“How’s that going, by the way?” Kieran nodded to the laptop, watching me move it.
“Unbelievably well.” I beamed, genuine joy overthatwelling up and brushing away the Colin-induced cobwebs that’d been threatening to settle over my mood. “I’ve never written so fast in my life. If I keep this up I’ll be done by this time next week.”
Something I couldn’t identify flickered across Kieran’s face as I said that, but it turned into a warm, soft smile a second later. Maybe it was a trick of the light. “Wow. That’s… that’s awesome. Barely enough time to see everything in Slow Falls.”
I didn’t say I was pretty sure Ihadseen everything on the drive into town, but I thought it. Slow Falls was nice, but it wasn’t exactly huge.
“Hoping to see one or two more things before I go,” I said, looking Kieran up and down. Ifhewas going to flirt shamelessly withme, then it was fair if I did it right back.
The blush that’d faded before roared back to life instantly, Kieran toying with his phone on the table between us.
Which reminded me…
“I saw the post you made to Instagram this morning,” I said. “I mean, Angelica saw it first and sent it to me. It was sweet.”
Kieran smiled, still blushing, still looking down at his phone. “I like the book,” he said. “Sincerely. Like, even if you hadn’t written it, I’d still like it.”
“Flatterer,” I said, just as the server brought my coffee and Kieran’s tea, which did turn out to be fairly orange. Hence the name, I supposed.
“Want a sip?” Kieran offered, pushing the delicate teacup toward me. It should have looked ridiculous in his hands, too dainty for the big muscular guy holding it, but something about itworked.
Kieran was gentle from the tips of his hair all the way down to his toenails. He could hold a teacup so thin you could see the light through it and not look like he was about to crush it outright.
It seemed rude to say no, and as I raised the cup toward my nose I could smell the warm sweetness of honey and the earthy, herbal notes of the tea, and I couldn’t help imagining what Kieran’s mouth would taste like after he finished this.
To be fair, I couldn’t help imagining what Kieran’s mouth would taste like in general.
Bracing myself, I took a sip and let the tea roll around my tongue, humming at the surprising sweetness and the faintest of bitter notes, bitter in a way that was sharper and fresher than coffee, and milder, too.
I didn’t hate it.
“Not bad,” I admitted, pushing it back over to him. “Not enough caffeine, though. If the whole world isn’t vibrating slightly, I’m not caffeinated enough.”
Kieran snorted. “It’s not theworldvibrating. What happened to resting?”
“I’ve rested and now I’m gonna write a book in a week and no one can stop me,” I said. “Thanks to you.”
“Still gotta sell the boyfriend thing to the nice publishing people,” Kieran pointed out.
He was right. I didn’t actuallyhavean okay yet, I was just forging ahead with the assumption that I’d get one.
“Yeah, I know,” I said, curling both hands around my coffee mug. I should have been cutting down, but the temptation to work myself until I passed out was hovering over me.
If not for Kieran forcing me to take a break like this, I would still have been sitting on the edge of the bed typing away.
… on the other hand, that was exactly what I was meant to be doing.
“So I was thinking we should talk about approach,” Kieran said. “Before we go. Maybe over dinner tomorrow? I don’t wanna distract you too much.”
He was right. I shouldn’t have been letting him distract me. No matterhowmuch fun he was.
But if I couldn’t make this lie into the adorable whirlwind romance it needed to be, then all the work I was doing now was for nothing. I’d have to spend months redoing it.
“Tomorrow night sounds like the perfect distraction interval,” I said, impressed at myself for not saying that tomorrow night sounded really far away and I was still thinking about how soft Kieran’s lips had been during that makeout session, how nice the happy little sounds he made were.
… how many times I was planning to jerk off over it later…
Kieran, oblivious to the direction my thoughts had just gone in, smiled one of his blinding, charming, undoubtedly panty-dropping smiles.
