Page 92 of Your Place or Mine

Lydia

“You’re glowing.”

I dropped onto Riley’s worn-out couch, a little stunned, breathless, and very transparent.

“Am not,” I mumbled, tucking my legs under me and pulling the blanket over my lap to hide the fact that I had dressed up fora casual dinner. “It’s just warm in here.”

“It’s seventy-two degrees, and you look like you walked out of a Hallmark movie. But, like, the kind where they have sex,” she added, sipping her coffee with far too much smugness.

“Riley,” I groaned, throwing a pillow at her. “It wasdinner. With a man who is, ninety-eight percent of the time, a grumpy badger in flannel and hates my guts.”

“And the other two percent of the time?” she asked, catching the pillow with infuriating ease.

I didn’t answer.

Because if I saidthe other two percent makes me feel like the floor’s about to give out from under me, I’d never hear the end of it.

Instead, I stared at the ceiling like it might help me process what just happened.

The way he looked at me when I walked into the café? Like I’d knocked the wind out of him. Like he didn’t know what to do with me but was ready to try anyway.

It rattled me.

Everything about that dinner had rattled me.

“He asked me why I came to Reckless River,” I said finally.

Riley didn’t say anything. Just waited.

“I told him a little about my mom,” I continued, voice softer now. “About how everything felt too fast and loud after she passed. That this town… this building… it felt like a place I could breathe again.”

When I glanced at her, Riley’s expression had shifted. Not smug. Not teasing. Just quiet and knowing.

“And?”

“He listened.” I exhaled slowly. “He didn’t try to fix it. He didn’t crack a joke or say something dismissive. He just…listened.”

“That’s big for him.”

“I gathered.” I let the silence stretch before admitting, “It’s terrifying.”

Riley tilted her head. “Because you like him.”

“I don’t know what I feel,” I lied.

She arched an eyebrow.

“Okay, I knowsomeof what I feel. But the rest?” I shook my head. “He’s so gruff one minute and then so…” I trailed off. “Real.”

“Callum’s always been real,” she said. “Even when he doesn’t want to be.”

I fiddled with the hem of the blanket. “Whydoesn’the want to be?”

Riley was quiet for a long moment. And then she said something that made the room tilt just a little.

“Because the last time he let someone in, it ended in tragedy.”

My stomach flipped. “What?”

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