“It’s fine,” she says snottily. “I know you think I’m a useless, spoiled princess, but I promise I can rinse a dish.”
Will rolls his eyes. “That’s not—” He reaches for it, the full length of his body pressing against hers, and it’s like she’s an electric car that’s suddenly been plugged in to charge after a thousand miles, everything inside her vrooming to life—dashboard flickering, a mechanical rev. Both of them freeze. They stay that way for a moment playing chicken. Lilly knows when she’s staring down a dare.
“Can I ask you something?” he murmurs. His face is very, very close. “Why do you keep following me around trying to kiss me when you hate me so much?”
Lilly glowers, her cheeks getting hot. “First of all, who says I’m trying to kiss you?” she demands haughtily, turning back to the sink and shoving the plates under the faucet one by one. “For all you know, I could have come in here to change my tampon. I could have come in here to sit on the couch and stream the entire first season ofGlee.”
Will lifts an eyebrow, but barely. “Did you?”
“No,” she admits grudgingly. “But second of all, stop crying. I don’t hate you any more than you hate me.”
“See,” he says, “that’s where you’re wrong.”
Well. Lilly doesn’t know what to say to that, and Will doesn’t say anything else, but when she glances up from the dishes there’s that look on his face again, the one she seriously does not get. “Lilly,” he starts, curling a hand around her waist, and the jolt of his touch is so hot and surprising that she drops the plate she’s holding right into the enormous sink, where it shatters with a holy racket into a million tiny pieces. Lilly swears.
“Everything okay in there?” Charlie yells from the backyard.
“Everything’s great!” they yell back in perfect unison. Lilly makes a face. She shuts off the water and turns around to face him, his fingertips just grazing her rib cage through her tank top. She can see his chest moving as he breathes.
“This is ridiculous,” she announces, trying to sound like a person whose heart isn’t slamming wildly against the inside of her rib cage, whose entire body isn’t humming with frustration and want. “Let’s just get it out of our systems already, and then we never have to see each other again.”
“Romantic,” Will comments dryly. He tilts his head to the side, interested. “Is that our problem here, you think? Am I in your system?”
Lilly scoffs. “Oh please,” she says. “I think we know exactly who is in whose system.”
“I mean.” Will’s eyebrows twitch; he takes a step closer, backing her up against the counter.
Lilly swallows hard. This close he’s bigger than she thinks of him as being, all broad shoulders and solid chest, a full head taller than her. The palms of their hands brush down low at their sides.
“I keep thinking about you,” he confesses quietly. He’s got his fingers wrapped around her wrists now—his thumbs strokingover the thin, sensitive skin on the undersides, making tiny circles there. “I don’t want to, but I can’t help it. I can’t fucking stop.”
Lilly laughs at that, loud and genuine. “Oh,” she teases, “now who’s romantic?”
“Can you not?” Will growls. “I’m serious.”
“I know,” she promises. It’s not like she doesn’t understand the sentiment. It’s a relief to have him say it, to know for sure she’s not the only one. She looks up at him for a moment, her head thunking back against the upper row of cabinets. “What do you think?”
Will doesn’t answer. He doesn’t have to; the expression on his face is so nakedly, achingly specific that Lilly gasps. It reminds her of the wildfires that rip through California every summer—quick and uncontrollable and enormous, swallowing entire neighborhoods in the time it takes to call for help. Part of her wants to grab her valuables and run like her life depends on it. The rest of her wants to watch it burn.
“Come upstairs,” he mutters finally, and it sounds like he’s begging. “Lilly. Come upstairs with me.”
Lilly hesitates for a moment, considering it. On the one hand, sneaking off to Will Darcy’s bedroom in the middle of a dinner party would probably confirm her as exactly the kind of person Caroline Bingley goes around telling people she is.
On the other hand: fuck Caroline Bingley.
“Yeah.” Lilly slips her hand into his and tugs him in the direction of the staircase, nodding. “Let’s go.”
That’s when she hears a voice from the side of the house: “Yoo-hoo!” it calls, ringing out like a klaxon in the warm, still night. “Anybody home?”
Lilly freezes. She knows that voice. Will seems to know it, too, instinctive. “Is that—” he starts, but Lilly holds a hand up.
“Just—” She shakes her head, suddenly dizzy—desire or disbelief, she isn’t sure. “Don’t say anything for a second, will you?” She makes her way toward the patio on wobbly legs, sliding the back door open just as the gate swings wide at the side of the yard; Charlie and June are getting to their feet at the table, Caroline staring with naked disbelief.
“Mom,” Lilly says, and her voice sounds like it belongs to someone else entirely. “Hi.”
Chapter Eight
Will
