She looks up at me, her lips spreading into a wide smile. “You’re not talking me out of it, Hot Shot.”
41
SADIE
My palms arewarm and sticky, nerves buzzing through me like I just took a stick and hit a beehive. We’re parked outside a steakhouse. I’ve changed from Milo’s jersey and my sundress to a simple pink dress that hugs my curves and has a slit halfway up my thigh. Another purchase I’d made that hung in the back of my closet until I put it in my suitcase for this trip. My hair has been washed and tamed and my makeup refreshed.
“Am I overdressed?” I ask as I check to make sure my thin straps are in place.
“You’re gorgeous, Sadie.” I hear Milo’s grin before it appears on his face, turning to see how his blue eyes have turned dark and heavy.
My cheeks warm, but I don’t claim embarrassment at this moment; instead, I slowly slide to the middle of the bench seat, Milo’s body tensing slightly as my leg presses against his.
“You’re trying very hard not to kiss me, aren’t you?” The words are warm and velvety as they leave my mouth.
“I don’t want to ruin your lipstick,” he says as his gaze dips down to my lips.
I give him a half smile. “And what if I want you to?”
I lean over and press my lips to his. The heat in the cab teasesmy hair and causes my skin to freckle with sweat, but it’s nothing like the fire engulfing me from within.
Kissing Milo burns away the noise in my head.
The guilt. The what-ifs. The carefulness.
With him, I don’t feel like a woman trying to earn her life.
I feel like a woman who finally has permission to live it.
With or without the list.
When I slide back across the bench seat, I lean back and let a laugh from deep within rumble through my chest until it fills the air.
“What?” Milo asks as he busies himself with wiping red lipstick off his face and trying to fix his hair.
“That was fun,” I say.
Milo smiles over at me, reaching for my hand, and I put mine in his. Then he says, “Well then, I really like your version of fun.”
This makes me laugh more, and before he can wipe the rest of my lipstick off his face, I crawl back over and make another mess.
The buzzing is backin my veins as Milo leads me through the restaurant to a private room in the back. When we enter the room draped in black curtains and twinkle lights, there are five men and four women sitting around a large table. My anxiety begins to crawl up my spine, and there’s a voice within saying I don’t belong here. But Milo squeezes my hand, and I feel rooted to his steadiness.
A woman with tight blonde curls in a gorgeous green dress jumps up from the table where she was sitting next to Sean. She hurries over toward us—no, toward me.
“Sadie Summers?” she squeals with a voice that twangs like a banjo. “I am so excited to meet ya. You’re just a pretty little thing—like a rose in a thorn bush. No wonder this guy always told me to stop trying to set him up.”
“Laura?” I ask.
“Oh, where are my manners? My mama would skin me alive. Yes, Laura Gregory,” she says as she grabs for my hand and tucks me in beside her. “Let me introduce you to the group.”
Milo follows and mutters, “Good to see you too, Laura.”
She raises her hand and flicks it at him. “You ain’t nearly as interesting as this girl.”
He chuckles behind us and replies, “Very true.”
“Everyone, Sadie Summers,” Laura says, and now all eyes are on me.
