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“I’ve got a question for you.”

I turn back to him. “What?”

“It’s an important one,” he teases and I nod as he pins me with a serious look. “Name your top three favorite movies.”

“Okay,” I say as I start counting them out on my fingers. “Selena, Titanic, and Hope Floats.”

He scoffs. “How about a recent movie?”

“I liked Guardians of the Galaxy,” I tell him.

“Babe, Guardians of the Galaxy came out a while ago.”

My mind goes blank and my eyes widen as I stare at him, my heart beating out of control in my chest. Oh, God… I was so happy and caught up in our conversation that I completely forgot about the fact that I know nothing about the last five years and the fact that I’m hiding that from him. Jesus. What a fucking mess! His gaze flicks between the road and me, demanding an answer. Swallowing my fear, I turn away from him and shrug.

“I haven’t been to the movies in a while.”

“Hey,” he whispers and as I turn back to him, he reaches across the truck and nudges me under the chin, forcing me to meet his gaze. “What did I do?”

I shake my head. “Nothing.”

“Come on, Juliette. I may be a dumb guy but I’m not an idiot. Tell me what I said to make you so upset so I can fix it.”

This man is going to be the death of me.

“Nothing,” I assure him, grabbing his hand and holding it between mine. I hope he believes me because the last thing I want to do is ruin this by telling him the truth. “I promise.”

He studies me for a moment before nodding. “You want to keep playing? I think it’s your turn for a question.”

“Actually, I think I get two now since you stole an extra one.”

“Lay ‘em on me, baby,” he replies with a smile and I push away my past once again to focus on us. In a few hours, he’ll be dropping me off at a hotel and then who knows if I’ll ever see him again. I don’t want to spend the last few hours I have with him stressing about everything I left behind. Not when I have him.

Chapter Twelve

Juliette

“What kind of girls do you usually go after?” I ask, fighting back a smile as he turns to me, his brows creeping up into his hairline. What started off as twenty questions has just turned into hours of conversation and the rest of the drive has gone by in the blink of an eye. He scoffs and shakes his head as he glances across the cab.

“The wrong ones.”

I arch a brow. “What does that mean?”

“Someone recently suggested that I sabotage myself.” As he peeks over at me again, he looks so damn vulnerable that my chest aches.

“Is it true?”

He shrugs. “They might have been on to something.”

“Why do you think you do that?” I ask, studying his face as he scowls. It breaks my heart to think about him stopping himself from being happy because of some kind of pain in his past. After a second, he glances over at me and forces a grin to his face.

“Well, if I knew that…”

“No,” I interrupt. “Don’t do that. If you don’t want to tell me, that’s fine but don’t lie to me.”

“The way you call me out on my bullshit should be infuriating but I just can’t seem to care with you…” He shrugs as his words fall away and I grin at him as I tilt my head to the side.

“It’s a gift.”