Page 212 of Cross Checked
I stared at him.
His jaw flexed once, his grip still gentle around mine. “I want the one from the version of you who got out, because that’s my girl.”
The tears slipped free before I could stop them.
I looked away fast, but he caught me anyway, because he refused to let me run from his truth. His free hand came up carefully, fingers brushing beneath one tear before it could reach the bruise blooming near my cheek.
“You are so annoying,” I whispered.
“I know.”
“No, I mean historically. Like, if scholars studied annoying men, you’d have your own wing.”
“Would there be photos?”
“Unfortunately.”
“Good ones?”
“Don’t make me laugh. I’m injured.”
His mouth twitched, but his eyes stayed too warm. “You started it.”
“I start nothing. I am a victim of your face and your emotional ambushes.”
“You bought me a love marble.”
“It was not a love marble.”
“It was a Never with romantic intent.”
“That sounds illegal.”
“There’s a detective out there pondering that very theory.”
I made a sound that wanted to be a laugh but turned into a careful wince, and Cade immediately leaned closer, all amusement vanishing for half a second as his hand tightened around mine.
“You okay?”
“Yes,” I breathed. “Just broken and offended.”
“Your brand is holding.”
“Thank goodness.”
His smile came back, small and private, and it made my chest ache because I could feel the thing we weren’t saying sitting between us. Big. Bright. Terrifying. Not ready to be spoken, but not hiding either.
He had said I loved him anyway.
I had told him I was getting there with the marble.
And he still hadn’t said it back, which was fine.
Totally fine.
Absolutely normal.
I was a mature adult woman with broken ribs and at least one pudding cup in my possession. I could handle emotional ambiguity. I could be cool and mysterious and not at all the kind of person who spiraled into catastrophic conclusions because aman did not immediately declare lifelong devotion in a hospital room after I accidentally confessed via missing glass sphere.
