Page 98 of Study Buddies

“I’m serious. You’re only here because you were kind enough to come help. So you’re not paying.”

“I told you, I understand. When we check in, we can ask them to—oh crap, they just emailed the receipt.”

It was kind of odd how much I wanted to strangle him, even though he was helping me. “I’ll pay you back.”

“Sure, but you don’t have to, I mean?—”

“Lucas, remember that extremely uncomfortable conversation we had last night? One of the main points, if not the actual thesis, was that you don’t need to protect me.”

“Extremely uncomfortable?”

“You disagree?”

“Yeah, I think you’re downplaying it.” He let out a quiet, rueful laugh and rubbed the back of his neck. The muscles of my face felt stiff when they broke into a small smile.

Last night’s discussion had been awful, but finding out my mother was marrying Doug had eclipsed it. “What’s a stronger word thanextremely, then?”

He didn’t lift his gaze from his screen. “You’re the future English teacher.”

Oh yeah. “Umm… astoundingly uncomfortable. Phenomenally uncomfortable. Overwhelmingly uncomfortable.”

“Yeah, all of the above. And you could get a summer job as a walking, talking thesaurus.”

Thank god he was still looking at his phone, because my jaw dropped when he mentioned the safeword Kyle had given me. Hopefully, that was just a coincidence.

“We’ve got an hour or two before we can check in,” he said. “I know a really good bookstore, if you’re interested.”

“No thanks. I know what we can do.”

“Care to share with me?”

“You’ll see.”

“Guess I will.” He put his phone into his pocket.

Forty minutes later, I parked in front of what was quite possibly my favorite spot in the entire state.

Lucas squinted through the windshield. “A thrift store?”

I turned off the engine. “Not just any thrift store. An upscale boutique that always has the best finds.” Okay,boutiquewas kind of stretching the truth a bit, but it was still a nice place. “Remember that green dress I wore on our date?”

“Vividly,” he said, in a tone I couldn’t quite identify.

“I got that here.”

Lucas examined the storefront with renewed interest.

“My mom and I stopped here whenever we could make it to Atlanta. Doug would never be caught dead in a thrift store, so it’s something that was just for us.”

“Ah,” Lucas said. “I get it. We’re here because this place is sentimental to you and your mother.”

My eyes rolled so hard they almost made a complete rotation. “No, we’re here because we need something to wear to the wedding tomorrow.”

“Oh.” Lucas glanced down at the flannel button-down shirt he wore over a white t-shirt and his black jeans. Then he looked over at the oversized sweatshirt and the jeans I’d thrown on this morning. “Good point. Okay, let’s go shopping.”

“It’s called thrifting.” I climbed out of the car with a grin on my face. If I could just focus on the store itself and not the reasonwhy we needed the clothes, this might even be fun. “And I’m excellent at it.”

Lucas moved to my side. “Then let’s go thrifting.”

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