“Yeah, okay, great,” he says and then just stands there for a second, shifting from one foot to the other before he shakes his head at . . . something, who knows what. “I’ll see you later, boss.”
Then he leans in and brushes a soft kiss to her cheek, that scruff she’s spent the last day admiring rough against her skin, but the contrast between it and the press of his mouth sends a shiver through her and thank God he’s gone, out the door and down her stairs before he notices how he left her completely dumbstruck and gaping with goosebumps spreading over every inch of her.
“Fuck, get a grip, Bianca,” she mutters to herself. “It was barely a kiss.”
She could go back and check her phone, answer the billion messages that rolled in overnight, but she doesn’t have the energy for it right now. She’ll just leave it alone and eventuallydelete the thing once they come clean. Instead, she needs a little mindless entertainment and maybe a nap and hanging out on the couch with Amelia for the rest of the day until dinner.
Despite the chaos she’s made of her life in the last twelve hours, she’s still a free woman for at least a little while, no more dissertation prep, no more studying. Aside from a few more shifts at the university library, her schedule is blissfully empty. She deserves to lounge for a while and she’s going to give in to that urge.
“What do you think, Meals?The Mummy, right?”
Amelia doesn’t look up from her food bowl that Xavier thought to fill as well because apparently he’s actually the perfect guy, but that’s good enough for her.
And then after two movies of watching Rick and Evie defeat evil, save the world, have a kid, save their kid and the world again, with a nap in between and more ignoring her texts (except one from Xavier where he asks how he should dress and she tells him that last night’s outfit would work fine, leaving out that he would absolutely look hot as hell in anything and he should never worry about what he wears, ever), she starts to get ready. He’ll be over soon.
She throws on a dress mostly because it’s easy and only one decision and that gives her enough time to take a blow-dry brush to her curls to smooth them into a long, shiny andnearlystraight curtain over her shoulders and apply some light makeup, with a little bit of extra highlight under her eyes because a day of rest is not enough to get rid of those dark circles after a night like last night and she does not need Lexi’s opinion on those on top of having the wrong nails to show off an engagement ring.
Shit.
She’d taken it off again because this time she really didn’t want to get it tangled in her hair as she tackled the monstrosityit tends to become when she lets it air-dry and had almost forgotten to put it on again.
That would actually be hilarious, if she blew this thing because she forgot to wear her fake engagement ring.
She’s just coming out of the bathroom and sliding it back onto her finger when Amelia streaks toward the door, a sure sign someone is on the other side of it. She’s better than a guard dog.
Lifting the tiny cat into her arms, she opens the door and Xavier’s there, hands in his pockets, mouth open in shock and seemingly not even attempting to knock.
“Hey,” she says, but that’s all she’s capable of because holy shit he looks good, even better than last night if that’s possible. He’s got on a collared shirt and dress pants instead of his usual jeans, and he shaved (which is just as good a look as the scruff, in a different way). His soap and cologne drift over her senses, fresh like a cool breeze off the ocean with a hint of something woodsy underneath.
“Hey,” he says, running a hand through his hair, which, if she didn’t know better, he might have blown dry because it looks a little shinier than usual and not just resting wherever the wind decided to take it. “Wow, you look . . .” He trails off, letting his gaze drop up and down, lingering just long enough to set a soft warmth over her skin.
She sets Amelia down as he closes the door behind him.
Biting her lip, she steps back to let him in. “Yeah, you too,” she manages to say, which is a massive understatement, but then he probably knows he always looks good.
“We match,” he says, laughing, motioning to the light blue color of her dress, which is incredibly similar to the blue of his shirt.
“Ha, well, all the better to fool them with, right? Isn’t that what engaged couples do? Dress similar so the pictures come out right?”
He shrugs, his brow furrowing in genuine puzzlement. “Honestly, I have no idea.”
“It feels like something engaged couples do, anyway.”
“Okay, you ready to go?”
“Before we go, we should probably get our story straight.”
“Our story?”
“Yeah, like of our relationship, because you met my sister for like five minutes so she didn’t have time to fully sink her claws in, but she will tonight.”
“Right,” he says, leaning his hip against her kitchen counter, and Amelia, who is definitely not allowed to be on the counter, hops up there and presses against his arm, begging for attention. “Well, the first part is easy.” He absently scratches under her chin. “We met at school, decided to start seeing each other and kept it quiet because people would talk – you know, the usual workplace-romance stuff.”
“Right.”
“And then we realized we couldn’t live without each other. Is that enough?”
Probably not, but . . . whatever, that’s basically what she told Lexi and it’s not like it needs to hold up beyond tonight.
