As he fell in line beside her, she gasped when she saw him. “Niko! What are you doing here?”
“I was helping Yaya get unpacked.” He motioned to the cottage.
“Oh.” She sighed in relief.
“Did you think I was stalking you?” Niko teased.
“No.” Tiana shook her head.
He’d been joking about the stalking, but he could see from her response she’d honestly jumped to that conclusion, which made him wonder what had given her such a bad opinion of him. Or maybe she just had a bad opinion of all men.
“How’s your day been?” he asked, finding himself in unfamiliar waters since most women were excited to see him.
“Fine, yeah, good,” she responded nervously.
He just wasn’t sure if it was the good kind of nervous, the butterflies-in-your-belly nervous. Or if it was the, why is this guy talking to me? When will he go away nerves?
Trying to figure out which it was, he continued, “I was actually going to call and see if you were free for dinner tonight.”
“Dinner? Tonight?” she repeated, her eyes looking absolutely terrified.
Maybe her nerves weren’t butterfly nerves. Maybe he actually had made her feel uncomfortable somehow. Even the thought that might be the case made him feel sick to his stomach.
“Yes,” he confirmed with a smile, hoping to defuse the situation and take the stakes way down. “You will soon find out, I am a very attentive, very thoughtful, very goodfakeboyfriend.”
“Oh, um…” Her head dipped as she licked her lips and brushed a stray strand of hair behind her ear.
He could see that she was panicking, so he decided to try and joke his way out of this awkwardness. “I thought it might be a good idea for us to get our stories straight.”
“Story straight?”
“Yeah, our origin love story. How we met, when we went official, our song?—”
Her smile widened, and he could see her starting to relax. “Oursong?”
“Of courseour song—that’s vital information. Our first kiss, pet names for each other, coffee orders, peanut butter preferences?—”
“Peanut butter preferences?” she cut him off again with a chuckle.
He nodded. “Crunchy or smooth.”
“You thinkthat’simportant to know?”
His brow furrowed. “Absolutely, peanut butter preferences are very intimate.”
As he said the wordintimatehe noticed that her cheeks darkened with color. He was already trying to figure out a way to work that same word into the conversation once more when his phone vibrated, but he ignored it.
“Aren’t you going to check that?”
“No,” he answered easily. He wasn’t going to waste this moment with Tiana.
Not more than a second later, her phone also beeped, indicating a message. Unlike him, she did not ignore it.
She pulled her phone out to check her message, so he did the same. His text was from Zion, telling him that he was at Brewed Awakenings coffee shop with Karina Black, and Brock and Gianna just came in, and apparently Gianna had fangirled when she saw the pop star.
Niko knew G was a huge fan of Karina Black. She’d asked him about a trillion questions about the pop princess after finding out he’d summered and spent all of his holidays in Hope Falls.
Zion’s message ended with a call to action requesting, no insisting, Niko and Tiana get their “fine asses” down to the coffee shop because they had a plan.
