Page 12 of Match Me if You Can

Clutching my armor tightly.

Strapping my feet into my heels.

Going into my bathroom, making sure I didn’t miss anything important, anything I might have the smallest chance of using. Then doing the same scan in my bedroom. Maybe I need another charging cord? Maybe I should shove one more paperback into my purse? Do I have my page turner for my Kindle? I can’t read without it, otherwise my hand falls asleep, and it needs a different cord to charge and⁠—

“Stop,” I say, page tuner in one hand, cable in the other. “Breathe,” I order again.

Exhale.

Inhale.

Repeat.

Mind settling, I tuck the cord and the miraculous little device in my purse, haul one side of my suitcase over the other and zip it up.

I’m just securing the tabs into the TSA approved lock when there’s a pounding at my front door.

Not a knock.

But a fucking SWAT team like assault on my door, as though someone is going to burst through with a battering ram.

Keeping my armor in place isn’t a struggle now.

It snaps around me, secures itself without the least bit of effort.

I storm out of my bedroom, march to the front door, and barely pause to glance through the peephole—to see Ace looking more than a little impatient on my doorstep—before I’m wrenching open the door.

“What the hell do you think⁠—?”

I don’t finish.

Because one big broad hand lands in the center of my chest and propels me backward a step.

And then another.

Until he’s inside and the door’s shutting behind him.

A glance down my body—a slow, burning drag of his eyes along my front, starting at my face, dropping to my breasts, contained and carefully concealed in a pale blue silky blouse, my waist and hips clad in a pair of black shorts that hit at mid-thigh. Down along my legs, pausing for an inordinate amount of time when he reaches my feet.

I look down at the strappy sandals, at my toes painted cerulean to match my blouse.

Then back up.

And find that his gaze is back on my face, his eyes are burning into mine.

Fucking burning.

My gasp rises in my throat, but before it escapes—thank God—he’s turning away from me, boots thumping on the floor as he starts down the hall.

“Where are you⁠—?”

But he’s gone already, disappearing into my…

Bedroom.

What. The. Actual. Fuck?

I start after him, moving through the door just in time to watch him lift my suitcase from the bed as though it’s filled with feathers instead of several weeks of a capsule wardrobe and matching shoes, nail polish, and makeup.