Saying yes meant risking everything.
Saying yes meant believing I deserved him, us, whatever this was becoming.
His thumb traced my cheekbone. Patient. Hopeful.
“Autumn?” he whispered.
And I had to decide.
Right now.
Chapter 3
“You had sex.”
I looked up from the intake form I was filling out—Luna, a boxer mix with a missing eye and the sweetest disposition—to find Eli standing in the doorway of my office with his arms crossed and the expression of someone who’d just solved a murder.
“I did not have sex.”
“You’re glowing.”
“I’m sweaty. There’s a difference.”
“Autumn Marie Winters, I have known you for decades. I can tell the difference between ‘I just wrestled a Saint Bernard into a bath’ sweaty and ‘I got thoroughly dicked down’ glowing.”
“First, gross. Second, I didn’t sleep with him.”
“But you wanted to.”
Heat crept up my neck. “That’s none of your business.”
“HA!” Eli pointed at me like I’d just confessed to murder. “You wanted to. Oh my God. Tell me everything. Spare no details. I want a full report with timestamps and diagrams.”
“Get your own boyfriend and stop living through my love life.”
“I’m between boyfriends. This is all the entertainment I have.” He leaned against the doorframe. “Do you know how many guys on the apps have ‘gym, brunch, travel’ as their entire personality? It’s an epidemic. Your romantic chaos iswaymore interesting.”
“There’s nothing to tell. We had dinner. We talked. He kissed me goodnight. He walked me to my car.”
“And?”
“And nothing.”
“Liar.”
He wasn’t wrong. The kiss had been the thing romance novels tried to capture and failed because words couldn’t describe the way Cole’s mouth felt on mine, the way his body had pressed me against that wall, the way I’d felt desired for the first time in years.
“It was good,” I admitted.
“Good like ‘pleasant peck’ good or good like ‘I need to change my underwear’ good?”
“ELI.”
“What? I’m invested in your happiness. Also, your sex life. Mostly your sex life.”
I threw a pen at him. He dodged, cackling.
“Seriously, though,” he said, his voice going softer. “You like him.”
