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“I’ll have a water please.”
“Umm…no, he won’t. He will have a strawberry blast, and I will have the vanilla swirl please.”
I glared at Lily. She simply smiled at me and then returned her attention back to Anne.
“Please may we also have some of your loaded cheesy fries, Anne? He will have the meat deluxe burger, and I will have spicy chicken tenders with all the dips please.”
“Okay, coming right up.”
Anne took our menus and left us.
“I’m not eating any of that.”
Lily rolled her eyes at me. “Come on, Ethan. You are literally no fun at all. I have watched what you eat for lunch. Salads and weird-looking brown bread that does not even look edible. Not to mention you get up before sunrise every morning to head out for a jog.”
“And how do you know that I get up before sunrise to jog? Are you watching me?”
“What?” She waved me off, “Don’t be ridiculous. I don’t watch you. I just happen to be up at the same time as you.”
“And what exactly would you be doing at 5:30 in the morning?”
“Meditation.” She didn’t even look like she believed herself, but I didn’t care enough to pry.
“Okay.”
Lily leaned back into the booth and looked around the diner. I took that moment to look at her, like really look at her. I was still so stunned to believe that this was the same Lily that I used to know.
I liked her hair down, but I preferred the blonde on her. It brought out her eyes more. There was a strand of hair that was covering her forehead, and I felt the strange urge to brush it away.
What the hell?
I shook my head, trying to shake out those thoughts. Lily was not only my employee, but she was Grayson’s little sister. I couldn’t go there. It didn’t matter if he was dating my sister now. I knew I couldn’t go there with Lily.
Even if I did have the green light to go ahead with it, I was in no place to offer anything stable. I was barely keeping myself afloat, and Lily seemed like the relationship type.
“What?” Her blue-grey eyes looked at me confused.
“Nothing,” I grunted. “So how is it living with Maddison? I’ve only ever talked to her a couple of times since she moved in.”
“I don’t see much of her really. I’m basically a house sitter, but from the time we met and her letting me move into her home, I would say she is nice enough. She doesn’t suit Riverroad, though. She’s very…”
“Stuck up?”
“No.” She let out a soft laugh, and my heart went hammering. That was my new favorite sound. “She is just different. You can tell there is a lot of city life in her. She grew up with money, with a silver spoon in her mouth. But to say she is stuck up wouldn’t be correct.”
I nodded. “I always thought you would move to the city one day. You always hated Riverroad. I was surprised to hear that you didn’t opt for college in New York or Chicago. You always talked about moving to one of the two.”
“It’s hard to get into college with the kind of resume I have.” She looked away from me. “Not all of us can be geniuses like you, Ethan.”
“I’m not a genius. I just worked hard for what I wanted. There is a difference. Grayson is the genius. He could be running a Fortune 500 if he wanted to, but the guy chose the simple life in Riverroad instead.”
Lily looked like she wanted to say something. Her eyes moved from the window to the table across from us. She started picking at her fingers nervously.
Without thinking I reached over the table and placed my hand on top of hers.
A surge of electricity moved from my hand up my arm and landed right in the middle of my chest. A warm feeling overcame me from that one simple touch. I removed my hand from hers, like she had burned me.
I cleared my throat, trying to cover up the obvious blunder I had just done. “How is Nora? I haven’t seen her in a while.”
