I let out a short laugh under my breath. “and what did you say?”
Her cheeks went impossibly red, and she pressed her hands against them, “I just said that—" she sank deeper into her seat, hiding her face completely now. “That I really like you.”
I blinked, words caught in my throat. “You told them that?”
My heart did that stupid thing again, the heavy, uneven thud in my chest that made it hard to breathe.
I mean yeah, we’re together and all but it’s just weird to think she’d tell other people that she liked me. Me. The Joshua asshole Lockhart.
She nodded. “Yeah,” she paused, flustered. “I didn’t know what else to say.”
I couldn’t help it. I chuckle a bit.
She looked offended. “What? Did I say something wrong?”
“No,” I said quickly, shaking my head, still smiling. “No, Princess.”
She pouted a little, still unsure. “Then why are you laughing?”
“Because you’re the cutest damn thing I’ve ever seen.”
Her lips curved into that shy smile that always killed me, and she murmured again, quieter this time, “And they said as long as I’m happy then they won’t hold a grudge against you”
“Wow, how kind of them.”
She giggled softly, whispering to herself, “Yeah, everyone is happy now.”
I shook my head, still grinning like an idiot as I drove on.
When we arrived at the garage, we barely made it five steps from the car before she stopped dead in her tracks. I turned, confused, and then suddenly she buried her whole face in my chest.
“What—Aurora?” I frowned, glancing down at the top of her head pressed against me. Her small hands fisted in my shirt as if she’d just seen something terrifying.
Then I heard it. The tiniest sound, a strangled squeak.
Not from fear.
Oh no.
I looked around the garage to see what made her like this and, of course. A tiny black kitten. Sitting right there in the garage’s corner, blinking up at us.
I swear, for a second, I actually prayed for patience.
For fuck’s sake.
She whispered, muffled against my chest, “Hide me.”
I blinked. “What?”
“I’m weak,” she hissed. “If I look again, I’m gonna cry or steal it.”
I sighed, pinching the bridge of my nose. She wasn’t joking either; her whole body was trembling from trying not to squeal.
Alright.
I bent down, wrapped an arm around her waist, and hauled her up over my shoulder as if she weighed nothing.
She let out the tiniest gasp. “Joshua!”
