Page 24 of Hold Me Today

Deep breath, girl. You can do this.

My lungs contract, and I catch the scent of dreams and must and dead flowers.

It’s official, the potted plants have to go.

Crossing the distance to the front door, I unlatch the key and slip the door open wide, poking my head out. “Did you bring the tissues?”

His full lips tug upward. “Something better, actually.”

My focus changes trajectory and darts down the length of him, to the plastic Walgreens bag he’s gripping in his left hand. “Forewarning, if you kill me and try to dispose of my body, I willneverforget that you failed to uphold your end of the bargain.” I step back as he turns his big body to edge past me. His jean-clad ass grazes my stomach—our heights are so varied, and I suck in my belly to eliminate contact.

Damn all those cookies I ate last night, waiting for him to hit REPLY and make me feel less pathetic.

“I’m not going to kill you,” Nick says, coming to a stop as he hits the center of the room. The plastic bag hangs at his side, its contents hidden by the red logo, as he plants his free hand on his hip and slowly spins on his heel to survey the space. “Those plants look mutilated.”

I look to the pots in question. Remorse stings my throat as I cringe. “I tried to keep them alive.”

Nick’s throaty chuckle curls my toes in my shoes. “With what?” he deadpans without looking in my direction. “Bleach?”

“Water,” I mutter quickly, half under my breath. He’s not wrong. The poor plants look like they’ve attempted to mosey on through the Sahara Desert and haven’t come out the other side to tell the tale. “I hope you realize I’m not paying you for the chit chat.” The words are matter-of-fact, my tone teasing.

Itcatches his attention, and he swings around to look at me. “Keep talking about payment, and I’ll start collecting.” He winks—winks—and then stalks over to the old sinks that line the far back wall and sit cattycorner to the hallway leading to a few back rooms.

“What were you thinking for this area?” he calls out. Light invades the space when he flicks a switch, and I scramble to hurry over and meet him. “A bathroom? Maybe a separate room to wash hair instead of having it all out in the open? The salon next door to me, they’ve done a great job utilizing the square footage they’ve got.” Nick knocks a balled fist on the wall to his left. “We can do the same thing here. Play with the room size, the layouts.”

I think back to the initial sketches Jake the IOU Man himself drew up. Sketches that I feel do the job, even if they aren’t incredibly unique. “Did you get the plans I sent you? The ones attached to the email?”

Nick spares me a quick glance. “I trashed them.”

My mouth falls open. “I’m sorry, I thought you just said that youtrashedour entire email thread?”

He sets the Walgreens bag down by his feet. Then, from the back pocket of his jeans, he pulls out his phone and swipes it open with a flick of his thumb across the screen. One tap, two taps, and then he’s turning the phone toward me and I’m staring at the layout of the salon Jake created before bailing with my money.

“This,” Nick murmurs, wiggling the phone in my face, “is the work of a man who doesn’t give a shit. He’s got a bathroom next to the kitchenette, and nobody, Mina, wants to shit where they eat.”

“I thought the saying was ‘shit where they sleep’?”

“Yeah, you’re probably right.” Head cocking to the side and lips curving in a sly grin, he pockets his cell phone. “I told my mom once that I wanted to write a book with all the sayings I get wrong because she never understood them in the first place.” With a low chuckle, he teases, “First-generation problems, am I right?”

His self-deprecating tone pulls a laugh from me. It’s definitely true. My mom and dad certainly haven’t cornered the market on American colloquialisms, even after thirty years of living in Boston. “It’d be an instant bestseller,” I tell Nick, “something they’ll pick up right after they’ve watchedMy Big Fat Greek Weddingfor the tenth time.”

“Only ten times?” His gray eyes flash with humor, and I’m momentarily struck silent with the realization that Nick and I have been talking for almost fifteen minutes and notoncehas our banter skated into dangerous territory. We’re actually, might I say,getting along?Hello, alternate universe. “How about twenty, at least,” he adds.

“I was trying to lowball it.”

“Speaking of lowballing it, we’re not doing that with your salon.”

“But the plans—”

“Are awful,” he interrupts, “and there’s no shot in hell I’ll ever put my company’s name anywhere near them.”

“Your ego is showing, Saint Nick.” I sing-song the words, unable to keep myself from making fun of him. Just a little. “You better watch out before I start thinking all that good-guy niceness was only a façade.”

Planting a hand on the wall to my right, he leans in, big body bending at the waist, lowering his face until we’re nose to nose. Up close, his pewter eyes are as mercurial as ever, with flecks of blue and green. His gaze never wavers from mine, and then he lowers his voice, the gravel pitch slicking through my limbs like I’ve been dunked in molasses. “You do realize that you don’t know everything about me, right?”

My breath constricts in my chest. “I think I know enough.”

One shift of his large frame and then the toes of his work boots are kissing the tips of my flats. I catch his scent, that musky combo of male and sawdust and something woodsy that shouldn’t be appealing given who he is—Effie’s brother, my old, teenage crush—but nevertheless succeeds in sweeping around me like forbidden temptation.

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