Page 46 of It Was Always You

I cleared my throat. "You don't have to worry about me sneaking in there."

She laughed awkwardly. "Of course I know that." But her face turned bright red, and I was pretty sure mine was already that shade as well.

She grabbed some clothes out of her dresser, making sure to block my view, hugging them to her chest before she disappeared into the bathroom.

I lay back on her pillows and sighed. I was in trouble. And if Easton could read the thoughts running through my mind, he would kill me.

"Thanks for lettingme stay in your closet last night," I said as I stuffed my dirty clothes into my backpack after my quick shower.

"No problem," she said. Then, with a pause, seemed to think better of it. "Well, thankfully my dad or Easton didn't notice, so it didn't become a problem." She laughed.

"Yeah, that would definitely be bad." I zipped my backpack shut and threw it over my shoulder, ready to leave her room for the first time that morning.

"I'm sorry I wasn't able to sneak you breakfast up here."

"It's okay." And thankfully, my stomach behaved and didn't grumble at me.

"I'll figure out something better tomorrow."

"Tomorrow?"

Her face flushed. "Well, didn't you say something about going back home on Saturday? I'm feeling brave enough that I'm stupid enough to think that we can pull this off again. I know my closet isn't the most comfortable place in the world, but it was better than sleeping in your car, right?"

"Definitely better."

She turned off her bedroom light, and I followed her down the hall, trying not to notice how good she looked in her dark jeans today.

Eyes up, Noah,I chided myself.

She stopped in the kitchen before heading out and rummaged through the pantry for a moment.

She came out holding two energy bars. "Will these tide you over until lunch?" she asked.

A warm feeling spread through my chest at her thoughtfulness. I took the bars from her hand. "These will be perfect. Thank you." I gave her a meaningful smile, hoping she'd understand how grateful I was. "You're kind of the most thoughtful fake girlfriend I've ever had before."

"You say that like you get fake girlfriends on a regular basis." She raised an eyebrow.

I laughed. "Nope. You would be the first."

"And hopefully the last. I don't think faking relationships should be a regular thing for either of us."

I nodded. "Yeah, they tend to make things confusing." Like how I was starting to get confused into thinking I wanted this to turn real.

She nodded and held her hand out to me. "Well, are you ready to go, fake boyfriend?" she asked.

I looked at her outstretched hand for a moment before taking it in my own. "Yeah, let's go." I gave her hand a squeeze and forced myself not to think about how good it felt in mine and how happy I was that she'd offered it to me even when no one from school was around to see it. I would just let this be whatever it was right now and try not to mess Lexi's life up too badly.

15

LEXI

I breatheda sigh of relief once Noah and I were on our way to school. We had done it. We'd successfully made it through the night without Easton or my dad suspecting anything was going on.

Maybe, just maybe, trying it again tonight wasn't such a terrible idea.

"How did you sleep, anyway?" I asked as he turned down the road just off my street.

He shrugged. "Surprisingly really good. I thought I'd be awake all night since that has become kind of my thing this week, but I slept like a baby."

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