Page 61 of The Wild Card
Except my lips are still tingling, and my heart won’t slow down, and I’m starting to think there’s nothing practice about any of this.
“I’m going to head to bed,” I announce, heading toward the hall.
Crew’s hand on my wrist stops me. “I think we’ll be okay Saturday,” he says quietly.
“Yeah?”
“Yeah.” His hand finds my hair, fingers threading through it absently. “We’re getting better at this. The touching. The being close.”
“Mm.”
He doesn’t say anything else, just watches me for a heartbeat before letting his hand fall away. “Night, Emmie.”
“Night, Crew.”
Chapter Fourteen
Dinner with the Boss
Crew
The apartment smells incredible, and I’m losing my mind.
Emmie’s been in the kitchen since four o’clock, and whatever she’s making involves garlic, butter, and something roasting in the oven for the past hour. I offered to help twice, but both times she shooed me out of the kitchen with “look pretty and stay out of the way.”
So here I am. Looking pretty. Staying out of the way. Watching her move around my kitchen like she owns it.
Which, technically, she kind of does now.
She’s wearing a simple, navy blue dress that hugs her in all the right places, and her hair is half up, half down, with loose waves framing her face. I want to brush the tendrils from her face and turn her lips to mine.
I take a long sip of wine instead.
“Stop staring at me,” she says without turning around.
“I’m not staring.”
“You’ve been staring for twenty minutes.”
“I’m supervising.”
She snorts, glancing over her shoulder with a grin. “You’re useless, is what you are. Come here. Make yourself useful and open this.”
She hands me a bottle of red wine—something Italian I can’t pronounce—and I twist in the corkscrew while she checks on whatever’s in the oven. We move around each other easily now. Two days ago, this felt awkward. Now it feels like breathing.
“They’ll be here in ten minutes,” I say.
“I know.”
“Are you nervous?”
She straightens, wiping her hands on a towel. “A little. Are you?”
“No.”
“Liar.”
Yeah. She’s got me there.
