Page 8 of The First Kind of Love
“Shiloh,” I supply.
“Okay. You andShilohhave spoken before, and it obviously must’ve gone well if she kept wanting to speak to you during her shift.”
My eyebrows draw together in confusion, and I shake a few cobwebs loose in my head. “What do you mean?”
Gage grabs the cap of my shoulder and gives it a squeeze. “Here’s how I look at it. If she really didn’t want to talk to you again, she would’ve avoided you when you came into the shop, yeah? Maybe asked one of her coworkers to take your order instead. But you told us that you two had a legitimate conversation, and she even complimented you. That’s huge! You’ve got charisma, Ful. Somewhere deep, deep inside.”
“Thank you? I think?”
The widening gorge of self-deprecation inside me seems to be retracting its monstrous fangs, but jumping to conclusions is a sport I have a gold medal in. I always expect the worst so disappointment can never creep up on me. It’s just easier that way.
Shiloh has a conventional job. She can’t just up and leave whenever she wants to. She has commitments, friends, family, a completely separate life that I probably don’t even fit into. I’m just a returning customer. That’s all I am to her. To think that we’re going to be like one of Aeris’ rom-coms is preposterous.Strangers don’t jet to Cabo for three weeks and instantly gain feelings for one another in that short a time.
What was I thinking? I wasn’t! And that handshake sealed my fate. I didn’t expect her to leap into my arms or anything, but I wasn’t expecting her to look so…terrified.
Kit grumbles to himself, reaches for my discarded phone on the coffee table, and begins to twiddle his thumbs away. “Since you’re clearly going to lose sleep over this, let’s get it sorted out right now.”
There’s a chalky taste on my tongue, like the remnants of an undissolved pill. “What?”
“I’m just going to text her?—”
I think my heart just dropped to my ass. He’s going to…WHAT? I barely trust myself to text her, but Kit? KIT? He’s going to blow everything up. And not from a safe distance either. No, he’s going to charge headfirst with one of those suicide vests on, blow himself and everyone in a ten-foot radius up, and leave me with the fallout…if I even survive the initial blast.
I don’t remember ever moving as fast as I do—not even on the ice—and I lunge for my phone, only to have Kit dodge me with those annoyingly honed reflexes of his. He jogs around the back of the couch while giggling maniacally, and I’m huffing for air as I chase after him. Realistically, me catching Kit would be like a mouse catching a grizzly bear, so I was pretty much doomed from the beginning.
“Kit, I swear—” I yell at him, a whip of fire wrapping around my thighs with each labored stride. I definitely regret not hitting legs the other day at the gym.
Kit’s not even breathless as he taunts me. “Dear Shiloh. I haven’t stopped thinking about you since you shook my hand today. It was the greatest moment of my life. I think I’m in love with you?—”
“You guys are just going to stand there and watch my lovelife go down the drain?” I exclaim as I brace myself on my knees.
Gage gives me an unhelpful shrug, and as I try to siphon more air into my burning lungs, Bristol snatches the phone from Kit’s grasp so fast that it practically teleports in a flurry of gray.
“Hey!” Kit says.
Bristol tosses me my phone, flicks Kit on the forehead, and then proceeds to give the entire room one of his disapproving captain looks. “What’s the first rule of being a Reaper?” he echoes in that stentorian voice of his.
“Don’t drink straight out of the Brita?” Hayes answers.
“Don’t be dicks to each other,” Bristol corrects in a clipped tone.
I quickly glance at the text, and a rush of relief shudders through me like balmy air through fronds of swaying palms. Kit might be a dick, but he’s not a big enough one to actually send it.
I begin to delete the absolutelyidioticparagraph taunting me—which teeters on the tightrope between the truth and the slightly more exaggerated truth—and then shit hits the fan. Because not only do I fail to delete the text message that has the potential to ruin my love life, but I accidentally send half of Kit’s stupid text to Shiloh with a slip of my thumb.
Dear Shiloh. I haven’t stopped thinking about you since you shook my hand today. It was the g
Oh. My. God.
Unadulterated terror surges through my bloodstream, circling my heart and looking for the tiniest tear to wiggle its way into the rapidly thrumming muscle.
What have I just done? I look like a fucking creep. If I was worried about her declining my invitation before, shedefinitelyhas a good reason to now.
Stupid Kit! This is allhisfault. I wouldn’t be in this situationif it wasn’t for him trying to bust my balls. Maybe…maybe she won’t look at it. Yeah, she probably doesn’t even know who’s texting her. I could be anyone, really. It’s not like I signed my name or anything. She probably shook hands with a ton of people today.
“I sent it,” I whisper under my breath.
Casen, our tough-as-nails defenseman, immediately abandons his sandwich fixings. “You didwhat?”
