Page 47 of Love You Truly

The air around us feels soupy, with the evening mist rolling off the mountains. It syncs with the unease in my gut. I want him to kiss me, but I don’t want to want it.

“Okay, Mallomar. Sleep tight,” he says softly, trailing a finger down my arm until it lands at my hand. He gives it a squeeze.

I open my mouth, thinking I’ll concoct some excuse for him to stay. I could make coffee or…

He leans over and kisses my temple. I freeze, hoping his lips will stay on my skin, which craves more contact with him. He lingers for a moment longer, and I hear a low rumble in his throat. I inhale a shaky breath and turn to face him, our mouths only inches apart. The air between us hangs heavy. Dash’s heavy-lidded eyes drop closed, but then he pulls away.

“Good night.” The rasp of his voice sends goosebumps over my skin.

“Good night,” I say. “Thanks again.”

As I start to go inside, Dash calls after me. “Hey, you have any plans tomorrow?”

“No.”

He nods. “I’ll call you.”

And there it is, this budding feeling I can’t identify at first, and I sure as hell can’t explain it.

Because it feels like excitement. And that’s something I should never feel about a playboy who’s about to do me a favor for the good of the business. Yeah. Tell that to my heart.

CHAPTER 18

Dash

Mallory: How’s your day going?

Me: I’m sorry, who is this?

Mallory: Your fiancée. You’re eternally devoted to me, remember?

Me: I do.

Mallory: Save that for the wedding

Me: Right. I’m off to buy you diamonds, as instructed

Mallory: I love a fiancé who listens!

I wasn’t lying about the diamonds.

I should be at the gym. That’s what I’d normally be doing at noon on a Saturday.

After a late night with friends and a chance to sleep in for once in a week, I’d be sweating on the treadmill to warm up for three rounds of weights. Same thing nearly every day.

Instead, I’m flying up Highway 80 on my way back from a ring shop in San Francisco. I spent the morning with Owen, a buddy of mine who owns restaurants in Napa Valley and divides his time between there and a house in Hayes Valley.

Initially, he recommended a place in the jewelry district and even offered to bring his wife with him when he met me to look at stones. “Isla has better taste than me,” he’d said when I called him last night in a panic. His wife is a renowned baker who supplies bread to the nicer of the two restaurants on the Buttercup Hill property, but she’s one of those women who’s good at everything, so I’m not surprised she knows something about diamonds too.

I secretly think it’s her bread that helped Butter and Rosemary earn its Michelin star a couple of years back, but she’s too modest to admit it. “I just make the sourdough starter and bake. It’s where you take it from there that has everyone swooning,” she always says.

Despite Isla’s taste, I panicked. “Stones?” I’d asked Owen. “I thought I was buying a ring.”

He explained to me that I needed to choose the stone and the setting, and then the jeweler would make the ring to my specifications.

“No, no, no. It doesn’t need to be that complicated. I have no specifications.”

“Well, maybe she does.” I love how married guys make it sound like it’s so obvious that every decision and question actually has one right answer, and it’s whatever his wife says. He was once a dummy like me who didn’t know such things, but now he relinquishes his choices like everyone else.

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