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He moves to turn away, but then he swivels back to me, his cheeks still an odd shade of pink. “Are you heading to the station as well?”
I shake my head. “My friend is coming to pick me up in a little while.” I don’t know if I’m imagining his gaze flitting over my outfit againorwhy it bothers me that he might be coming to his own conclusion, so I quickly add, “Bailey. The one I was with the other week.”
His brows furrow slightly in the middle. “So you’re just going to wait here? Alone?”
“I’ll probably wait inside a coffee shop or something,” I tell him. Bailey’s still a little while away and I don’t feel like hanging out on the street until she gets here. “I’ll be fine, Hawthorne. I’m a big girl, I can take care of myself.”
“I know, I just—” He swallows, and for a brief second, a look of pure panic flits across his features. “I’ll wait with you.”
“I told you, I’m fine. You go and enjoy the rest of your Saturday doing whatever it is you do to have fun.”
Probably making spreadsheets or something like that.
“I want something to drink.” He shrugs nonchalantly and then shoots me a grin. “And it just so happens that someone I know is heading to a coffee shop right now.”
I peer at him suspiciously, trying to figure out what his ulterior motive is here. He stares back at me, his gaze oddly earnest, and a soft smile tugs at his lips. “Fine. But no work talk or I’m charging the hours to your account.”
He huffs out an almost laugh, nothing more than a soft puff of air that slips from between his pursed lips. “Fair enough. Is there a café close by?”
“Thereshouldbe. But I don’t really know this area very well.”
“What about over there?” He points to an old building just across the road and I raise a brow.
“That’s a pub.”
“Pubs have drinks, don’t they?”
“They don’t havecoffee. And I wouldn’t really go into a pub by myself,” I tell him.
“Good thing you’re not by yourself then, isn’t it?”
Before I have the chance to retort, he reaches for my arm and gently starts tugging me in the direction of the pub. I quite like the feel of his hand on my arm — strong, confident, gently possessive in a weird kind of way that makes my stomach do a tiny somersault — and I don’t make any move to pull away until we’re across the road.
The pub is crowded, already filled with Saturday night regulars sipping beer, laughing, and roaring at the football game plastered across the TV at the end of the room. Hawthorne goes first, carving a handy pathway through the throng of pubgoers for me. He glances back a few times, probably to check I haven’t abandoned him and run off.
Whyhaven’tI done that yet?
I’ve had plenty of opportunities. It would’ve been easy enough to shake him off when he grabbed my arm and walk off in the opposite direction. But here I am instead. With Finn Hawthorne, the current bane of my life (bar Cynthia) in a crowded and definitely too expensive pub in the middle of London.
I can’t help but wrinkle my nose as I take in the exorbitant prices on the sticky menu once we reach the bar. I’m not a big beer drinker, but even I can tell the people in here are being robbed blind.
A bartender slides over to me and offers me a grin. “What’ll you have, darling?”
I glance over the menu again and reluctantly settle for an equally overpriced cocktail. I reach for my purse, but Hawthorne suddenly sticks his hand over mine. The touch lasts for maybe half a second, but a warmth blooms almost immediately as his skin presses against mine. I almost miss it when he lifts his hand to point at the menu.
“And I’ll have a pint of whatever you recommend,” Hawthorne says to the bartender before looking over at me. “I’ll get it.”
I shake my head. No. Absolutely not. “I can pay for my own drinks.”
“I know you can. It’s my way of saying thank you.”
“For what?”
“For the key.”
Oh. Yes. The key. I’d already forgotten about that. Like it’s perfectly normal for me and Hawthorne to be together in a crowded pub on a Saturday night.
“And I can’t give you another reason to call me cheap, can I?”
