Page 97 of Up All Night

I turned to her, resting my hip on the counter. “Let’s just say this is our fourth date. That doesn’t mean we’re dating. We haven’t talked at all about where this is going, about expectations, anything remotely having to do with being a couple. We’re taking things slow, and I’m grateful for that.”

“Slow?” She raised one brow. “I wouldn’t call your hot and heavy make-out sessions taking things slow.”

Now I was regretting telling her all the juicy details.

And fine, maybe our physical relationship wasn’t going very slow. I’d been more than ready to give it up to him right there in the middle of my dance studio floor. Thankfully he’d had enough willpower to stop us from taking things too far. Sleeping together would only complicate things between us. I already didn’t know what we were doing. All I knew was that I wanted to spend every spare minute I had with him.

I crossed my arms. “I’d like to see how strong you are at resisting a guy who makes you—”

She held up her hand to silence me. “I know, I know. He rocks your world and all that jazz. You’ve told me three times this past week about what an amazing kisser he is and how he has magic hands and all the other cheesy metaphors.”

I couldn’t help but smile. It was true. I’d been singing West’s praises the four days since we’d last spent any time together.

“All I’m saying,” she continued, “is that if it was more of a casual relationship, you wouldn’t be texting each other all day, making out like there’s no tomorrow, and spending all your weekends together.”

Her words both excited and scared me.

I liked West. A lot. But the thought of getting serious, making things more official, kind of freaked me out.

When West had just been my grumpy neighbor, I’d sworn I was done with men. At least for a really, really long time. I wanted to focus on making myself happy without feeling like I needed a man to do that. Or feel like I needed a man to define my worth. I prided myself on being independent but had really been going from guy to guy over the last ten years—just like my mother.

This was actually the longest I’d ever gone without having a boyfriend. Jeremy had broken up with me nearly a year and a half ago, and look where I was now: I was finally chasing my dreams.

Would adding West into my life make me forget my priorities? Would he cloud my judgment and have me forgetting myself? I wanted to say there was room for him and my dreams and that we’d ride out into the sunset together, but my past experience reminded me that I didn’t have a great track record when it came to choosing men.

Every guy I’d ever dated had broken up with me. I couldn’t know for sure why unless I went and asked them, which was not going to happen, but all I could think of was that I hadn’t truly been myself with any of them. I was a chameleon, trying to be the woman I thought they wanted. Again, just like my mother.

My stomach roiled, and suddenly I felt sick.

I’d tried so hard to not be like her, but I’d shown that despite my best efforts, I couldn’t be trusted to not follow suit when it came to men.

“Are you okay?” Kate asked, interrupting my bleak realization. “You look pale.”

I inhaled deeply, hoping to ease my sudden nausea. “Yeah, I’m fine.” I gave her a weak smile.

Kate didn’t look like she believed me, but before she could say anything, a knock sounded at the door.

“Do you want me to get that?” she asked.

“No, no,” I said, pulling myself together. “I can get it. Thanks.”

I took one more big breath and opened the door.

West took me in, a wide grin filling his face. Seeing him so happy to see me had my nausea disappearing, quickly replaced by the exciting feeling of butterflies.

He looked so handsome in his Henley shirt and jeans, and I had to work hard not to launch myself at him so I could feel the muscles I could see outlined underneath his shirt.

“Hey,” he said, his voice coming out softly. He sounded like just the sight of me had an effect on him.

The corner of my lips tipped up in pure giddiness at how he was looking at me. “Hi.”

We stood there for another couple seconds, staring at each other with goofy smiles on our faces, and it was like I was in junior high again going on my first date.

“Are you ready to go?” he asked.

“Yep.” I walked out and closed the door behind me, not wanting to see whatever ‘I told you so’ look was surely on Kate’s face.

We got in his car and pulled out of the parking lot, and I waited for him to tell me where we were headed.

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