and me.
Was he filming for my benefit?
I covered my burgeoning, uncontrollable grin.
He glanced at me and fumbled the chord. Aw, he probably thought I was laughing at him. I lowered my hand to rest it overmy heart and smiled gently to show him I was actually touched by the gesture. He rubbed his ear on his shoulder and kept playing.
For all I knew, in this pink hue, his whole body was blushing.
Warmth tingled from my toes to my cheeks. This was adorable. So unnecessary.
I swayed along to the music. This was the stuff I dreamed about after watching him in concert as a teen. I clapped. I swooned. At the end of the song, I sat next to him and squeezed his knee. "That was amazing."
He frowned at his guitar. “Sorry. I messed up."
I shrugged. We all messed up sometimes. “It was still beautiful.”
The song. Our relationship. Everything.
Warmth radiated through his clothes. I shivered and snuggled closer to him. My arm brushed his thigh and guitar. I peeked at him out of the corner of my eye. “You can keep playing, if you want to.”
“Any requests?”
I glanced at his lips.
Thankfully, that was enough of a signal for him to move the guitar off his lap and lean in. We kissed. A soft, warm fire blazed through my body. It was like he’d dropped a bath bomb into my heart and everything bubbled up with ecstasy.
He squeezed the back of my neck. “I love you.”
“I love you too.” I climbed more comfortably into his lap to kiss him properly.
“I’ll just get this.” Shelby shielded her eyes and closed the door to the hall.
I laughed and covered my mouth. “Sorry.” I forgot she was there.
“No worries. I’m off to work. Good to see you,” she said through the door.
“Wait, what about the house warming party?” I called.
Zack rubbed his flushed neck. “We’re actually doing a late Lunar New Year’s party next week, if you want to hang out with everybody.”
