Page 67 of Runaway Bride's Guide to Love

Kissing me as if he was bringing me back to life.

Making me feel things I didn’t know were real.

Being a friend.

Becoming so much more than that.

“Thank you.”

He quickly glances at me before turning his eyes back to the highway.

“For what? The snacks? Stella, you really don’t need to?—”

“It’s not just the snacks,” I quickly say. “It’s everything.”

“Everything?”

I turn to face him, though his eyes stay focused on the road as we enter back onto the highway. “Do you know how thoughtful and considerate you are?”

“It’s just good manners.”

I shake my head as I turn in my seat to face him—and do my best not to stare at the veins in his forearms that are slightly more prominent than usual as he grips the steering wheel.

“It’s more than manners,” I continue. “There’s polite, then there’s thoughtful. And you’re both. You’re without a doubt the most considerate man I’ve ever met in my life. Not many men would do what you did for me.”

“Are we talking about the orgasms or carrying your suitcases?”

I playfully smack his arm. “You know what I mean. You’re a good man, Emmett Collins. Probably the best I’ve ever met. And you don’t give yourself enough credit for it, so I’m going to be the one to do it. Especially if…”

I trail off, not wanting to finish that sentence. I close my eyes, willing myself to not get emotional, but when I feel his hand on my thigh that quickly becomes a losing battle.

“We’re going to see each other,” he says, somehow reading my mind and finishing the sentence. “You’ll just have to be a better actress so no one knows I’ve fucked you six ways from Sunday.”

That makes me laugh. “I’m an amazing actress.”

“Whatever you say, Tiger,” he says. “But seriously…we’ll see each other. It’ll be a little awkward at first. But pretty soon it’ll just become a memory we look back at fondly. Hell, maybe someday we’ll tell Simon.”

We exchange a look before cracking up laughing. No way in hell will my brothereverfind out about this.

Our laughter dies down and we fall back into a silence, the only sound in the cab is the low hum of the country music station Emmett has on his satellite radio, playing a fitting song about wanting to stay a little longer.

The lyrics hit even harder when I see the “Welcome to Tennessee” sign on the highway.

One hour and forty minutes…

“When do you have to go back to work?”

One thing I want to talk about less than Emmett and my time together ending is going back to the office.

“Monday morning,” I say. “I have no idea what I’m walking into, or what’s been said. I’m sure Duncan has told them a million outlandish lies about what happened, so I’ll be putting out a ton of those fires. It won’t be the first time I’ve had to battle office gossip. I just never thought I’d have to do it again.”

“When did you have to do that?”

I lean into him so I can wrap my arms around his bicep, my head resting on his shoulder. “When I graduated from college, I had no idea what I wanted to do. I had a degree in marketing, but nothing felt right. I was a bit lost, but I needed a job. If there’s one thing my parents instilled in us, it was a work ethic. So, until I figured out what I really wanted, my dad got me a job at the law firm as the office administrator.”

“I’m guessing you had to fight off talk that Stella Banks was only there because her dad was on the nameplate?”

“Exactly. It didn’t matter that I was really good at it. No—Iamreally good at it. And I love it. I really do love my job. But unfortunately, none of that mattered. To some I was just a nepo baby hire who had her daddy buy her the red bottom shoes she was wearing.”

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