We should just marry him.
I tap my temple.
“I am gonna get to the story behind that.” He points at me. “I swear.”
“Now,thatis something you’ll never know. I’d rather let you read my work first.”
“One day, Ella Gibson,” he says. “Or … next best thing. Do you have any copies of your books?”
Yeah, about a thousand.
“Um …” I glance around. “Yeah, but you don’t have to read them; they might not even be your thing?—”
“I want to,” he insists. “Give me your goriest one.”
I straighten up off the couch. “Okay, come with me.”
He follows me into the second bedroom, where there are four large boxes filled with books. There are also some stolen Barnaby packages I haven’t gotten around to opening yet.
“These are all yours?”
“No, they’re books from home, too. I don’t have anywhere to put them.” I run my fingertips across the spines. “So, my poor babies have to stay in boxes.” I hunt until I find a copy of my first book, about two women who clean up crime scenes until one of them falls in love with a suspect.
“Cleaners,” he says. “A good one?”
“My best one. So far.”
We walk back to the door, and he pauses for a second, looking down at me.
“So … coffee.”
“Coffee. I’m free whenever.”
Cool, very cool. Hi, I’m Ella Gibson and I have no life.
“Just how pathetic would I be if I wanted to see you tomorrow?” he asks.
Not pathetic at all!
The butterflies are performing synchronized swimming lessons in my stomach. “Tomorrow works for me.”
“Is nine too early?”
I laugh. “A little. I work through the night and sleep most of the day. How about four?”
“Sure, I can work with that.” He steps into the hallway, checking his watch. “Nineteen hours to read this.”
“You don’t have to read it tonight! I won’t quiz you, I promise.”
“I kinda hope you do. I’m great at quizzes,” he says. “But yeah, nineteen hours. I can totally wait nineteen hours to see you again.”
I laugh, my body hot because damn. Is he real? I did touch him when I cleaned up his arm, didn’t I? He’s definitely a real person.
“One problem,” he says.
I tilt my head. “What?”
“I don’t think I can wait nineteen hours to do this.”
