Page 65 of Unromance

Sawyer’s lips puckered in frustration, Lily calling her onher shit the way only Lily could. “Okay, well, I gotta get ready. I’llseeyoutomorrowbye!”

Sawyer washed her hair and shaved her legs faster than she ever had in her life, alternating between yelling at her blow-dryer to “do better!” and murmuring sweet encouragements as it feebly blew barely warm air. She applied foundation all over her face, creating a blank canvas that always made her look like Leatherface until she painted and contoured her features back on.

She was racing against the clock, turning her phone over and refusing to look at it after her hand started shaking so badly she had to redo her dark red lipstick twice.

She allowed herself to peep at the time once her makeup was done, her heart dropping when she saw it was a quarter past six. She hadn’t realized she’d been hoping Mason would call, asking why she was late to dinner, until the time came and went with no word from him. She wanted to sink to the floor, wrap her arms around herself, and cry. Instead, she tightened the knot around her robe, as if it could hold her together as she finished getting ready.

She hurried to grab the dress from the front hall, spinning a roll of boob tape around her finger as she went. A knock sounded at the door and she jumped in surprise, boob tape flying across the entryway. She watched it roll away under her end table, before diverting her attention back to the door, heart in her throat.

It wasn’t Mason. It was a neighbor or something. She tried to quell the frantic jump of her pulse, but it was no use. She wanted it to be Mason with an intensity she couldn’t ignore. But she knew it wasn’t going to be him. People didn’t just show up at other people’s doors asmuch asOne Tree Hillwanted you to believe. Never mind she was planning on doing exactly that with Mason—but they had a predetermined meetup, so this wasdifferent. Definitely not a rom-com-worthy grand gesture, no matter what Lily purported.

Stretching up on her tiptoes, Sawyer peered out the peephole. A strangled noise escaped her, one hand already on the lock, the other on the doorknob, practically ripping the door off its hinges in her enthusiasm.

Mason was wearing the same black coat he’d worn on Christmas, with burgundy slacks underneath. The fact that he’d worn the suit Celia told him to because it would complement her best made her heart constrict. He’d styled his hair, and while she missed the unruly curls that flipped out around his ears, she had to admit he looked handsome. If she were wearing panties, she would have dropped them.

Mason smirked at the sight of her robe, the one he’d worn for his “modesty” while she washed his muddy lumberjack clothes. “I know I’m supposed to be staying out of the tabloids, but I really do think we needPeopleto decide: Who wore it better?”

“You, obviously,” she said automatically.

He grinned, eyes dancing with amusement. With how they left things last time, bantering with him felt like a breath of fresh air. Maybe they were okay. Returning his smile, she leaned more heavily against the door. Fuck, she’d missed him. Never mind that it had only been two days.

“Can I, uh, come in?”

She started. Right. That was the customary thing to do, not mooning in the doorway.

Not that she was mooning.

Stepping aside, she gestured for him to come inside. Mason washere! He’d come to see her, and while she’d been planning to hunt him down so they could talk, she was suddenly incapable of making words.

When she didn’t say anything, didn’t move from where she propped herself up against the door, he hovered awkwardly in the entryway.

“Hi,” he hedged tentatively. “I just, um, wanted to stop by.”

She sank an inch lower down the door. He was only stopping by, not here to pick her up. She nodded numbly, her elation at his presence evaporating as quickly as it arrived.

His gaze ran over her briefly, his attention snagging on her arms wrapped around herself. “I’m sorry about the other day.”

The sincerity of his tone thawed out her frozen tongue. “Mason, you don’t need to—”

“I do,” he insisted. “I’m not sorry for what I said, but I am sorry for how I said it. You’ve been nothing but honest with me from the beginning about what this was. I thought I was okay with it, but when you asked me to come back to your place… I knew it meant something different for me than it did for you, and that didn’t feel right. But when I said I couldn’t do this, I didn’t mean us. I don’t want to lose you, Sawyer, and I couldn’t close out the year without talking to you.”

Sawyer made a noise that was half sob, half sigh of relief. He wanted to stay friends. That was what she wanted, too, wasn’t it? So why, now that he’d shown up at her door like fucking John Cusack, giving her the platonic grand gesture she was planning to do herself, did she feel lonelier than ever?

Mason’s eyes traveled slowly over her face. “You look beautiful, by the way.”

She rarely found it worth the time to do more than mascara and lipstick, but tonight she’d gone all out. Brows: plucked. Cheekbones: contoured. Lashes: fake as hell.

She laughed shakily. “Well, good, because it was all for you.”

“What?” His brows drew together, and he tilted his head to the side suspiciously. “For our list? Because I don’t want to ruin midnight kisses—or whatever else we had left on the list.”

Sawyer didn’t either. She didn’t want to ruin any of it anymore. She didn’t want to pretend to hate it all. And goddamn Lily for being right, but she missed being happy, and Mason—Mason made her happier than she’d been in a really long time. If only she could just… tell him.

The words lodged in her throat, and she cleared it brusquely. “No, not the list. I was thinking about you going to that party alone and having to face Kara and her hideously big diamond, and I couldn’t let you go without backup.”

“You were coming to find me?” he asked in disbelief.

She nodded again. “I’m sorry, too. I know this started as a somewhat silly mission, but when you said you were done, I thought you meant with me and—” She inhaled sharply, her heart twisting. “I know I’m not the easiest person to get close to—I go dark for hours or days at a time, and that’s not going to magically change, but whether there’s half a city or half a country between us, I don’t want to not know you.”

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