She let out a small breath, half a laugh. “Almost. I keep thinking I’ve forgotten something.” She reached for the next book without looking up, and I watched her hands move over the stack with confidence, like she’d done this ten thousand times and her hands knew it even when her head was elsewhere.
“You probably haven’t,” I said.
“You don’t know that.” She set down the paper she’d been holding and looked at me properly for the first time in a few minutes, which was either a concession or a warning. I hadn’t decided which.
“I know you’ve been thinking about it long enough that if you’d forgotten something, you’d have remembered it by now.”
She looked up at that, caught somewhere between amused and skeptical. She had her arms crossed loosely over her chest, and she was looking at me with her head tilted slightly, the way she did when she was deciding whether something deserved a real response or just one of her looks. “That sentence made no sense,” she said.
“It made complete sense.”
“It really didn’t,” she said. But the corner of her mouth had started to give her away, and we both knew it. She leaned her hip lightly against the counter, arms crossing loosely, giving me her full attention in a way that felt like something she hadn’t entirely decided to do. Up close like this, I could see the faint smudge of ink on the side of her hand. The loose strand of hair that had fallen forward across her cheek. She left it there. I noticed thatI noticed it. “I probably have a list somewhere that proves you wrong,” she said.
“I’d like to see that list.”
“Why?”
“Curiosity,” I said. “And I like being right.”
“Those are two different things.”
“They don’t have to be.” I watched the corner of her mouth twitch. She was trying not to smile and losing, and the effort she was putting into not showing it was affecting my ability to think in straight lines. “Worst case?” I said.
She glanced up through that strand of hair. “It all falls apart.”
“It won’t.” I leaned forward slightly against the counter, closing the distance between us by an inch or two, just to see what she’d do. She didn’t move back. “You’ve got it handled.”
She stilled—fingers hovering over the register, eyes coming up to mine—and I could see her deciding whether to accept that or deflect it. She accepted it, which was rarer from her than it should have been. Something in her expression settled, quietly, like a breath going out. “I hope you’re right,” she said.
“I usually am,” I said. “Ask anyone.”
She laughed—a real one, short and surprised—and tucked the strand of hair behind her ear herself, shaking her head slightly. I’d been about three seconds from doing it for her, and I was not entirely sure what would have happened if I had. “I’ll take your word for it,” she said.
“Smart.”
She looked up at me, eyes bright. “Don’t push it.”
“I remember you and your notebooks,” I said. “Back in school. You had a system for everything.”
Her expression softened, the color in her cheeks deepening slightly. I’d caught her off guard with that one, and I wasn’t sorry about it. “Maybe I still do,” she said.
“Then you’re fine.” I held her gaze. “You’ve always been better at this stuff than you give yourself credit for.”
She cleared her throat softly and looked back down at the register, pulling the receipt free and straightening it once before holding it out. Her fingers grazed mine as I took it—lighter than last time, slower—and she didn’t pull back quite as fast as she had before. I stayed where I was. Neither of us said anything for a second, the shop quiet around us, the receipt still half in her hand and half in mine.
“See you Friday?” she asked.
“Yeah,” I said. “I’ll be here.”
Her mouth curved. “Okay.”
I stepped back from the counter, tucking the receipt into my pocket, and she went back to her books with the small private look of someone trying not to show that something had just happened. I walked to the door, pushed it open and stood for a second in the frame with the afternoon behind me.
I held her gaze for one more second, just long enough for her to know I meant it, and then I took the bag from the counter and headed for the door. The street outside was bright after the warmth of the shop, the air sharper than I expected. I made it halfway to my truck before I pulled my phone from my pocket. A new message lit up the screen—Emmett. I read the first line and stopped walking.
I glanced back once toward the bookshop window. Warm light through the glass. Movement behind it, quiet and unhurried. Then I turned the screen off, slid the phone back into my pocket, and stood there for a moment before I got in the truck.
Chapter 9
