Page 29 of After Tonight

Yeah, Derek was going to be fine at this relationships stuff. He was wonderful with her mother, their grandmothers…hell, he was sweet to the entire town of Sapphire Falls. He basically romanced the town all the time. He’d just never applied it to a woman.

The thing was, once he decided to, he’d probably be really good at it.

How had she not seen that? She hadn’t thought it through. Because with her, he was a…pain in the ass. He liked to push her buttons and tease. And not in a sexy way. In a…well, a pushing-her-buttons kind of way. He was different with her, but yeah, he kind of had some potential for being boyfriend material after all. Maybe there was a chance he could pull it off.

Like a 40% chance.

But that wasn’t good enough for girls like Lucy. No, Riley wasn’t actually training him to be the perfect boyfriend for Lucy. Lucy wasn’t interested. But Derek didn’t know that and it was fun to lead him on, letting him think that Riley was hauling him out of bed before his alarm because Lucy was a morning person, when really Riley just wanted to mess with him a little. She owed him for the ants in her peanut butter. At least. Anyone would agree. And she wanted to test him. Test him to see just how far he’d go to become a “better man” for these sweet, nice girls he thought he wanted to date.

Riley poured coffee and carried the cups to the table. She drank it black and so did Derek. In spite of the multitude of cream flavors he kept around.

“You okay?” she asked as she slid into the chair perpendicular to him.

He cut into one of the crepes. “Yeah.” He lifted it to his mouth. He tasted the bite, chewing slowly. Then he nodded. “This is really good.”

“Thanks.” She sipped her coffee.

He sipped his coffee.

She took a bite of her crepe. Which was really good.

He took another bite.

She took another sip of coffee. And tried not to grind her teeth.

At her parents’ house, she would give a hundred bucks every morning just to sit at the table and eat without conversation. But with Derek, this felt awkward.

“I don’t think I’ve ever had anything that was blueberry and pomegranate together,” he said, taking another bite.

She blinked at him, waiting for him to make some disparaging comment about pomegranates. She didn’t really know how someone would disparage pomegranates, but Derek would find a way. Even if he didn’t mean it. She knew, had always known, that about 70% of the stuff he gave her shit about was just to give her shit and wasn’t actually how he felt.

When she’d gone through the phase where she’d studied and listened to everything the Beatles had ever done, Derek had delighted in telling her “behind the scenes” stories about the guys. About 90% of what he’d told her was complete bullshit. Just like the things he’d told her he’d read about the dangers of a vegan diet when she’d gone through that phase had been 90% bullshit. Just like the statistics he’d cited when they’d argued about the government’s climate change policies had been 90% bullshit. Just like most of the things they’d ever argued about had been around 92% bullshit on his part. He just seemed incapable of agreeing with her and having the conversation end cordially.

All of which made her conscience completely clear about her fake nice-guy training program.

And maybe it wasn’t entirely fake. If he warmed up a towel for a woman while she was in the shower, even once ever, Riley would have done a very good deed.

But Derek said nothing disparaging about pomegranates. He just took another bite.

Riley slapped her hand down on the table. “What are you doing?”

He cocked an eyebrow. “Eating.”

“You’re eating crepes,” she said. “With blueberry pomegranate chai seed jam.”

He cut off another piece. “I know.”

“And you haven’t said one thing about how the chai seed farmers are slowly poisoning us with pesticides, or asking if eating crepes will suddenly give you the urge to go see a musical.”

He chewed, watching her. After he swallowed, he took a sip of coffee. “No, I haven’t,” he finally agreed.

“Why not?”

“Because…”

She frowned as he trailed off. “Because why?”

“Because I wouldn’t say any of that to Lucy.”

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