Page 151 of Romeo

Maybe that was why I noticed so quickly when he didn’t.

Me: You give it to me without being asked.

His response took longer this time.

Jasper: That sounded dangerously observant.

I smiled as I looked down at the picture again.

Me: I notice things

Jasper: I’ve noticed.

The warmth spreading through my chest had very little to do with flirting. Jasper noticed things too. Probably too many things. He knew when I was avoiding a question and when I said something was fine because I didn’t want to talk about why it wasn’t. He remembered ridiculous details that I’d forgotten sharing.

And apparently, he knew I did the same to him.

Me: You look different holding her.

Jasper: Better or worse?

I enlarged the photograph again. The baby’s cheek rested against his chest, and Jasper’s fingers covered nearly her entire back.

Me: Softer

Jasper: Don’t spread that around.

I laughed quietly.

Me: Your reputation would never recover

Jasper: I trust you with my secrets.

My fingers stilled.

It was such an easy sentence. So... Jasper. He could probably type something like that without understanding how it might land on the other end.

Except I was beginning to think he always understood.

Me: Is this a secret?

Jasper: Depends.

Me: On what?

Jasper: Whether you like this version of me.

I looked at the picture for a long moment before answering.

There was something almost vulnerable in the question, though Jasper would probably deny that until his last breath. He’d spent months letting me see different pieces of him. The man who flirted because it came as naturally as breathing. The Cajun who called his mother and aunts regularly and had somehow decided the way I drank my coffee was worth remembering.

Now there was this man too.

I liked him.

Maybe more than I was ready to say.

Me: I might