Page 31 of The Spider Queen
I shook my head. “For not running.”
“Why would I run?”
I rubbed my hand down my arm in a nervous gesture. “I haven’t made it easy on you.”
“Someone hurt you in the past.”
I thought about it a moment and then nodded.
“Ex-boyfriend?”
“Father,” I clarified. “He left.”
“Oh.”
“Yeah…”
“We don’t have to talk about it. Not now.”
“Not a lot to talk about,” I said, striving for casual. “Pretty classic, text book case of abandonment. Nothing unique.”
“I like you, Poppy.”
“Even though I’m difficult?”
He smiled. “Says who? Your mother?”
“Oh, now you reallydohave me pegged.” I laughed.
“You’re not difficult. You just have your things. We all have our things. It is what it is.”
I cocked my head to the side. “What are your things, Hunter? Because you seem really well-adjusted.”
“I am well-adjusted,” he teased. “You’re so far out of my comfort zone. And when you showed up at my house party, you just…I don’t know. You’re just…yeah, I’m not explaining it right.” He sighed.
“We’re different. Have different interests, lives, hobbies, but meeting you made me want to jump out of my routine. And I think—” I swallowed. “If I let you, you’ll make me a better person.”
Hunter blinked blue eyes at me and didn’t say anything for a moment. Finally he said, “Well, shit. Yeah. That’s exactly how it is.”
We both laughed. Hugging him goodbye one last time, I forced myself away from him. Our date tonight couldn’t come soon enough.
“That was a nice little goodbye,” Anita said the moment I walked through the door.
“What were you doing? Standing by the window like a creeper?”
She pretended to look offended. “Just for a minute.”
“Well, at least you admitted it,” I said with a grin. I shrugged out of my jacket and hung it up and then kicked off my Vans.
“Nice hoodie.”
“Be quiet. Please.”
“You get any?” Anita persisted.
I rolled my eyes. “I didn’t go to Hunter’s for a booty call.”
She snorted with laughter. “You said ‘booty call.’ You’re funny. You went to bed here, Poppy. But you didn’t wake up here. What time did you leave? Midnight? One?”
