Page 96 of Tempting Me

She doesn’t even fake her smile. It’s completely real.

“Yes. How’s it going? “

I glance around the room to make sure we’re alone, because fuck all if I still want to respect her wishes that no one knows about us in a moment when I need her to need me as much I need her.

Jesus. Listen to me. I’m obsessed with her.

“Well, to be honest, Shay, I would be a whole lot better if the girl I was crushing on would message me back,” I say slowly so there’s no way for her to ask me to repeat myself. I was very clear. Minus maybe the part where the girl is her, but she’s smart enough to figure it out.

“Oh.” She glances outside the large marina windows toward the lake and then back at me. “Perhaps this girl is just a little busy and not sure what to think about things right now.”

So that’s where her mind is.

Taking my frustration down a notch, I say, “Well I wishshe knew she could come and talk to me about it. Because I like her. Like a stupid amount.”

She smirks and then bites her bottom lip.

The urge to tell her that’smybottom lip hits me hard, but I don’t. I’ll save that for later.

“I’ll be sure to pass the message along,” she says with a grin.

“You do that.”

“Until then,” she says before I have time to obsess over whether I need to leave now or not, “Turns out that cabin three needs new upper cabinets in the kitchen nook. Can you go look at it before you leave, for measurements?”

Work. She wants to just cut straight to work?

Maybe that’s what she needs me to do. Reassure her that no matter what happens, I promise not to let it affect my work here.

“I’m on it,” I say and turn for the door.

It takes everything I have inside myself not to reach for her and kiss her goodbye.

I want that.

But I don't want to rush her either.

I walk out the door, wave to a couple of locals who are friends with my dad, then grab my tool bag from the back of my truck. I check to make sure a few key pieces are inside the bag before I make the walk to cabin three.

I don’t remember the cabinets in any of them needing to be fully replaced, but my mind was a little elsewhere the day we looked at them.

The light is on when I get there, which makes sense since Shay was clearly in here earlier.

I walk in and there is no stopping the grin that forms on my lips.

“Hi.” Shay blushes and stands from where she’s been sitting at the kitchen table waiting for me.

I drop my tool bag to the floor. “Hi.”

Her hands fidget in front of her as she walks toward me.

“I don’t know how to do this.”

“Do what?”

“This.” She waves a hand between us. “I just know that you love honesty, and I need to give you that.”

“Okay.”

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