“You’re so much more than you let people see.” She holds my gaze when she says it, like she’s making sure I actually hear her. “You’re kind of amazing.”
“You’re completely amazing,” I say quietly. Two people are coming down the hallway that runs perpendicular to this one, heading for the conference room Scottie’s due in any minute. If anyone saw us standing like this, they wouldn’t ask questions. They’d assume answers.
Correct answers.
“If we were anywhere else, I’d think about kissing you right now,” I say.
She breathes in sharply. “We can’t.”
“I know. But I can still think about it.”
“Me too.”
“Good. That means we have a new line, then,” I say, my hand lifting without my permission, hovering near her waist before I remember where we are. Her breath hitches when she notices, but she doesn’t step back.
“Talking about something we’re thinking of but not doing?” she asks, but she’s staring at my mouth, and it makes the heat between us feel like it could melt steel. “I guess so.”
More people are heading toward the conference room, and their laughter breaks the moment like glass. We’re far enough apart to look appropriate, but the space between us is so electric, it could surge at any moment.
If anyone stepped between us right now, they’d incinerate on the spot.
“Text me when you’re in your room,” she says. “So I know you’re behaving.”
“I always behave,” I tease. “If I text, will you text back?”
“Maybe.”
“You know that’s a yes.”
She narrows her eyes. “I should go. See you tomorrow.”
I watch her walk into the conference room, the door swallowing her whole.
When the hallway is clear, I head back through the lobby to the elevator, searching on my phone.
Before I’ve even reached my room, I’ve already found the highest-rated coffee shop in North Scottsdale.
And they deliver.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Scottie
It’s 5:04 a.m. when I get a text from an unknown 602 number.
Your coffee has arrived. Thank you for ordering from Pinnacle Perk.
Thanks to the time zone change, I’ve been up working for half an hour, but when I crack my door and grab the to-go cup on the ground, I smile for the first time all morning. The hallway is quiet, beige and corporate, like nothing extraordinary could possibly happen here—like arranging a caffeine delivery isn’t peak romance.
Padding across the room back to the table, I take the drink out of the carrier when a neon pink sticky note falls from the bottom of the carrier, fluttering slowly to the ground.
It’s a handwritten note in an angled script that represents Lucas’s finest penmanship.
Itinerary: 5:10 am—think about Lucas
5:30 am—think about how Lucas is thinking about you
Alternate every twenty minutes as needed
