“Right, Cecily. Who is she?”

As much as I wanted to say she was nobody, I knew I couldn’t. To any other girl in my life, that would have been my immediate answer . . . but not to Kennedy. “She was one of many girls who meant nothing more than the fact that she was convenient to have around. She also works for your uncle, and we’d been . . . uh, seeing each other for a handful of months before you moved here. Nothing ever happened outside of work or our places. If we happened to be out with the same group, we acted like we worked together and that was it. That was what I liked about her. She wasn’t clingy, and she saw me simply as someone who could satisfy a need. It wasn’t until I backed away and started turning her down when you moved here that she got mad. I think she wanted to make you ignore me, and have me make a big scene so it would look like she had been wronged.”

Kennedy raised an eyebrow and cleared her throat. “Is this—is that what you’re wanting from this?” she asked, using a finger to indicate the two of us.

I laughed and shook my head once. “Are you serious? No. If you were like them, I wouldn’t have thought twice about trying to pursue you—especially after the first time you made it clear you didn’t want anything to do with me.”

Kennedy’s eyes got bright with amusement, and the look was so welcome after the intense beginning of this conversation. “Oh, a little confident there? So many women fall at your feet that you don’t have to bother yourself with something like pursuing one of them? Must be nice.”

I huffed softly and stood. Grabbing her hand, I pulled her up with me and over to the door. Just before I opened it, I turned to face her and waited until her eyes were locked on mine. “No one was ever worth the chase. But you? You will be worth it every time. I will always chase you, Kennedy.”

8

June 27

Kennedy

AT THE SOUND of knocking, I shot Kira a look and stood to go open the door. “I don’t need dates, Liam,” I said by way of a greeting.

“Yes, you do,” he countered, and smiled at Kira.

“I don’t do dates.”

“Neither do I, which is exactly why we should.” Stepping into the doorway, he laid one hand on my waist and passed his lips across my forehead. “You look beautiful.”

It’d been two weeks since I finally gave up trying to fight my attraction for him, and every time we’d hung out in that time, he’d asked if he could take me on a date. I just didn’t see the point in going on one when we were together all the time, and dates to me meant that there would be a small title attached to what we were—and I wasn’t a fan of titles anymore. It had taken Kira agreeing for me to get to this night. But I had to admit—with his confidence, sweet observation, and nonchalant attitude toward the whole night, he was already making it easy to go through with it.

After my initial swoon at hearing his deep voice tell me I looked beautiful, I shook my head and tried to hide my smile. “This is stupid.”

“I don’t care, we’re still doing it. I even made reservations—we’re going all out tonight.”

I stopped trying to fight my smile, but still raised one eyebrow. “We’re going all out, and I don’t even get flowers?” I asked, trying to sound hurt. I clicked my tongue and whispered, “Strike one, Mr. Taylor.”

“You mean these?” He brought his other arm out from around his back, and produced a brightly colored bouquet.

“Aw, look at you being sweet.”

“I tried,” he said with a cheesy grin.

I took the flowers from him and started backing up to put them in a vase, but Kira was right behind me and took them out of my hand. “I’ve got this, you two go.”

“See you later,” I called out to her after she’d retreated, and followed Liam outside and to his car. My eyes widened in surprise when he opened the door for me, and I couldn’t hold back my smile as I slid inside.

“Okay, fine. The first strike has been erased,” I said once we were reversing out of the spot.

“Good,” he huffed, and sent me a look. “Because I have no fucking clue what I’m doing.”

“Ah, yes, of course. Because you’re used to having girls just fall at your feet, right?”

“Exactly,” he responded immediately, his eyes never leaving my face. “Until you.”

We’d barely reached the street outside of the complex when a car behind us began honking repeatedly. Looking behind us, I saw the driver was waving with one arm, and his passenger was holding both her hands out and mouthing the word stop.

“What the hell?” Liam whispered, but pulled over to the side of the road and rolled down his window.

The car pulled up beside him, and the lady pointed to the back of the car. “Your tire is flat!”

Liam looked in his side mirror, then out the car toward the back. “Are you kidding me?”

“Nope. Sorry, man, but it is flat flat.”

With a wave, Liam mumbled a thank-you, and sighed when the other car pulled away. When he turned to look at me, his eyes widened as he saw how hard I was trying to hold in my laughter. “This is funny?”

The laughter finally burst past my lips, but I cut it off quickly. With an amused expression, I asked, “Did you not see this?” I pointed to the huge screen on his dash. At the top was a warning about the pressure in the tires.

Liam sighed, and looked like he was kicking himself. “Wait. You saw it and you didn’t say anything?”

“No, no. I saw it after those people pulled up and started talking to you.” Liam was looking at me like he was trying to figure out if I was telling the truth, and I laughed. “I swear! But can we bring back strike one now?”

He rolled his eyes, but I didn’t miss his smile as he got out of the car and popped the trunk. Once he’d taken the spare out and disappeared behind the rear of the car, I got out and went around to watch him.

“Stay in the car,” he ordered, but his tone was gentle. “I don’t want you out here in case anything happens.”

“Oh no, this is a must watch. Besides,” I mumbled as I took a picture of him, “Kira needs to see how the night is starting off.”

Liam raised one hand to flip me off before going back to jacking up the car, and I couldn’t help but laugh again.

It wasn’t long before the spare was on and we were heading toward the restaurant. The entire way there, we talked about the only other time he’d gotten a flat, and I told him about all the times Kira and I had gone out to our cars to find our dad had taken off a tire and hidden it when we were supposed to be grounded.

The second we stepped inside the restaurant, I was blasted by a distinct smell, and I looked around to try to find the name of the restaurant—since I hadn’t bothered to look while we were outside. I didn’t have time to find what I was looking for, but kept my mouth shut as we were led back to a booth. I just hoped like hell that there would be something on the menu that I could eat.

After quickly glancing through everything, I bit back a smile and had to hide my face from Liam for a minute before I dropped the menu to the table and looked at him.

“You already know what you want?” he asked, surprise coating his words.