“I want to see you again,” he said.
“You do?”
“Yeah, I do,” he said, and leaned in.
I leaned back. “Connor, wait. Before we go any further… Well, I was trying to tell you something before, and I guess didn’t do a great job of it.”
His smile tilted. “Okay.”
“About this being my first date in two years? I need to be perfectly honest with you. The long-term relationship I just got out of? It didn’t end well.”
“No?”
“No, and I—”
“How come?”
I flinched a little, my cheeks burning. “Oh. Well.”
God, do I have to say it?
Connor waited. Apparently I did.
“He wasn’t…faithful.”
His grin faltered. “Oh, gotcha.”
The air tightened around me and I wanted to turn and run upstairs.
I cleared my throat. “Yes, it was a ‘gotcha’ moment, all right. And it’s made me a little reticent to jump into something new.”
“I totally get that,” Connor said. “I’m down with keeping it casual. Or whatever you want.”
I bit my lip. “Maybe we could grab a coffee sometime and talk—?”
His face lit up. “Hey, you know what? A bunch of us are going to Lake Onota next weekend. Ever been?”
“No.”
“It’s a blast. Swimming, boating, and a huge bonfire on the beach. One last hurrah before it gets too cold.”
“I don’t know.”
“Just think about it,” he murmured, his voice deepening and turning husky. “Okay?”
“I will.”
He gently kissed my cheek, his warm breath lingering, and sending a zing-y shiver over my skin.
“Talk to you soon.”
“Okay,” I said. “Bye.”
Inside the apartment, I shut the door and rested my back against it, trying to make sense of the night. I pulled out my phone and reread the text he’d sent me a week ago. The beautiful words that set tonight in motion.
You’re the Halley’s Comet of girls…
It was perfect. And he’d been a perfect gentleman. But our conversation was a seesaw of warm moments and awkward. Zing and silence.