Page 58 of Mr. Wrong
“Sorry?” She advances on me like she’s thinking about hitting me. After what I did last night, I kinda wish she would. “You’re sorry for fucking me?”
“Jesus—can you stop saying that?” I swipe a rough hand over my face. “I know what I did and I know that you’re probably—”
“You don’t know shit, Lex.” Her gaze drifts across my shoulders before dipping down to my bare chest and abs. “You’re not wearing a shirt again.”
“Nope.” I give her a flat smile. “You want me to put one on?”
“No.” She shakes her head, swallowing so hard I can see the inside of her throat working against her neck from across the room. “What are you doing here?” she asks, looking around the room for clues.
“I live here.” I give her a shrug, taking a few cautious steps in her direction.
“No…” She sighs and looks at me like I’m being obtuse on purpose. “What are you doing here,now? Why aren’t you at the house with Cassie, making breakfast like you’re supposed to be? When I left, Greta was there andshe—”
“Because I would’ve followed you,” I say, telling her the truth. “Because if I’d have been there when you left to meet that fucking douchewad I would’ve done something stupid like follow you or—”Barricade us both in the pool house. Get you naked and keep you that way for the rest of your life.Now it’s my turn to swallow hard and sigh. “It was just best for everyone if I wasn’t there.”
“Is that why you didn’t stay last night?” She blushes again and it takes everything I’ve got in me not to tackle her onto the couch and get her out of that soccer mom sweater. “Because you didn’t want to watch me leave to meet Derek?”
No.
I didn’t stay because if I’d woken up next to you, I’m pretty sureyouwould’ve woken up tied to the bed.Instead of saying it out loud, I give her a jerky head nod. “Yeah.” I swipe a hand over my face and force myself to be her friend and not the guy who can’t stop thinking about getting her naked. “How did it go? Your coffee date?” Saying it out loud makes me want to put my head through a wall.
“It wasn’t a date,” she says, looking at me like I just whipped my dick out and shook it at her. “And I…” She looks away from me, down at the coffee table she’s standing next to. “What is that?” she asks, lowering herself slowly to sit on the couch I was camped out on.
“It’s a book,” I tell her, slightly irritated when she jogs a disbelieving look upward before refocusing on the open book and the stack of index cards on the table in front of her. She reaches for it without asking, careful to wedge her finger inbetween the pages to hold my place while she flips it closed so she can read the cover.
CHILD DEVELOPMENT: AN ACTIVE LEARNING APPROACH
“You’re going to school?” I feel my gut clench when she says it because I’m sure she’s going to start laughing at me, but she doesn’t. She just beams at me like it’s the greatest thing she’s ever heard “Lex, that’s fantastic!”
“Just a few summer courses at a community college.” I rub a self-conscious hand over the back of my head. “It’s not a big deal.”
“It’s ahugedeal,” she says, gesturing toward the stack of notecards on the table in front of her. “Why didn’t you say something? I could’ve—”
“The book can wait,” I tell her quietly. “Right now, I need that brain of yours to focus. How did things go with Derek?”
“They went great.” She gives me a watery laugh, looking up at me while she lets the book fall open again. “Better than great—I didn’t go.” She laughs again, brushing her hands over her face to wipe away what looks like tears. “He’s been texting me all morning and I was pretty sure I was going to end up strangling him when I saw him again because Jesus Christ, hesoannoying and I don’t know if he was always that annoying or if—”
I’m across the room in a flash, so fast that neither of us have time to think before I’m on the couch beside her and I have her face in my hands. “You didn’t go.”
Even though it’s not a question, she answers me anyway. “No, I didn’t.”
Something stutters in my chest, pressing against my lungs so hard I can’t take a full breath. “Why not?”
“Because you kissed me last night and then you…” Her cheeks go warm under my hands at the memory of what I did to her and she sighs. “And when you texted me this morning, I thought you were Derek, and I was irritated but then I saw it was you and I wasn’t irritated anymore, I wasfurious.” Her eyes flood with tears again. “You saidgood luck, Lex.” She rolls her eyes at me like I’m too stupid to live. “Good luck? Who says that?”
“Apparently, I do,” I tell her, giving her a crooked grin. “I can be pretty lame sometimes.” When she doesn’t laugh at my joke, I sigh. “What was I supposed to say?” I give her a shrug and let my hands drop away from her face because we’ve finally circled back to the beginning of this crazy conversation. “Don’t go? That asshole is all wrong for you? He’ll never love you like I do? He—”
I realize what I said too late.
That I love her.
And even though it’s true, I do love her, I know it’s too soon to say it out loud. Something I should keep to myself for a little while longer. Even though I know she heard me, caught what I said to her, she doesn’t call me on it. Tell me I’m nuts or that I can’t possibly love someone like her. She just looks at me, chewing on that bottom lip of hers. “Going to meet with Derek would’ve been a waste of time. All I was going to do when I got there was tell him to his face that I never want to talk to him again.” She gives another helpless shrug. “Because as it turns out, I’m not a big fan of pudding.”
“That’s okay—” I say, laughing a little because I’m so relieved I’m almost dizzy with it. “I can love pudding enough for the both of us.”
“My middle name is Hope,” she says, doing another mental leapfrog. “There was an unfortunate period in the seventh grade when I decided to change my name to Hope because I hatedEllenore and Hope sounded so much cooler than my dumb grandma name but it didn’t take—everyone just laughed at me.” She gives me an embarrassed smile. “I tried again in college. Shortened it to Elle but that name never really fit me either.”
“I happen to like the name Ellenore,” I tell her, my voice squeezed tight by the riot going on in my chest because I want to tell her that I like everything about her. Her sweaters and ponytails. Her weird relationship with her cat and her purse full of plastic dinosaurs. The way she makes me laugh and the fact that she’s a Stephen King fan. That she loves Cassie almost as much as I do and that she has no idea who she is when she’s with me.
