“No.”
“A cactus?”
“I killed a succulent once. It was a gift from a student who said she thought I was lonely and needed a friend.”
She exhales slowly. “Incredible. Truly. And yet you saw an abandoned tornado dog and thought, Yes. I, a man with no track record of keeping anything alive, should assume responsibility.”
“When you say it like that, it sounds crazy.”
“If the, hey let’s take in a stray dog after a tornado, boot fits…”
Max snores loudly from the backseat, completely oblivious to the fact that he currently smells like wet fur, dust, and gas station beef jerky.
I glance back at him sprawled across the seat, one oversized paw twitching in his sleep. “In my defense,” I say, “he looked like he needed someone.”
Lila studies me for a second before shaking her head slowly, fighting a smile.
“You are absolutely in over your head.”
Something about the way she says it makes warmth creep up the back of my neck, because I’m suddenly not entirely convinced she’s talking about the dog anymore.
I glance sideways at her. Sunlight cuts through the windshield in shifting bands, catching loose strands of dark hair the wind has pulled free around her face. She looks more relaxed than usual, one hand loose on the steering wheel, the corner of her mouth curved faintly upward from laughing at me.
“You know what your problem is?” she asks, glancing over at me briefly.
“I suspect you’re going to tell me regardless.”
“You spend so much time inside your own head that anything spontaneous completely wrecks you.”
“That feels harsh.”
“It’s accurate.” Her grin widens . “You adopted a stray dog in the middle of storm season.”
“He was limping.”
“And now you’re emotionally attached.”
I glance back at Max again. Unfortunately…she’s not wrong.
“He needed help and he followed me,” I mutter weakly.
“Oh, so that’s your weakness.” Lila smirks. “Big brown eyes and abandonment issues.”
I should not enjoy talking to her this much. That’s becoming increasingly clear. Because every conversation somehow slips into this rhythm between us—teasing and easy and charged underneath in ways I’m trying very hard not to examine too closely.
“You realize,” I say carefully, “you’re being remarkably judgmental for someone who named a drone after a porn star.”
Lila gasps softly. “First of all, Stormy Daniels is an icon.”
“In what field exactly?”
“The arts.”
I laugh despite myself, and her eyes flick toward me immediately like she likes hearing it. That realization lands harder than it should.
“You laugh more now,” she says quietly.
I blink. “What?”
