Page 22 of Fake It Til You Break It

“Let’s dance.”

He didn’t look thrilled, but he also didn’t fight me, allowing me to drag him out onto the dance floor. We found a bit of openspace amidst the throng of gyrating bodies, and when another partygoer bumped Jasper from behind, I pulled him close.

I couldn’t hold back my groan when his bare chest pressed against mine, and I suddenly found myself obsessed with his pouty lips, unable to drag my gaze away. Fuck, everything about him was perfect, a beautiful mixture of contradictions.

A hard body and a shy smile. Big, wide eyes that still managed to look soft and alluring. Nervous and unsure, but still showing up. Insecure, but still trying so damn hard.

With one arm locked around his waist, I began to sway, not to the beat of the music, but a gentle tempo meant to ease him into it. In return, he wound his arms around my neck and matched my rhythm, our bodies moving as one.

“What are you doing tomorrow?” I blurted.

Jasper tilted his head and grinned. “Apparently, spending the day with you. What did you have in mind?”

Nothing. I had no plan whatsoever. The question had been spontaneous, born from the desire to be close to him, and I had voiced it without thought.

“It’s a surprise. Come by my place in the morning?”

Jasper hesitated, his soulful eyes searching me for…something. Whatever he’d been looking for, he must have found it because he smiled again and dipped his head.

“I’ll be there.”

seven

~ Jasper ~

“Thatisasloth.”Adorable, yes, but it had no business inside an aquarium. “Why is there a sloth here?”

Beckett’s hand pressed against my back, natural, easy, like it belonged there. “I feel like everywhere should have sloths. Target would be a lot more fun with sloths. Imagine if your dentist had an emotional support sloth.”

I turned my head away to hide my smile. “You are ridiculous.”

“Oh, look, monkeys.”

He steered us toward a mesh enclosure that housed three of the tiniest, fluffiest little animals I had ever seen. They didn’t evenlook real, more like those felt toys I’d had as a child. They still weren’t aquatic.

“What kind of aquarium is this?”

“The best kind?” He tucked a strand of hair behind my ear and brushed his thumb across my cheek.

The move hadn’t been flirtatious, but it had been intimate. One might even call it domestic. Not me, but other people.

And he didn’t even seem to realize he’d done it…or that I had stopped breathing.

“Try to have fun.”

“I’m having fun,” I answered, instantly defensive.

“You are one more primate away from an unhinged Yelp review.”

When he turned and walked away, I stuck my tongue out at his back before following after him. I wasn’tthatbad.

Granted, it had been years since I had visited the aquarium, but I remembered it being much different. And I had a lot of questions about the setup of the place.

For starters, where were all the fish?

We entered a dark room with walls of terrariums filled with snakes, lizards, and toads. We saw ghastly spiders, and another mesh enclosure with a very confused-looking chameleon. We stopped to snap a couple of pictures of an albino alligator, which had at least been in the water.

There had been racoons.

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