Page 109 of Tell Me It’s Right

I look away and lean back. Obviously I don’t like seeing it. Or being around it. Or, God, smelling it. But I get enough jabs and jokes when people find out I’m a vegetarian as it is. Bringing more attention to it is the last thing I want to do.

He ducks his head to meet my eyes. “You’re just too nice to ask me not to, right?”

My face burns at how easily he can read me.

“Gracie, I want the asparagus roll. You know, I think the only thing missing in my life right now is some asparagus, actually.”

“Do you even like asparagus?”

He shrugs and finishes making the order. “I will now. So.” He settles into the couch, then grabs my legs, pulls them across his lap, and hands me the TV remote. “What’ll it be, birthday girl?”

I chew on my lip and sift through the options.Something I haven’t seen before or an old favorite…

“Can I ask you something that’s none of my business?” Liam says.

“Sure.” I switch to a different app that’s usually better about having new releases.

“This being your first time…why is that? I don’t believe for a second you didn’t have guys throwing themselves at you in college.”

I stop scrolling.

“You don’t have to tell me. I just wondered if there was a reason.”

I inhale slowly, considering my words. It’s a fair question, but I’ve never tried to put together the words for an answer.

“There were a few guys in college,” I say slowly. “And we fooled around a little bit. But the first time I ever got close to having sex, I ended up telling him I wasn’t ready yet. And, you know, he was nice about it in the moment, but then afterward he pretty much ghosted me. We talked sometimes, but nothing like it had been, until he stopped reaching out altogether.”

I hated the way I could still feel butterflies in my stomach every time his name popped up on my phone, how that turned into a gaping pit in my gut when I finally realized I was never going to hear from him again. I’d held out hope for weeks—far longer than I should have.

“And he’d seemed so genuine before that,” I say softly. “But as soon as he realized he wasn’t going to get to sleep with me, he turned into this completely different person. So then whenever there were other guys, and I actually did, you know, want to sleep with them? I would tell them no. Just to see if they reacted the same way.” I swallow hard. “And they did. All of them. I just wanted to see if they would wait—they wouldn’t have even had to wait long!—if a single one of them cared about me more than they cared about that, and it never happened. So I decided I would rather stay a virgin than have my first time be with someone like that. At some point I stopped bothering with dating. It felt…pointless. Shallow.” I give him a wry smile. “The hopeless romantic in me couldn’t take it.”

He frowns, the tension in his forehead carving deep lines, and his hands tighten around my legs. “I’m really glad you didn’t. Not just because selfishly I’m glad it was with me. I hate that you experienced that. I don’t understand how a single one ofthem could have gotten to know you and not fallen completely in love with you.” He brings me into his chest and kisses the side of my head. “I’m crazy about you, Gracie,” he murmurs in a voice almost too low for me to hear. “And I’m still going to say that tomorrow and every day after.”

My throat tightens. I hadn’t realized how much I needed to hear that. He traces the backs of my hands, his fingers playing idly with mine. Such a simple action, but it makes the last of the tension in my body deflate, like this, finally, is what convinced it we’re safe right now.

In fact, being with Liam, I don’t know if I’ve ever felt safer in my life.

The sushi arrives halfway through the movie—a recent romcom release—and Liam ends up liking the asparagus rolls so much that I have to fight him away from stealing pieces of mine too.

He tries to pull me against his chest, but I wiggle away.

“Would you just get over here?” he says with a sigh.

“You’re trying to distract me so you can take the last piece.”

“Fine. Finish it, then come here.”

I narrow my eyes at him as I chew, and he lifts an eyebrow while he waits. When I’m done, I cautiously scoot closer, not sure if he’s trying to lure me in to put me in a chokehold or wrestle me to the ground or something.

He stretches an arm out to make room for me. “So paranoid.”

“I grew up with Leo. Sue me.”

But as I settle against his chest and he props his chin on the top of my head, all he does is pull up the camera on his phone.

“I’m sorry I didn’t get one at the party,” he murmurs. “I don’t want to not have a picture with you on your birthday.”

I look up at his face as he snaps the picture. Simple words, and he says them casually enough, but the romance-book girl inside of me is melting. Because despite how hard and intimidating and cool he may seem on the outside, I think Liam Brooks is as much of a hopeless romantic as I am.

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