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My eyes snapped to his. “What?”
He’d said it in the scene I’d written. Whispered in my ear as my body spiraled out of control. Then he’d tucked a stray piece of hair behind my…
“You need to be patient with yourself,” he said, eyes locked on my face. “You’ll get there.”
I watched, wide-eyed, as a strong breeze fluttered a piece of my hair over my face, and Ian’s hand lifted slowly like he was going to brush it out of my face.
For the teeniest of moments—not even a full second, probably—my heart stuttered, my stomach flipped pleasantly as I thought about what the brush of his finger on my face would feel like.
But there were people. Everywhere. And he was Ian, and I was Harlow and what happened on that page was not real.
Just before his finger made contact, I stumbled back and tripped over a rock. “Shit, ow.”
His forehead creased. “Are you okay?”
“Totally, yeah. A-okay.” My breath came in short pants, and I reached down to rub my twisted ankle. “Fine. Just … completely fine.” Ian started crouching down like he was going to check my ankle, and as I imagined big hands with nice veins wrapping around my body parts, I hopped backward. “Oh no, really, it’s nothing.”
He narrowed his eyes. “What’s your problem?”
I pasted a smile on my face. “No problems. I have zero of them. None. Zip.”
Stop. Talking. Harlow, I screamed in my head.
He didn’t believe me, that much was obvious, but the photographer was ready to start again, and even though the guy was giving him more directions, Ian’s gaze stayed locked on mine, curiosity battling with some intense focus that had my skin tight and my pulse skyrocketing.
“Be nice,” I told him lightly. “Let the man do his job.”
He stopped just short of rolling his eyes again but finally conceded my instruction with a slight lift of his chin.
“See you at home,” he said.
I tucked the stray piece of hair behind my ear and waved goodbye to Cameron and Ivy, but felt Ian’s eyes on me as I walked back to the car and backed away from the shop.
Chapter 12
Ian
Mornings were a bit like a carousel in the Wilder/Keaton living situation.
I pivoted around Sage while she dumped her cereal bowl in the sink.
Harlow was at the counter, making Sage’s lunch. “Dishwasher,” she called without looking over her shoulder.
Sage and I danced around each other again, when, with a tiny roll of her eyes, Sage picked up her dishes and set them in the dishwasher. I snorted into my cup of coffee because I’d seen variations of that look a lot in my sisters and younger brothers. When you were just independent enough that you hated being told what to do but smart enough not to actually argue with your mother.
The zip of a bag had Harlow spinning from the counter, and I edged around her with my coffee mug lifted briefly over her head while she ducked under my arm.
“You didn’t make me a lunch?” I asked.
The look I got from the mother was stunningly similar to what I just saw from the daughter. A dry, restrained roll of the eyes.
“So that’s a no, then?” I asked.
She patted me on the chest after setting the lunch in the fridge until Sage was ready to leave. “You’re a big boy who’s been making his own lunch for a very long time, and far be it from me to end your streak of self-sufficiency. I know men do so love feeling like they can handle all their own shit.”
I held her gaze over the rim of my coffee mug.
She grinned, that dimple popping out. Something about that smile, that dimple, it unleashed a tight coil of something warm and pleasing in the base of my belly.
