Page 43 of Never Been Worse

SIXTEEN

HARPER

The day after we arrive home from our honeymoon, Leo announces our marriage to the public and tells us we’ll have to do a few press rounds. The morning of the television interviews, I walk downstairs in an emerald green shift dress I designed and a pair of black over-the-knee boots, and Wes just stares at me.

He looks handsome as ever in a gray sweater and jeans that scream hot casual and yet still says rock star somehow, something I think only he could pull off.

Things have been good between us in the week since I moved in with him, though there’s been a definitive tension between us. We’ve both been busy, Wes going to Riggs’s often for recording or practice and me having girls’ night to fill in Ava and Jules and being on deadline for a few pageant gowns.

But each night, he’s home by dinner and we eat together, talking a bit and continuing to learn about one another. I’ve learned that Wes was Billie Joe Armstrong from Green Day for Halloween three years in a row, something he saysshould have been a sign, that his favorite food is tacos, and he loves the color green. It’s strange getting to know the little details about someoneafteryoumove in with them, but it’s been nice and easy all the same.

And even though we’ve been sleeping together every night in Wes’s bed, we haven’t done anything more, not even the most basic of kisses.

But the way he stares at me now without speaking, without moving, has panic filling me.

“What?” I ask. “Is this too much? I know it’s a little short, but I?—”

He cuts me off with a smile. “Did you make it?” he asks, stepping forward to me, and I nod. “Then it’s perfect.”

His hand reaches out, fingers grazing the chain of the necklace I continue to put on every morning despite barely leaving the house. It just feels…right to wear. His fingers tuck under the higher neckline of my dress, trailing along the chain and tugging it out from where it settled under my dress and letting it lay on the fabric. He fiddles with the charm, his fingers grazing along the skin of my neck once more before he steps back.

I’m dazed for a moment, and he smiles wide like he knows.

“Do we have time to stop somewhere for coffee on the way to the studio?” I ask when I come back to myself.

“Of course, but if you want, we can make something here. I’ve got this giant-ass espresso machine I barely know how to work, but I can Google it.”

I shake my head and laugh. “No, I know how to work it. I could make you something if you want. I just don’t have my creamer, and it’s the only way I like it at home.”

Wes’s brows furrow in confusion. “Just tell Laurel to get it. Whatever you need. I told you that when you moved it.”

I bite my lip, not wanting to get her in trouble, but I can’t lie, not with him looking at me in that way that sees through every fib I tell.

“I, uh, I did. I added it to the list, but she didn’t get it.”

“You did?” he asks.

“I don’t think Laurel likes me.”

He shakes his head, disagreeing with me. “She likes you just fine. That’s just how she is. She’s the same with Stella, a little standoffish. It’s not personal, she prefers male friendships to female.”

“Red flag,” I say under my breath, reaching for my bag.

“What?” he asks with a laugh, and I sigh, turning to him to explain.

“It’s a red flag. Any woman who says they prefer the company of men to women? I don’t trust them.”

He lets out a small chuckle, crossing his arms over his chest and smiling at me.

“Do you like my company?” I roll my eyes.

“Yes, of course. But my girls will always be my number one. Women…we can read people differently than men can. If a woman doesn’t like the company of other women, I assume it's because she’s afraid of them reading her in a way she doesn’t like, which makes me wonder what she’s hiding.”

He shrugs on his jacket, moving for the front door and opening it for me.

“I guess that makes sense,” he says as I walk out in front of him, before he locks the door behind us. “But Laurel isn’t like that. You two will get used to each other, it just takes a bit.”

I shrug my shoulders, not really wanting to explain to him that his assistant wants in his pants and hates me because, in her eyes, I got there first, and because of that, we will never be used to each other.

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