Page 45 of Scoring with my Bestie's Ex

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We meet at the public library and find a secluded corner where we can talk quietly without disturbing anyone else.

Bella wears a sleek, sleeveless turtleneck paired with high-waisted shorts that are a deep emerald green. Her hair is curled, and she wears drop earrings that look like stained glass frogs.

The dark circles under her eyes are less pronounced today, though once she sits down next to me, I suspect she just covered them up.

“Alright, so how are things going?” she asks enthusiastically.

I open my folders and share everything I have so far. I have an uncomfortable feeling that I’m pulling her away from her own important work, but she shows no sign of being anxious to leave.

We chat about the event for a while, and Bella shares a few suggestions that blend perfectly with my plans. After we wrap up, I close the folders with a satisfied nod.

“Bella, can we talk?” I ask.

She tenses and averts her gaze at once. I’m so surprised by her reaction that I miss her nod.

“What do you want to talk about?” she prompts.

I clear my throat. “Well, I wanted to clarify a few things between us,” I start.

Bella holds up her hands, stopping me. “I like being your friend, Aaron. I don’t want us to put labels on what we have.”

“Alright. So no labels. I just want to—”

“No, please don’t,” she says quickly. “Putting anything else into words is going to end up being too much commitment. I know that it might not make sense to you, but I need this to be undefined right now.”

I process her words, nodding slowly.

She bites her lip. “Is that okay?”

“We don’t need to put labels on anything,” I assure her. “That said, I do need for us to make a few decisions.”

She wraps her arms around herself. “Like what?”

“Like kisses.”

Her cheeks go pink. “I like kisses.”

“But kissing is as far as it should go, at least without further discussion,” I say slowly. “And when or if you invite me up to your apartment, what does that mean to you? Because the common understanding is that it’s an intimate gesture.”

Bella chews the inside of her lip.

I lean my elbows on the table. “Friendship can be intimate, too. So perhaps it’s best if we say that invitations into the apartment mean sitting in the living room and chatting or grabbing a bite to eat. A hard line of no lip contact in the privacy of someone’s home?”

Bella giggles at the way I describe it. “No lip contact, huh?”

I grin back at her. I can’t help but be disappointed that she doesn’t want to define what we are, but I like seeing her laugh.

“Is that agreeable to you?” I push. “Kissing as a hard limit?”

She nods slowly. “Okay. Kissing friends and that’s all.”

She holds out her hand and I shake it. And almost at once, I want to draw her in and kiss her smiling lips.

This may be harder than I thought.

Chapter seventeen

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