Page 76 of Roommate's Guide to Love

Maeve’s outburst scares the shit out of me. “What?”

I frantically start looking around the bar to see if I missed someone come in, or if maybe the kitchen randomly caught on fire. But when I see nothing, I turn back to Maeve, who’s pointing straight at me.

“That look!” she yells. “Thereissomething going on between you two.”

Now, I have a split second to make a decision here. I could finally come clean to my sisters about what had been going on with Porter and I for longer than Maeve’s son has been alive. Or, because it’s not happening anymore, I could continue to keep mum about the only secret I’ve ever kept from them.

“Sorry to burst your bubble, Mama Maeve, but nothing is going on between Porter and I. I’m just his roommate.”

“That’s how italwaysstarts,” Stella says. “One second you’re living together, raising a baby. Next thing you know you’re bumping into him coming out of the shower and oops! Towel falls down. I wonder what will happen next.”

“You’re ridiculous,” I say as I stand up from the chair. But only because I don’t want my face to give me away, because I have seen Porter in just a towel. And it should be criminal for a man to look like that, well, ever. “I’m going to go get your salads. When I come back, let’s maybe find a new topic of conversation that doesn’t revolve around my life. Oh! Remember when Ainsley said she drank in college? Let’s finally circle back around to that.”

My sisters snicker as I walk back to the kitchen to grab their salads. Honestly, the bell notifying me that their food was ready couldn’t have come at a better time. Just going back to the kitchen, grabbing the dishes, and an exorbitant amount of ranch, gives me enough time to compose myself. Because truth be told, every day I live with Porter is one more day I have to remind myself that I shouldn’t be staring at him.

Or sneaking looks at him anytime we’re in the same room.

Or trying to forget how I almost kissed him the day I cut myself.

I’ve been so close to breaking so many times. Between the way he held me when I finally grieved the loss of quitting my job, to taking care of me when I nearly sliced my finger off. Which I didn’t. I didn’t even need stitches. But the way he came running to me, and looked at me with such concern…fuck, it was hard to resist.

And when he kissed my finger? I nearly melted on his kitchen floor.

I always knew Porter had a sweet streak in him. Granted, for years, I mostly saw the dirty-talking side that chokes me from time to time. But seeing him over these last few weeks? The sweetness is undeniable. It’s pure. And it’s been there the whole time, and yet, I never got to know it.

Or, more accurately, I never allowed myself to.

I kept it casual. I made sure I never spent the night. I made sure it was sex and sex only. There’s no room for sweetness in the situation I carved for us.

But not Porter. He’s the one to always clean me up after. Make sure that I’m okay after I come down from the high he’s given me. He’s the one who always demanded a text message to let him know I got home safely.

And he’s the one who asked me to stay.

Then there’s me: The one who leaves as soon as she can. The one who wants to make sure this is a secret. The one who draws the line in the sand.

The one who never believed a man like him could actually love a woman like me.

The one who feels her carefully constructed walls breaking a little more every day.

“Dammit, Porter McCoy…what are you doing to me?”

* * *

Usually it takes me all of two minutes to walk across the parking lot from The Joint to Porter’s house. But today I take my sweet time.

Not that I don’t want to get home to spend my night with Grace, but I don’t want to see Porter.

I mean, I have to at some point, and it will only be a few minutes before we play tag for Porter to head over to the bar. But after the talk I had with my sisters today, and the emotional floodgate that opened, my head and my heart need a little bit of a break.

Even if that comes in the form of walking extra slow and then sitting on the front porch to scroll through my phone.

Out of habit, I check my emails, which I don’t know why I do. It’s not like I have a job offer sitting there, or a formal apology from my school district telling me that they realize that the P.E.N.I.S.s are horrible and they’d love to have me back. No, I’m usually just looking for good coupons so I have an excuse to shop for things I don’t need under the impression that buying will make me feel something.

I delete most of them, saving a few for possibly an online shopping dopamine hit later tonight, when I see an unusual email from something called “Quinn’s Crew Book Club.”

I probably would’ve scrolled right past it if it wasn’t my name. And, don’t get me wrong, I get plenty of spam and random emails every day, but after a while, you start becoming familiar with the senders. And I know for a fact I’ve never seen a sender of anything with my name.

Curiosity getting the best of me, I ignore every email training I’ve ever had and open it.

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