Page 51 of Runaway Bride’s Husband

“You’re looking much more relaxed,” she said lightly. “Good shower?”

“Great shower,” I corrected, holding her gaze for a beat too long before I glanced down at my food. “This looks amazing too.”

The slightest flush spread on her cheeks, but she sat down across from me, both of us practically vacuuming in our pasta before heading out to the game without saying so much as another word to each other.

By the third inning, I’d realized Maggie had absolutely no idea what was happening in the actual game itself. She had, however, fully devoted herself to having a good time. She seemed to love being part of the crowd, joining in as soon as a chant started and nearly climbing over me trying to participate in the wave.

At one point, I glanced at her, her loose hair wavy from the humidity, her cheeks flushed, and one of my baseball caps backward on her head. Mine.

The thought was so abrupt and so fiercely possessive that it shocked the hell out of me, which meant she caught me staring because I forgot to look away. She smiled. “What?”

“Nothing.”

“You were smiling.”

“I’m having fun.”

She looked at me for a second, then started laughing. “Well, I’m glad. I mean, I’m happy you’re happy. Honestly, that’s why I bought the tickets, but if that’s your happy smile, it’s weird.”

“What?” I barked out a laugh of my own. “What are you talking about?”

“Nothing. You just looked really weird for a minute there.”

I rolled my eyes. “Gee, thanks.”

“Anytime.”

It took me another inning to understand that she’d bought these tickets to thank me. She just refused to say the words, but I saw this for what it was, a much-needed olive branch between us. And I took it.

From there, the rest of the night was remarkably easy. She stole half my fries, so I took her drink. We argued over which team had the worst uniforms and she accused me of being jealous when she swore one of the players had looked directly at her. He’d been looking at the ball, but I couldn’t convince her of that.

On the walk back to my apartment, she stuck so close to my side that her shoulder bumped into my bicep every few steps. We were almost there when she finally looked up at me again. “You know, it turns out you’re not nearly as much of a snobby, stick in the mud as I thought.”

“You thought I was a stick in the mud?”

“Or that you had a stick up your ass.”

I let out a strangled laugh. “Why, thank you. You’re not nearly as much of a brat as I thought you were either.”

“Now, that’s high praise,” she joked, pumping her eyebrows at me. “I think I might like baseball now, too. You’ve converted me.”

“I’ll take it. As long as you promise you’ll be a Cubs fan.”

She turned to face me when we stopped outside of the building. “Of course. I could never betray you.”

As I drew my keys out of my pocket, my hand grazed the back of hers and I froze, immediately looking down into her eyes to apologize, but I realized a second too late that she was much closer than I’d thought. The words died an instant death on my tongue when I found her already looking back up at me. From the corner of my eye, I saw her lips part and my gaze dropped to them instinctively. Then hers followed suit.

Somewhere in the back of my mind, alarm bells were going absolutely nuts, but I started leaning down anyway. She moved closer, her head tipping back.

Then my phone chimed with a text and I jerked away, crashing hard back to the real world. A world in which I definitely should not even be thinking about kissing Maggie Pembroke.

With my heart pounding but the moment mercifully shattered, I pulled my phone out of my pocket to find a message waiting from none other than Marcus. I didn’t open it yet, just sliding my phone back into my pocket and completing the turn to the door.

“We should get some sleep.”

She blinked a few times, the smile that had still been on her lips fading slightly. “Yes, of course. You’re right. It’s getting terribly late.”

I unlocked the door and waved her in, neither of us saying another word until we were back in my apartment. Even then, Maggie only spoke when she noticed a pretty glaring problem.