Page 34 of One Whopper of a Love Story

“I know what you’re hoping.”

“Is it that obvious? He doesn’t care that I giggle. He likes me in spite of my irrational fear of fish, and he’s so big and oomph.” I pretended to squeeze an invisible Nico, which made Lettie shake her head. “I just mean he’s tall, broad, and muscly. And I love it.”

“It’s obvious he’s just as nuts for you as you are for him.”

I couldn’t help but grin because what she said was true. He made it obvious. If I was being played, he deserved some sort of acting award and a hard smack, and I didn’t mean the kissing kind.

After waddling back to my bedroom and wriggling out of the tail, I pulled on my frog jammies.

Lettie called out, “You feel like cooking? Because I don’t. I vote we pick up barbeque.”

“Good idea. I hadn’t even thought about dinner.” I glanced at my phone. “Usually when he isn’t working, I’ve talked to Nico at least four times by now, but so far today, I’ve only gotten a short text canceling our workout session. My muscles were happy, but my eyes were not.”

“He’ll call. Maybe something happened with work.” She picked up her keys. “You going in your jammies?”

“Yeah.” I pulled on a sweatshirt to cover the fact that I had on only a tank top. “You don’t think something bad happened, do you? I’ve never heard of him getting called in on his day off. Would they do that? I like to think of him giving speeding tickets and writing up reports, but what if...” I stopped in the doorway.

She motioned me out, then locked the door. “No news is good news, Layla. If something was wrong, he’d have someone contact you.”

Nodding, I followed her toward the parking lot. “You’re right. He would do that... if he’s alive.” My phone vibrated, startling me. When I saw who was calling, I swiped to answer. “Nico! You aren’t dead!”

“Not dead. Just dead tired.” He almost didn’t sound like himself because of heaviness, a weariness weighing down his words. “Sorry I didn’t call earlier. Are you free right now? I thought we could grab a quick dinner.”

“Yes. I can meet you. I just have to change out of my jammies. I know it’s not even seven, but jammies are comfy.”

“The frogs?” A hint of the usual Nico broke through with that question.

“The very same. But I can be ready in two minutes. Hang on a sec.” I muted the phone. “Nico is coming to get me.”

She waved. “Have fun. I’ll see you in the morning.”

“Bye.” I clicked to talk again as I turned back toward the apartment. “Okay, I’m back. When will you be here?”

On his end of the line, there was movement, but he didn’t say anything.

I stopped at the door and remembered that I’d left my keys because Lettie had hers. “Nico? You there?”

I felt his breath before I heard the words. “I’m right here.”

Slapping a hand to my mouth to stifle my scream, I spun around and stared into his sad brown eyes. “What’s wrong?”

“I’ll tell you over dinner. Don’t change. If you’d rather not go into a restaurant like that, I’ll get it to go, and we can eat at my place.”

“Sure. And that’s good because Lettie has the keys.”

He hooked a thumb over his shoulder. “She just went that way. We can probably catch her.” He turned, then stopped. “Or you could stay at my place, and I could just have you back here in time to get ready for work. No funny stuff. It would be just like last time.”

“I have to be up really early.”

He caught my hand. “So do I, and I could use the company tonight.”

I threw my arms around his neck. “I don’t know what’s wrong, but I hate seeing you so sad.”

He lifted me off my feet, and I wrapped my legs around him.

When we arrived at his truck, he set me down. “What sounds good?”

I shrugged. “I’m happy with—”

---