“I’ll be damned.” She sassed her hip and planted a fist on it. “It’s inhere.”
“Well, don’t justlookat them.” He chuckled, crossing his arms over his chest. “Take them out.”
“Here.” She held out her cardigan. “Hold this for me?”
“Aren’t you going to put it on?” He kept his arms crossed, pointedly not taking her sweater. “It’s freezing out here.”
Her eyebrows rose. “It’s nearly sixty degrees.”
“Yes.” He nodded. “Freezing.”
“Californians.” She scoffed with a teasing smile.
This was the Anne he remembered—happy and gently playful. He returned her smile. She was back where she belonged.With me…He slammed the door on the thought.
“Don’t forget you belong here, too.”In California with her family, he reminded himself.Not by my side.
“Yes.” Anne met his eyes, and her smile slowly faded. “I’ll never forget where I belong again.”
Frederick sucked in a sharp breath, and his blood pounded in his ears.Don’t read too much into her words.He took a step toward her.She didn’t mean what you hope she meant.But she took a step toward him, and he wanted to touch her so badly that his hands shook.What the hell are you doing?He couldn’t stophimself from lifting his hand, wanting to feel the warmth of her face against his palm.Maybe just this once.Her eyes rounded, and she seemed to stop breathing. He wanted…Fuck.He snatched her cardigan from her and gripped it hard in his hands.
“I’ll take that if you insist on freezing to death,” he said, breathing unevenly.
“I’m pretty sure I’ll survive.” Her smile was a little unsteady at the corners but still lovely, and his treacherous, hungry eyes fell to her lips.
He’d barely averted disaster by not grabbing at her, but he craved to be closer to her somehow. “So have you figured it out?”
“Figured out what?” She cocked her head to the side.
“What Anne Lee wants?” His heart stuttered for no apparent reason. He just wanted to know more about the new future she hoped to build for herself. No big deal.
But when her eyes dropped to his lips for a split second as if to say,You’re what I want,he nearly groaned out loud—either with mortification from his delusional thought or because of the white-hot lust tightening his body. But Anne met his gaze again with a subtle shake of her head.
“I want to continue acting. On my own terms.” She raised her chin as though owning her words. “And I want to do it here.”
“You want to act here?”She doesn’t want to leave.Frederick’s chest constricted with emotions too tangled for him to recognize. “In Hollywood?”
“Yes? I mean, yes,” she said with a firm nod. “But I’m going to hold out for a role that I can pour myself into without depleting my well. A role that fills me with joy.”
“You’ll find it.” Frederick had no doubt she would. “And Hollywood had better watch out, because you’re going to kill it.”
“Thank you.” A hesitant smile lit her face. “Frederick, I—”
“We’d better get started.” He abruptly changed the subjectagain. His heart would explode if she kept looking at him likethat, kept saying his name like that. “That spare isn’t going to change itself.”
“No.” She watched him for a moment longer. “No, it isn’t.”
Anne lifted the tire from the trunk with surprising ease. She was stronger than she looked. His eyes traveled down her toned figure. She obviously worked out regularly. Would his fingers not sink as deeply into her skin—would there be less give—if he gripped her hips and… She stared at him with a hint of a frown, waiting for instructions on what to do with the unwieldy load.Shit.
He hurriedly pointed to the grass beside the sidewalk. “Just set it down there.”
“Here?” She didn’t wait for him to answer before dropping the spare tire on the grass. “Oof.”
Frederick wanted to give himself a swift kick in the ass for making her hold the heavy tire for longer than necessary. He needed to pay attention to the task at hand, but that was next to impossible with her so close.Try harder.She could get hurt if he didn’t get it together. He winced, remembering the cut on her hand. She wouldn’t have gotten hurt if he’d watched Katie closer.
“This street is pretty level.” He walked around her car, then studied the road with a hand on his jaw. “But we should still use wheel wedges. I’ll order… I mean…youshould order a set to keep in your car.”She isn’t yours to take care of.Why did he keep forgetting that? “I’ll go grab mine for now.”
Frederick demonstrated how to put the wheel wedges on the tires opposite the flat.Good job, Nam.He didn’t even fumble over his words when she leaned in close to watch him explain how to remove the wheel cover.One step at a time.He couldn’t believe he needed to give himself a pep talk to survive teaching her how to change a fucking tire.
