She tucks her notepad into her apron and walks away. What? No way is she getting the last word. I come up behind her as she stops and almost run into her.

“We get along. We can set an example. Show everyone what the boundaries are between employer and employee,” I suggest. My voice sounds desperate. To spend more time with her or to prove a point, I’m not sure. Pull it together, man.

I need to prove a point.

She spins around, her mouth open like she is going to say something, but she stops. She takes a deep breath then looks me in the eye.

“No.”

No.

People don’t say no to me.

“What do you mean, no?” I growl at her.

Now she’s looking at me with pity. She gives me a half smile.

“Look, Ethan, with our history it would be a bad idea. We have never been able to play nice with each other. It happens.”

History? We don’t have a history. We kissed once and then she freaked out on me. Besides, she’s the one who can’t play nice. Not me. I’m a nice guy.

“Hey, I’m not the one who kicked myself in the face, hit myself with a car door, and then dumped hot coffee all over myself,” I say politely, refreshing her memory.

She scrunches up her face and then pulls her lips into a hard line as she tries not smile. She starts to clear the dirty dishes sitting on the table near us.

“I didn’t mean to do any of those things and you know it. I thought we were past that.” Her tone is light and playful. I smile as I approach.

“Well,” I begin and help her clear the table. “You did get me pretty good. How about if you lock yourself out again, you come get me and we can avoid the cops next time.”

For the first time since we started this conversation, I cause her to smile. If she liked what I said, I will absolutely find a way to get her to come to me. We walk the dishes to the bar, setting them on top so the closing bartender can wash them.

“Ok, I will,” she says and looks around. “But I don’t plan on locking myself out again, so I don’t think we will have to worry about that.”

I give her my biggest grin. Yeah…we’ll see about that.

Chapter Eight

Kelsey

It was a waste of time showing up to class today. I haven’t been able to focus in any of them. It’s been two days since I saw Abby flirting with Ethan. I didn’t like it and hope I don’t have to witness it again. I’ve never felt that way about any guy. Ever. Not even when she walked out of my bathroom that god-awful day I caught Tyler cheating on me.

And Ethan’s not your man, Kelsey.

The way she stormed away from Ethan, I knew he shut her down. It took everything I had not to smile at him when he caught me watching. How could I be interested in him again after just a couple days? This just goes to show how unstable my brain is when it comes to choosing someone of the opposite sex.

“Are you even paying attention?” Logan whispers.

I shake my head no.

“Then let’s skip out because I’m about to fall asleep.”

We quietly grab our bags and sneak out of class without drawing attention. This isn’t good. Ethan has distracted from the one course I give a rip about. In fact, the other night, I wanted to do nothing but write and Ethan got in the way of that too. This isn’t a good sign.

“What should we do?” Logan asks. “Maybe go grab a bite or something?”

Food doesn’t sound appealing in any way, but I have nothing else going on today and going home to hang out alone doesn’t sound fun. And sadly, once again, my mind is more focused on Ethan than plotting some points I could enter to that writing contest.

“Yeah, that’s fine.”

At my car, I’m a little surprised Logan’s making the kind gesture to open my door. He does this sort of thing for Sara all the time or when we’re together but never just me on my own. Logan really is a sweet guy. Ironically, just as I think it, all the kindness is gone when he hits me with the driver’s door. I stumble backward, my purse slipping off my arm, tossing every item in it across the ground.

“Oh, dude, I’m sorry.” Logan kneels down with me as I gather everything up.

“It’s alright,” I tell him, but he’s almost laughing. “It doesn’t look like you’re too upset about hitting me,” I joke back. It’s really not a big deal, but then he reaches his hand toward me and I realize why he is laughing. I grab the tampon out of his hand, stuff it deep into my purse, and close my door once I’m inside the car, praying he doesn’t see the blush I have no doubt my cheeks are displaying. This is probably why he’s never opened a door for me. Probably had some sixth sense that it would be awkward one way or another.

Hanging out with Logan for a while is fun. He asks about Sara a bunch, which doesn’t surprise me. Those two aren’t very good at hiding their feelings. I thought for sure they were going to finally put themselves out of their misery and make things official, but then she up and decided to leave for this trip and didn’t even tell Logan. He found out from Ethan. The way he’s been talking about her this afternoon only confirms everything I thought: Logan doesn’t want her to go.

I pull up to my parents’ house around five. I have a plan to accomplish a lot of homework tonight, but after a good fifteen minutes of searching through my purse, backpack, and car for their house key, I give up. I must have lost it when I dropped my purse.

I get out of the car, close the door, and lean against it. I should have made a spare key after the first night. I take a deep breath and glance across the street to Ethan’s house, where the front light is on. He did tell me I could come to him if this happened again. I push off my car and head for his house.

I knock once and the door opens. Ethan’s in a pair of blue jeans and a simple red t-shirt. His hair looks a little messy, like he’s been running his hands through it. At least, I hope it was him.

“Hey, Kelsey, what brings you over?” His voice is shaky, and sounds a tad bit forced or rehearsed, I’m not sure which.

“I, uhh…I lost my key, I think,” I say, hoping he’ll invite me inside.

“Oh, yeah, come on in,” he says, stepping to the side to let me by with a pleased grin on his lips.

His cologne stands out when I pass him, and the smell of sandalwood and oranges fills the air. It’s a good smell. One that will forever now remind me of Ethan. Then again, scent or not, I have a feeling I’m not going to forget about him because right now, my mind has forgotten everything but him. If I can’t get a locksmith here soon, I might end up doing something completely not in my plans.

My eyes flash from his to his mouth and back. Yep. Kissing is definitely not in my plans, but right now, I might need to add it.

Ethan

No one needs to know that I asked Logan to sneak her house key off her keychain while they were in class. Except he didn’t do it while they were in class—instead, he faked opening her door and then knocked her on her ass to get it. He let me know I owed him big time for getting that key.

“Do you want anything to drink?” I ask her. She shakes her head and sits on my black leather sofa. Okay, so I hadn’t thought this far ahead. I was too worried watching her out the window like a creep, hoping she would take me up on my offer from the other night that I almost pulled my hair out. I sit down next to her. She looks at me, tilting her head to the side and gives me a small smile.

“No thanks. I’m just going to Google a locksmith and hopefully I won’t be in your way too long.”

“Yeah, sure, of course,” I say, heading into the kitchen for a glass of water anyway. I can’t just stand out there staring at her and doing nothing. If I can’t convince her to hang around for a little while, this whole thing will be for nothing. I could just ask her out like a normal guy, but she seems to have her shit together a lot more than me and I’ve yet to see signs of a guy in her life being something she’s interested in.