“I know I like you a lot so I guess I’m winning.”
She gave a little laugh and then went up on tiptoe again, this time her gaze was nervous, a little hesitant—and then she kissed me.
I let her take the lead and it nearly killed me to keep from deepening the kiss. But all this was new to her and I wanted her to be comfortable.
When she pulled back she gave me a dazzling smile. “I like kissing you.”
“Well, that’s a relief.” I said it mildly even though my heart was swelling up to twice its normal size with something so much bigger than a crush. This was more than ‘like.’ My heart felt like it might burst if this kept up any longer.
Falling in love with Simone…?
This might just be the death of me.
“This relationship would be off to a rocky start if you didn’t like kissing me,” I said.
She laughed as I’d hoped and I felt something shift inside me. Not so much an emotion as a certainty that something had changed. Not just between us, but with me. Maybe I’d just needed time, or maybe it was meeting Simone, but I was ready to get close to someone, even if it meant getting hurt, even if it meant one more person in my life that I could lose…
But for right now, she was here. She was in my life. And taking risks...that was living.
“So you left poor Tony high and dry, huh?” I gave her a lopsided grin as I tilted my head down to nuzzle her ear with my nose. “Poor guy.”
She laughed. “He didn’t even know my name.”
I pulled my head back in anger on her behalf. “No.” I shook my head. “I always suspected he was an idiot, but that’s bad.”
“Right?” She shook her head with a rueful sigh, but her lips were twitching with rueful amusement. “I had to introduce myself to my crush.”
I had an image of how that would go and it made me grin. “I hope you said Hello, my name is Inigo Montoya—”
Her gasp cut me off and her eyes widened with excitement before she leapt up to kiss me. Hard. “You know me so well.”
“Not as well as I’d like.” I wanted to know everything about her. I wanted to know what made her tick, and what made her laugh, and what made her sigh… “I hope I get to know you even better,” I said.
“I think that can be arranged.” She tilted her head to the side as she sank back onto her flat feet. “I don’t know what I was thinking when I fell for Tony. He’s self-absorbed and cocky and…” Her eyes glittered with mischief. “He’s not even a star pitcher, can you imagine?”
“Ahh, so you have a thing for baseball players now, huh?” I teased as I dropped a kiss on her nose. “I thought you didn’t even like baseball.”
“I don’t,” she said. “But I like baseball movies, so that’s a start, right?”
I pretended to think it over. “Sure sounds like common ground to me.”
She groaned but she wore a smile as she closed her eyes tightly in embarrassment. “I can’t believe I ever looked to those silly magazines for advice.”
“I don’t know…” I said slowly.
Her eyes popped open. “You can’t be serious. They’re ridiculous and you know it.”
One side of my mouth hitched up in what was undoubtedly a smug smile. “I don’t know,” I said again. “I took some of its advice—I found a reason for us to spend time together. I found reasons to touch you and keep you close…” I pulled her even closer and held her tight. “I kissed you.”
Her brows shot up. “You got the idea to kiss me from a magazine?”
I laughed. “Well, to be fair, I’m certain I would have figured it out on my own eventually. But it worked, didn’t it?”
“It totally worked. But that’s not fair.” She was grinning from ear to ear as she shook her head. “You stole my playbook.”
“It’s true. Thanks to you I learned how to catch my crush,” I teased, making the words sound just as idiotic as they were. “What are you going to do about it?”
She laughed as she wrapped her arms around my neck to pull herself up for another kiss. “I guess I’ll just have to get to work studying so I can beat you at your own game... You up for some more practice sessions?”
I was still laughing as I kissed her back. “With you? Always.”
Epilogue
Avery
“See?” I dug my elbow into Max beside me as I stared across the cafeteria at the cutest sight I’d ever seen. “I told you this stuff works.”
Max’s sigh was filled with exasperation. That was fine. I was used to her exasperation. That was pretty much how we rolled as besties. She was practical, I was a dreamer. She was a realist, I was an optimist. I was a full-blown romantic, and she was...not.
Which was why I was sighing over the sight of Simone and Andrew laughing and whispering at their lunch table while Max was eyeing them warily.
“Don’t get me wrong,” Max said. “I’m happy for Simone. She deserves a great guy like Andrew, but…” She shot me a sidelong look. “I don’t believe for one second that their newfound happiness has anything to do with those stupid magazine articles.”
I shrugged. We’d agree to disagree.
As usual.
Charlotte was sitting on my other side and even though her sigh was quiet, I heard it. “That’s so sweet.”
I grinned as I watched Andrew tug Simone’s chair closer so he could whisper something in her ear. Whatever he’d said, it had Simone ducking her head but nothing could hide her bright red cheeks.
“She gives me hope,” Charlotte said, her
