“What? I’m practical.”
“You are not practical. You’re impatient.”
“Same thing.”
“No, it’s not.”
He smirked and tugged me closer by my hand. “If I want something, I’m not standing there almost touching it. I’m grabbing it.”
The way he looked at me when he said that made my stomach do something stupid.
“See?” I muttered. “You always gotta make stuff about you.”
“You said what you saw. I said what I saw.”
I shook my head, but I liked that he was trying. He didn’t know much about art, and I could tell some of the pieces confused him, but he still walked beside me, still asked questions, still listened when I explained what I liked about certain ones.
That meant more than I wanted to admit.
We made it deeper into the studio when a woman near one of the displays looked up and froze.
“Oh, my God,” she whispered, but it was loud enough for both of us to hear. “Are you Kyrie Maddox?”
I felt Kyrie’s hand tighten around mine just a little.
He turned toward her with a polite smile that looked like it took effort. “Yeah, wassup?”
“I’m so sorry. I don’t mean to bother you, but can I get a picture? My brother is a huge Vipers fan.”
Kyrie glanced down at me first.
I gave him a small nod. “Go ahead.”
He let out a quiet breath before stepping beside the woman. She took the picture quickly, thanked him about five times, then hurried off with her phone pressed to her chest like she had just met God.
I tried not to laugh.
Kyrie came back over to me, already looking irritated.
“What?” I asked.
“Nothing.”
I raised an eyebrow. “You sure?”
“Yeah.”
“You lying.”
He slid his hand back into mine and kept walking. “I ain’t lying.”
“Kyrie.”
“What?”
“You mad because somebody interrupted our little date?”
He looked over at me. “Who said this was a date?”
