Losing Hope

And I’m pretty sure that accidental admission just made my entire year.

I reach over and slide my fingers around her wrist, pulling her arm away from her face. I know she’s embarrassed right now, but there’s no way in hell I’m letting this go.

“You’re attracted to me?”

“Oh, God,” she groans. “That’s the last thing you need for your ego.”

“That’s probably true,” I admit, laughing. “Better hurry up and insult me before my ego gets as big as yours.”

“You need a haircut,” she blurts out. “Really bad. It gets in your eyes and you squint and you’re constantly moving it out of the way like you’re Justin Bieber and it’s really distracting.”

I know she doesn’t have access to technology, so I let it slide that Justin Bieber cut his hair off a long time ago. I’m disappointed that I even know that. I tug at my hair with my fingers and fall back against my pillow. “Man. That really hurt. It seems like you’ve thought that one out for a while.”

“Just since Monday,” she says.

“You met me on Monday. So technically, you’ve been thinking about how much you hate my hair since the moment we met?”

“Not every moment.”

I laugh. I wonder if it’s possible for people to fall in love with a person one characteristic at a time, or if you fall for the entire person at once. Because I think I just fell in love with her wit. And her bluntness. And maybe even her mouth, but I won’t allow myself to stare at it long enough to confirm.

Shit. That’s already three characteristics and I’ve only been here an hour.

“I can’t believe you think I’m hot,” I say, breaking the silence.

“Shut up.”

“You probably faked passing out the other day, just so you could be carried in my hot, sweaty, manly arms.”

“Shut up,” she says again.

“I’ll bet you fantasize about me at night, right here in this bed.”

“Shut up, Holder.”

“You probably even . . .”

She slaps her hand over my mouth. “You’re way hotter when you aren’t speaking.”

I shut up, but only because I want to revel in the fact that this night has already turned out better than I ever anticipated. Every second I’m with her I like her more and more. I like her sense of humor and I like that she gets my sense of humor. She’s the first girl besides Les to ever actually give me a run for my money and I can’t seem to get enough of it.

“I’m bored,” I say, hoping she’ll suggest an interesting make-out session in lieu of staring at her ceiling. Although, if my options are limited to staring at her ceiling all night or going home, I’ll gladly stare at her ceiling.

“So go home.”

“I don’t want to,” I say resolutely. I’m having way too much fun to go home. “What do you do when you’re bored? You don’t have internet or TV. Do you just sit around all day and think about how hot I am?”

“I read,” she says. “A lot. Sometimes I bake. Sometimes I run.”

“Read, bake, and run. And fantasize about me. What a riveting life you lead.”

“I like my life.”

“I sort of like it, too,” I say. And I do like it. We already have the running in common. And she may not realize it, but we also have the fantasizing in common. I don’t bake, but I do like her baking.

That leaves reading. I read when I need to, which isn’t a lot. But I suddenly want to know everything about everything that interests her and if reading interests her, it interests me too. I reach over and pick up the book from her nightstand. “Here, read this.”

“You want me to read it out loud? You’re that bored?”

“Pretty damn bored.”

“It’s a romance.” She says it like it’s a warning.

“Like I said. Pretty damn bored. Read.”

She shrugs and adjusts her pillow, then begins reading.

“I was almost three days old before the hospital forced them to decide. They agreed to take the first three letters of both names and compromised on Layken . . .”

She continues to read and I continue to let her. After several chapters, I can’t tell if my rapid-fire pulse is a result of listening to her voice for so long or if it’s from the sexual tension in the book. Maybe both of them coupled together is what’s doing it. Sky should really think about a career in voiceovers or audiobooks or some shit like that because her voice is . . .

“He glides across the room . . .”

Her voice is trailing off.

“. . . and bends down, snatching up the . . .”

And . . . she’s out. The book falls against her chest and I laugh quietly, but I don’t get up. because the fact that she fell asleep doesn’t mean I’m ready to leave.

I lie with her for about half an hour, confirming the fact that yes, I’m definitely in love with her mouth. I watch her sleep until my phone chimes. I scoot her away from me and onto her back, then pull my phone out of my pocket.

Dude. It’s Daniel, me. Val is f’ng crazy n I think I’m at that Burker Ging and come get me I can’t drive. I drank and I hate her.

I text him back immediately.

Good idea. Stay put. Be there in thirty.

I slide the phone back in my pocket, but it sounds off again with an incoming text.

Holder?

I shake my head and shoot a text back that says, Yeah? He replies immediately.

Oh, good. Just mak’n sure it was u, man.

Jeez. He’s more than just drunk.

I stand up and take the book out of her hands, then set it on the nightstand and mark the page she stopped at so I’ll have an excuse to come back over here tomorrow. I walk to the kitchen and spend the next ten minutes cleaning up her mess. I swear you would think she harbored resentment toward flour considering the amount I have to wipe up. After all the food is wrapped in Saran Wrap (minus the few cookies I might have swiped), I walk back to her bedroom, then sit down on the edge of her bed.

She’s snoring.

I love it.

Shit. That’s four things already.

I really need to leave.

Before standing up to leave, I slowly lean forward, hesitating, not wanting to wake her. But I can’t leave here without a little preview. I continue inching toward her until my mouth grazes her lips, and I kiss her.

Chapter Thirteen-and-a-half

Les,

Sky, Sky, Sky, Sky, Sky, Sky, Sky, Sky, Sky.

There. Get used to it, because I have a feeling she’s all I’m going to be talking about for a while. Oh, my God, Les. I can’t even explain to you how perfect this girl is. And when I say perfect, I mean imperfect, because there’s just so much wrong with her. But everything wrong with her is everything that draws me in and makes her perfect.