He studied her face. “Is that okay?”
“Of course. It makes sense. There’s just a lot more to all this than I anticipated.”
He tilted his head. “Is there someone you don’t want to know about us?”
“No, it’s not that. It’s just that this keeps getting bigger and bigger.My mom texted me last night and asked when I was bringing my ‘Hollywood hunk’ over to meet her and my dad.”
He chuckled. “She sounds like someone I need to meet. How about if I have you all over for dinner this weekend before prep work gets underway? Next week is going to be insanely busy.”
“That’s sweet of you, but she’d like to have you over to her place. She loves to cook and of course my brother will be there too.”
“The more the merrier.”
He truly seemed unbothered. Of course, it wasn’t his family he was duping. “Or I could just tell my parents the truth and then we wouldn’t have to go through the motions.”
“It’s up to you, but I hope you won’t.”
Her parents had a hands-off approach to adult parenting. They were close in other ways, but Chloe didn’t really open up to them about the men in her life. Meghan was the one whose shoulder she cried on.
“You’re probably right. I guess we should have a meet ’n’ greet with the folks anyway, just for appearances’ sake.”
“Good point.” Liam stopped paddling and let the boat drift to a stop.
“What are you doing?”
“Come up here. Let’s take our first selfie.”
She glanced down at her shirt, which bore the wordsThis is a clean shirt. I just have a cat.“I didn’t exactly dress for this.”
“You look great. But I have to ask, do you have a slogan tee for every day of the week?”
“Meghan gets one for me every Christmas, so I probably have one for every day of the month.”
He held out his hand. “Get over here.”
Guess they were gonna do this. The boat rocked gently as she slid off the seat. Before she could determine where to sit, he pulled her onto his lap.
Okay then. Her hands clung to each other in her lap. His thigh was like a boulder under her rear end but somehow comfy too, and his arm was a welcoming support around her waist.
He held his phone in front of them.
Chloe turned her attention to the screen and grinned. It felt stilted. Fake. Her pulse raced and her mouth was dry as dust. Also, she didn’t exactly look her best after sorting through her garage. “Maybe we should do this later after I’ve fixed myself up.”
He turned, his gaze roving over her face. “You look great. Cute. Natural.” He faced the screen and snapped a shot, seeming for all the world like he was having the time of his life.
“I’m pretty sure ‘natural’ is a euphemism for ‘ugly,’” she said through her plastic smile.
He leaned closer until their cheeks almost touched. “You could never be ugly.” He took another picture. “Turn this way.”
She did—and froze when he did the same. Their faces were inches apart. His warm breath whispered over her mouth. His eyes wereright there. Had she called them gray? Silly her. Specks of silver and blue gave them a depth she hadn’t noticed before.
His lips were nicely shaped, the lower one lush. There was a tiny scar at the corner of his mouth she’d never noticed.
She dragged in the smooth scent of his cologne. Nice. It smelled like man and money, because let’s face it, that wasn’t drugstore cologne he was wearing.
“Close your eyes,” he said softly.
“Huh? What?”
