Page 44 of The Kiss of Deception

“Why?”

Here he is contributing to my quandary again with pretty flowers and observant questions and all sorts of gestures that aren’t part of our deal, adding more stuff to the pile of actions I can’t comprehend. A pile that sits considerably lower than laundry on my to-do list. I want to keep ignoring it, but he won’t let me.

“I saw them and I thought of you.” Miles doesn’t elaborate further, as though it’s that simple: flowers remind him of me—so he gets them for me.

So simple that it doesn’t make sense.

I breathe in the floral aroma. “They’re beautiful.”

“Exactly.” My eyes whip up to him only to find his are already on me, heavy with answers to questions I hadn’t dared to voice. With things I desperately don’t want to know.

And still, I can’t look away.

He’s the first to drop his gaze, dragging it down all of me once more. “Ready? Interesting choice of fashion, but it suits you.”

Free from his gray spells, I frown at the outfit in question—another pair of ratty pajamas, these with panda bears, that survived from my teenage days. If there’s an advantage to my small stature, it’s the fact that I’ve never outgrown my favorite items—and I’ll keep them until they’re tatters.

Grateful for the merciful change of topic, I gladly go along. “Hilarious.”

I trudge back inside, veering for the living room. When he follows, he finds me kneeling in front of the laptop on the coffee table. I feel his eyes on me as I save the document I’ve been working on all day, but only when he’s in front of me, on the opposite side of the small table, do I meet his cloudy grays.

“I thought we’d agreed to go to the match as a date.” His voice sounds lower, as though he’s dipped it to reach me, given the asymmetry of our positions.

My knees tremble a little as I push myself to my feet, with the urgency to clarify the terms. “We established it would be one of our public appearances, yes.”

“Yes,” he says with a tug on my messy ponytail. “Our public appearances.” My raven hair falls in long tresses around my shoulders with the faintest slosh. Then, his fingers are on the tangles, combing through them, and my argument melts into a moan I barely stifle. “Perfect.”

But it isn’t his work on my hair that he admires.

He blinks.

“Very in tune with the outfit. Let’s go.” He playfully turns to leave, giving me the time to analyze his fashion choices.

A white dress shirt fits his strong shoulders like it was tailor made for them, clinging to his abs in a way that leaves little to my imagination. Three buttons were purposely forgotten to allow me a peak at the sparse hair of his chest. The sleeves are rolled up to show me corded forearms and carved muscles—and the scrunchie he stole.

On his blessed feet, white sneakers, pristine, polished with the symbol of his sponsors in blue. The slight limp as he favors his left leg—a perk of the injury he's been dealing with for the past few weeks—is almost gone, unnoticeable to anyone who isn’t analyzing the slightly faded stitches of the back pockets of his jeans.

When he swings his head in my direction, his grin is smug. Knowing.

My cheeks flame, caught red-handed, but I shrug. “Informed decisions regarding important matters such as the outfit for a key public appearance require due investigation on the dress code.”

Big words sound an awful lot like an incriminating justification, so I scurry away before I inflate his ego further to avoid an accidental explosion.

Barricaded myself inside my room where his chuckles can’t catch me, I allow a few breaths to compose myself, though I don’t have an answer as to why my knees wobble.

The mirror gapes horrified at the mess he made of my curls. I look like I just rolled out of bed—or rolled around in bed. I apply some cream to tame the mane, giving them a squeeze to solidify the shape.

I don’t own anything denim, so I select a black crop top with spaghetti straps that I’ll pair with an unbuttoned white oversized shirt tucked into black wide pants. Finally, I resort to my collection of sneakers for a splash of color, picking a pair that’s a tapestry of pastel pink, green and beige.

With a final breath, I adjust a strap over my collarbone tattoo and steel myself for what’s coming.

I find Miles where I left him, agonized face bent over the book I’ve been reading.

“Why would you willingly read—” He stops as soon as his gaze darts to me.

“Happy to know you don’t like horror. That’s what you get for snooping.”

“You look…” He stares at the chandelier, as though the answer hangs there. “Fuck.” It was a mutter that wasn’t meant for my ears, but they caught it all the same.

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