Page 64 of Unexpected You

“Who?” I said, pretending not to know.

Eloise glared and I laughed.

“I know who that is, El. I was just messing with you.”

Unable to stop, I stroked my fingers through her dark hair as she leaned into me.

“You’re a menace,” she said.

“You’ve told me that before.”

Eloise sighed. “You’re going to have to stop doing that. I need to get this chapter finished.”

I also had a million things to do. My libido couldn’t get in the way of doing my job.

“You’re right.” I let her go and went back to my chair and put my headphones on.

* * *

For the first time ever, Eloise let me make lunch. It was just a basic chopped salad with some leftover chicken and dressing she’d already made, but I was still pretty proud of myself when I dished it up.

“This is nice,” Eloise said as we ate on the porch. I really did love eating lunch with her every day.

“Hopefully it’s okay,” I said, getting nervous.

Eloise filled her plate and took a bite and I waited as she chewed. She didn’t choke or spit anything out or make a face when she swallowed.

“Very good,” she said, and I thought she was overselling it a bit but I’d take it.

“So,” I said as I added more salad to my plate, “what are your plans this weekend?”

Eloise sipped her iced tea and looked at me over the rim of her glass.

“I was thinking we could go on a date. If that’s something you might be interested in?” Her voice was hesitant, as if she wasn’t sure she should be asking.

“Hell yeah, I want to go on a date,” I said. “I was going to ask you, but you did it first.”

I’d thought about what we could do together, and I didn’t have any good ideas, but that didn’t mean I wasn’t going to ask her.

“Would you like me to plan it?” she asked. “Or you could. Sorry, I’m out of my depth.”

I reached my hand out and stroked her arm. “You’re doing pretty well so far. And you can absolutely plan this one. I’ll do the next one.”

Eloise nodded. “That seems fair. Is there anything you want to do in particular?”

I wanted to say “you,” but it was absolutely too early for that, so I didn’t.

“I’m cool with anything. As long as you’re there and there’s food. And cake. There has to be cake.”

Eloise put up one finger. “Me, food, cake.” She added two more fingers. “I think we can handle that.”

Chapter Eighteen

Eloise

A date. I was taking Cadence on a date. I’d planned to hang out with Camille and the family this weekend, so on Friday I went over for dinner and had to tell her that my Saturday was booked. I’d wanted to stay with Cadence, but she already had plans with her friends and we were new to navigating this whole thing together.

We’d decided not to tell people yet, since it was so fresh.