Page 34 of The Girlfriend Zone

She looks around. Everly’s deep in conversation with a reporter, and Max is with her. “I can take the bus or ask Everly to drive me home,” she says, glancing back at them.

“But I’m offering.” I try to keep my tone casual. “It’s no big deal to give you a ride.”

She nods. “You’re right.”

A minute later, she’s sliding into my car, and we’re leaving the parking lot like we’re escaping. Something in me relaxes as soon as we’re out of there, on the streets of San Francisco with my team far behind, and I can’t hold back. “What happened to the pictures?”

She glances at me, as if she’s feigning confusion. “Which ones?”

“You know which ones,” I say, feeling an uncharacteristic edge in my tone. There’s a part of me that thinks she might have deleted them, erased that day like it didn’t happen. The possibility’s been gnawing at me all morning. Even though we can’t be together, it’s like I need to know that we might have tried. That even in spite of both our relationship baggage—because I know I have plenty of checked luggage, and based on what she said the day we were together, I’ve got a hunch she has a carry-on too—we’d still have tried. The thought that I could be wrong about that is a bruise I can’t stop touching.

“Don’t make me spell it out.”

“You’re going to have to be more specific,” she says, arching a brow. “I take a lot of photos.”

At the red light, I turn to her, my irritation slipping through in my tone. “The ones from that day.”

She looks at me, her gaze calm, steady. “And I’m asking you—which ones?”

Like she’s forcing me to admit I can’t stop thinking aboutall of them.Well, easy enough. “Every shot. What happened to them?”

A small, devilish smile plays on her lips, and it’s clear she has the upper hand and knows it, maybe even likes it. “I kept them.”

Shehasthem, and I don’t. That’s not fair. She gets to revisit that day whenever she wants, and I’m left withnothing. I’m irrationally annoyed. “Why didn’t you send them to me?”

“You said we weren’t going to talk.”

Technically, we saiddate, but pointing that out would be a dick move. Especially since I never responded to her thank you text. And yet, I’m kind of a dick, when I add, “You said that too.”

“Yes,weboth said that,” she corrects me softly.

And she honored that, and I have mad respect for her self-control. But still, I’m so tightly wound right now. Since the second I saw her peering at the back of her camera, it’s all I’ve been able to think about—the pictures. Except, no. It’s not even the pictures that are driving me wild. It’s what she might have done with them. That’s what I need to know. If she’s as affected by that day as I am.

The light flips to green, and I press down on the gas a little harder than before. “Do you look at them?” I ask, barely above a whisper but loud enough, I hope, for her to hear.

“What do you think?” Her voice is light but tinged with something more.

“Why aren’t you answering me?”

“Why areyoudying to know?”

The answer bursts out of me. “Because I’d look at them if I had them. I wouldn’t stop looking at them,” I say, not bothering to play it cool.

Her gaze softens, but there’s something bittersweet in her tone as she says, “That’s why I held on to them. To look at them.”

The light ahead changes to red, and I slow down, the weight of her words sinking in. “I want them.”

She raises a brow. “Are you sure?”

“Yeah, I’m sure. Why? Are they bad photos?”

Her lips twitch into a smile. “No, they’re good.”

“So I’ll like them,” I say, feeling…relief, but a wild excitement too.

“Maybe too much,” she adds.

I’ll consider myself warned.

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