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I tilt my head toward him.
“And I don’t think you, as a person, are a danger to us. Believe me, I know what bad people feel like, and you aren’t bad. I’m not afraid of you in that sense.” I hear what I just said and shake my head a little. “I mean, I’m not afraid of you at all. It’s just—I—” Huffing out a breath, I gesture at the open air of my living room like it’s the rest of the world. “When I realized how we looked with you—howIlooked with you—out in public, it was like having cold water dumped on me.”
A frown has been creasing his features, and it deepens now.
Although he looks like he has several questions, the one he asks is, “That ice cream woman was seriously what upset you?”
“Well, not exactly. It’s what she saw that upset me.”
He gives a slow, confused lift of his shoulders. “She saw…us having fun? What?”
I give him a look. “Come on.”
“Hand to God, I don’t understand.”
“We were having so much fun that she thought you and I were in love with each other.” Not unkindly, I add, “Do you see how that flies in the face of the whole keep-me-and-Rae-away-from-guys thing?”
He chews on the inside of his cheek as he studies me tiredly. He doesn’t say anything.
My cheeks grow warm as my next thought comes to me, but I clear my throat a bit and make myself keep looking at him. “And let’s be honest: you and I have some…some chemistry, I guess. So that plus the woman’s comments…” I shrug, “…I just thought it’d be better to back away.”
“Chemistry,” he echoes.
I nod. “Or something.”
He raises his eyebrows in a way that says he can’t argue. But then he tells me, “We could still be friends, though.”
“No, we couldn’t.”
“Why not? Who cares what some random stranger assumed about us?Weknow what we are and aren’t.”
I fight the urge to roll my eyes. “Don’t you see, though? We looked like we were so in love with each other that we got married and had a kid together and live in some happy little world with her. And that’s not—that’s not what I—I mean, if I look like that with you, I’ve dropped the ball. That’s not what I thought we were doing. I thought we were having some innocent fun asfriends,indeed, and then there I was, listening to a total stranger say we were freaking radiating true love.”
He leans toward me.
“Liv,” he says slowly, “it does not matter what other people think of us. I’m not interested in you in that way, and you aren’t interested in me in that way either.”
“But it’s messy,” I insist. “What if we slip up? What if it ends up being—?”
“Why do you think that would happen? Ijust saidneither of us wants—”
“Well, for God’s sake, Landon, you kissed me. You don’t kiss people you aren’t attracted to.”
Caught off-guard, he opens and closes his mouth, his eyes moving over me quickly.
“I—yeah, okay, true, I—I’ve always thought you were gorgeous and super adorable with Rae—”
“And there’s no denying you’re handsome as hell,” I go on, forcing his words in one ear and out the other, “as well as a lot of other likeable things, so can you see how distracting all of that could be?”
Once again, he goes quiet. The look he gives me is one of acknowledgement; he knows I’m right.
And once again, what he says doesn’t match his expression: “But we go together so well.” His tone is quieter than before. “Not in a romantic way, but just as people. Asfriends.Friends can be a little attracted to each other and not act on it, you know.”
He gives me a halfhearted smile.
“And don’t confuse happiness with distraction, Liv. You, me, and Rae all likeeach other.She’s never been ignored or done wrong by us. You and I have never had fun at her expense.”
As he hesitates, his smile fades.
