Page 47 of Never Kiss Your Neighbors

I rush over to the back fence faster than if I were shot out of the toy cannon I’m constructing. Cam’s right behind me, and both of us peer over into her yard, waving to get our gorgeous neighbor’s attention.

She doesn’t see us at first, then she gives a small wave from the back door.

She’s still focused on getting the dog to come to her, and it’s hard to tell from this distance, but it seems like something’s wrong.

“Everything okay?” I call out.

“Yeah, everything’s fine.” Her tone is stiff. Maybe Goldfish got into something? We’ve only been messing around with water lately. I hope we didn’t accidentally create a muddy spot in her yard.

“Do you have a minute to talk?” Cam asks.

She hesitates, then slides into her shoes and comes out, closing the door behind her.

“Okay if we come over?”

Instead of waiting for her to answer my question, Cam vaults over the fence, so I go after him.

Stella’s standing in the center of the lawn, arms wrapped around herself, covering most of the pale pink shirt she’s wearing. Her hair is piled up on her head, and her face looks so soft and fresh that I have an overwhelming urge to kiss her.

But first, I need to find out what’s wrong. I pull my eyes away from her and assess the yard. Nothing seems to be amiss. Goldfish is running around between Cam and me, wagging his tail.

“Everything okay?” I repeat.

“Everything’s fine.” She still doesn’t sound fine, and she’s not smiling, but maybe something’s going on that she doesn’t want to talk about.

“You look nice this morning. I like your hair like this.” Cam must be having the same urges I am, because he goes straight over to her, touches her hair, and slides an arm around her waist. He tries to hug her, but she pulls back.

“We shouldn’t do that,” she says.

Shit.There’s a wall up. And it’s higher than the fence we just cleared.

“Stella, what’s wrong? Did something happen?” I want to touch her so much my fingers ache, but I stay back.

“Thank you for the beer, by the way,” Cam says. “Trish forgot to tell us about it, and we didn’t see it until this morning.”

She nods and mumbles, “You’re welcome.” It doesn’t look like the beer, or our lack of acknowledgement, is the issue.

“We were planning to come by to see you later this morning,” I tell her, and she frowns.

Maybe we’ve been taking things too slow, but it’s only been a few days since we went out. We kissed her the night we babysat, and we’ve been in touch with texts. I thought we’ve been striking the right balance between letting her know we’re interested and coming on too strong, but we’re still getting to know her, and she may have a different perspective on things.

“We wanted to ask if you’d like to go out again,” Cam says. “We could play a different escape room, with or without Jessie, it’s up to you. Or do something else entirely.”

She takes a step backward, folding her arms more tightly around herself. The wall just got higher. She kicks at a clump of grass near her foot. “I had a lot of fun the night we went out, but I don’t think we should go out again.”

“Why?” Cam asks, beating me to the question.

“When I date again, I need to focus on looking for something serious. I have Jessie to think about, and I want to invest my time in something with future potential.”

Wow, okay. Does Stella see us the same way our followers do? Just good for looks and laughs, eye candy with no substance? It’s a punch in the gut, and I’m ready to jump back over the fence, but Cam doesn’t seem to be taking it quite as hard.

“Why are you assuming this can’t be something serious? Because there’s two of us?”

She doesn’t quite look him in the eye. “I’m not comfortable with what you do …with what goes on with all your fans.”

“That doesn’t mean anything,” Cam says, waving a hand dismissively. “Besides, we don’t plan on making shirtless videos forever.”

I crouch to pet Goldfish and take time to think things over. The idea of Stella looking at our channel makes me cringe. Some of the videos are fun and funny, but if she ventured into the comment section? That’s a different story.

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