Page 46 of Fundamentals of Chemistry

To my surprise, Cooper chuckled. “High school Jack would never have dreamed that he’d have a date with Princess Melanie Burke.”

I bristled, feeling a stab of hurt. “What do you mean by that?”

“Nothing,” he said quickly, and I thought I heard something like surprise in his voice. “I just mean—we both know you were way out of my league.”

“Oh,” I said. “I don’t know about that. I think if we had run into each other at a bonfire ten years ago, we might still have ended up talking.”

He barked a laugh. “The difference is that I never would have gone to a bonfire ten years ago. I either would have felt too awkward to go or I simply wouldn’t have been invited.”

“Why would it have been awkward?” I asked, genuinely curious.

“You’re not going to make me spell it out, are you?”

I could see his profile in the dark, his face tipped down toward me. I leaned over, bumping his arm with my shoulder.

“Oh, come on,” I said. “I wasn’t that scary.”

“It wasn’t that you were scary. You were untouchable. There was an aura of confidence around you that everyone was drawn to. I wouldn’t have made it within twenty feet of you.”

“That’s ridiculous,” I scoffed.

I could feel him shrug. “Maybe you couldn’t see it from the inside, but it was painfully obvious from the outside.”

“You could have come in,” I insisted. I was starting to feel an unfamiliar itch, something that wouldn’t go away just from scratching. It felt like shame, or maybe regret.

“No,” he said in a tone that brooked no argument. “I couldn’t have.”

I fell silent. I couldn’t contradict his feelings. This smart, funny, sexy man had felt excluded, or at least overlooked. I silently cursed my younger self for being so oblivious. So careless.

Away from the heat of the bonfire, there was a sharp chill in the fall air. I rubbed my hands down my arms as I walked.

“Cold?” Cooper asked.

“Aren’t you?” I replied.

“I wish I’d brought a jacket,” he said, “so I could give it to you.”

I glanced up at him, his face dark in the shadows. “You’re sweet,” I said, at a loss for what else to say. We had been talking for hours, but suddenly I had no more words.

He could have said that I should have brought a jacket or that he should have brought one for himself. But he wanted one only to give to me as a gesture of… what? He didn’t like me like I liked him. I couldn’t rationalize it, but my heart twisted anyway.

His jacket would probably be heavy and warm over my shoulders. It would probably smell clean and earthy, like him. Or perhaps, he would keep the jacket on and tuck me inside, warmed with his body heat.

We entered Brookside and climbed the stairs to the third floor. Tension radiated through my muscles as we drew closer to the inevitable goodnight. In the middle of the hallway between our two doors, we paused. I dug my keys out of my pocket, but once I had them in my hands, I still couldn’t bring myself to unlock my door. It had been a surprisingly perfect night, and I hated to have it end.

“I had a really nice time,” I said, internally cringing at the cliché line. This was not a date!

He ran a hand through his dark hair. “I’m glad Alan brought me out.”

I rubbed the key between my thumb and finger, vaguely aware of the cool metal. This was beyond awkward. Why the hell was I being so awkward?

Because this feels like a date, my brain supplied. He’s supposed to kiss you at the end of the date.

It was a bad idea. A stupid, reckless, incredibly bad idea. We had barely spoken to each other after our almost-kiss. An actual kiss would also have consequences. At the moment, I didn’t care. I wanted him to kiss me anyway.

He stared back at me, searching, looking for the answer to a question that neither of us could ask out loud.

I looked back at him, eyes wide, and bit my lip to keep from just coming out and screaming kiss me! If one of us was going to pull away, it would have to be him.