Page 42 of Crushes to WHAT

His lips are firm, and soft, and directly touching mine.

I gasp.

He takes advantage, adding tongue to the experience. He tastes like chocolate and peanut butter, like the Reese’s cup pack we split in the car on the way here. I wonder, vaguely, if that’s what I taste like, too, and I have the shred of a moment to feel disappointed that he isn’t getting his pumpkin first kiss like he wanted before it becomes abundantly clear he doesn’t care a whit, and so I shouldn’t either.

Emerson likes how I taste without the pumpkin just fine.

He pulls away a hairsbreadth to curse, then falls back in, gliding lips and tongue and teeth against my swelling, sensitive mouth.

We break again. “This isn’t really how the fake dating trope is meant to work,” I breathe.

“Screw the fake dating trope,” he replies, pressing his nose hard against my cheek. His lips graze my jaw, followed by nipping teeth. “We can keep doing it if you like, though. You seemed like you were having fun.”

I kind of was, but is that stupid?

“Might be fun for me, too,” he murmurs, bringing our mouths together again. “I’d have to behave myself in private. Have my fun in public, where options are limited.” He grins against me, wicked. “I could work with that for a while, I bet. See how long it takes me to break. See how good I could be for your fun.”

I whimper.

“Yeah,” he rumbles, breath warm on my lips. “I like this plan.”

Before I can reply in nervous agreement, a disgusted teenage voice intones, “We don’t let old people make out in the aisles. Like, as a rule. And a law, probably. You can’t do that here. There are kids around.”

Emerson and I break apart in varying levels of dishevelment. Read: I am disheveled and blushing and a stammering mess, and he looks like a model on the cover of Big Attractive Men magazine who’s just been lightly fanned for the ultimate windswept pose.

Freak, that’s my boyfriend. My real, fake, fake boyfriend.

“I’d apologize, but I’m not all that sorry,” Emerson tells the grossed-out teenage employee.

The boy faux gags. “If you do that again, I have to kick you out.” He eyes the top of Emerson’s head. “Please don’t make me try to do that. I can’t afford emergency room bills caused by undue strain, and neither can my parents. We just moved here to be closer to my sister and her husband. It was a stupid move, if you ask me, but now they’re thirty minutes and a state border away instead of in the same state and two hours away.” He rolls his eyes. “So dumb, especially because moving is expensive.” His face turns contemplative. “My sister… could maybe foot the bill. Probably. But I think it would be illegal for her to give me money from her husband’s job.” His brows furrow. “Hey, do you know if it’s illegal to accept money from someone if they made it by torturing dudes in their basement?”

I blink. A lot. “I’m pretty sure it’s only illegal if you know for sure that’s where the money came from. It makes you an accomplice or something. If you don’t know anything about it and he gifts you money, I don’t see how you’d be liable for that.” I glance at Emerson. “You do legal people-hand-you-money type things. What do you think?”

He raises his eyebrows at me. “You also do legal people-hand-you-money type things. What would make me more of an expert than you?”

I shrug, biting my lip. A mistake, of course, because the little nibble presses against swelling I’d let—I read the teen’s name tag—Fred distract me from. I stumble over my reply. “Well, because. Obviously. And also since probably? I don’t charge as much as you do, so I don’t have to take payment plans or shake anyone down to pay me back like I assume you do. It makes sense to me that when you take payment plans and shake people down to pay you back, you might know what the legal lines are in regards to accepting ill-gotten gains.”

Together, Fred and I wait expectantly for Emerson’s great wisdom.

Emerson sighs. “If you know about the torturing, which you seem to, it can be an issue. Maybe don’t ask the guy for money?”

Fred frowns, then sniffs. “That means you have to make sure I don’t strain myself kicking you out of here for being indecent in a place where kids wander around. What’s wrong with you guys anyway? Can’t you do that at home?”

“We can’t, actually,” Emerson answers while I sputter in embarrassment. “We’re fake dating.”

Fred’s face clears, and he nods sagely. “Ah.”

“Mm,” Emerson replies. “I don’t suppose you could offer up a semi-secluded corner where children won’t find us but we could easily be caught by someone visiting from our small town an hour away, perfectly setting up a scenario wherein they tell the entire town about the scandal?”

Fred shakes his head, and to his credit, he really does look like he doesn’t want to tell us no. “My sister would disown me for this, but the answer is no. In consolation, though, I can show you which Pearl Taylor books are signed by the author, and I can vouch for them being legitimate. The one you have in your stack is a dud.”

Emerson examines his collection of books, pulls out the Pearl Taylor, and flips it around in his free hand while I gape at Fred, who I’m pretty sure just confessed to being siblings with one of my favorite authors on the planet Earth. “It looked like all the other ones on the shelf.”

“It’s exactly like all the other ones on that shelf,” Fred agrees. “Because I put the signed ones on an end cap near the front.”

Emerson puts the book back on the shelf.

I freak the freak out. “Oh my gosh,” I wheeze.