I could practically hear the sass through the screen.
I rubbed the back of my neck, rolled my eyes, and typed slower this time, even though I was already regretting it.
Would you like to attend the Storm team dinner with me tomorrow at 7?
There he is.
A pause.
She didn’t answer right away. The typing bubble popped up. Disappeared. Came back.
I sat there longer than I should’ve, waiting. Thumb hovering. Chest tight in a way that had nothing to do with cardio.
It was stupid. She was going to say yes. Of course she was. We had a deal.
But part of me didn’t want her to say yes because of the deal.
I wanted her to say yes because she wanted to go with me.
Because last night meant something to her, too.
Finally, the message came through.
Pick me up at 6:45. And if you’re late, I’m posting that photo of you trying to eat a taco in one bite.
I smiled.
Worse—grinned.
And I didn’t even try to stop it.
My phone buzzed just as I was pulling a shirt from the closet.
What’s the dress code? Are we doing ‘fake girlfriend, but fashionable’? Or ‘date-night-in-January chic’?
I smirked.
She always had a way of making things sound casual even when I knew she’d spent twenty minutes thinking it through.
It’s at that place downtown with the open-air patio. Upscale casual but it is January.
The typing bubble popped up instantly.
Translation: don’t embarrass you?
I didn’t think. I just typed.
You couldn’t if you tried.
Sent it.
And then I stared at the screen like it might explode.
Because… what was that?
I wasn’t the guy who said things like that. I wasn’t the guy who flirted, even fake flirted, unless it was part of the script we’d agreed on.
This wasn’t part of the script.
