Page 87 of After Tonight

“Well,” Riley said. “They do call it falling in love. Falling is easy. You just let yourself go and it happens.”

Lucy grinned. “Yes. Exactly.”

“And now, I need to go. To your bookshop. To tell a man I love him.”

“Go!”

And she did. She ran all the way to the shop.

Riley caught Derek just as his hand reached for the bookshop door.

“Hey.”

He turned. “Hey.”

“I love you.”

He dropped his hand and turned to face her fully. But he said nothing.

“Did you hear me?” she asked.

“Well, yeah.” He arched a brow. “I was waiting for more.”

She propped a hand on her hip. “More? Like what?”

He shrugged. “Something else. I already knew that part.”

Her heart warmed. “Oh.”

He grinned. “How about you tell me that this little tantrum of yours is over.”

She frowned. “Tantrum? Really? Being sure that you really do feel the way you say you feel? Making you work at winning a woman over? Making you—”

“See? Your cheeks are pink and your voice is rising,” he broke in. “Tantrum.”

She realized he was pushing her buttons. As usual. “If you’re not going to take me seriously and you’re going to argue with everything,then I don’t know about this after all.”

“But you love me.”

She felt a little thrill shoot through her. “Yeah, but I also kind of want to smother you with a pillow.”

His grin grew. “So that’s a yes to the question about whether you’ll be back in my bed tonight.”

She fought her smile. “You might want to sleep with an eye open.”

“Oh, I don’t intend to do a lot of sleeping at all.”

And just like that, heat and desire swept through her. And happiness. There was a huge dose of that too. “I have to work tonight. I don’t know when I’ll be done.”

He shrugged and took a step toward her. “Well, I’m doing these crazy cemetery tours, so I’ll be late too. Come over whenever.”

“Oh, that reminds me…” She rummaged in her bag and pulled out the black T-shirt she’d bought him. “I need you to wear this tonight while you do the tours.”

He caught it when she tossed it to him. He shook it out and held it up and read, “I licked it so it’s mine.” He grinned. “I like it.”

“It will keep your tour groupies away.”

He slung it over his shoulder. “That’s kind of clingy of you.”

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