Page 206 of Flipping His Script
Chapter 77
Flynn
Showtime?What the hell didthatmean?Didn't she get it?I didn't ask her out to put on a show. I'd asked her out for real.
I gave myself a mental kick in the ass. But of course she thought otherwise. Why wouldn’t she? It's not like I'd told her that our deal was over.
But it was.
I was done.And wanted her to be done, too. No more faking. No more acting out for the cameras. No more saying one thing and meaning another.
I'd been planning to tell her over dinner – or maybe afterward – when the time was right, when we had some distance from yesterday's shit-show, when she was relaxed and smiling.
Dumb-ass.
Not her. Me.
Whywouldshe be relaxed? To her, this was work. But to me, it was something else entirely. "Wait," I said.
With her car door still open, Anna turned in her seat to face me. "For what?"
"Shut your door."
She frowned. "But—"
"We won't be late, I promise."
With obvious reluctance, she quietly shut her car door and sat staring straight ahead as if waiting for me to chew her out. The sight was like a punch to the gut.Had I really been that big of a jackass?
The answer came hard and fast.Yes. I had.
Shit.
I thought of all the grief I'd given her over the past few months. All the digs. All the shitty little things I'd done to make her time with me more unpleasant than it had to be.
You dick.
Even that ugly-ass pink bedroom. It was no coincidence that it matched her work uniform.
When it came to Anna, I'd royally screwed up.
I'd spent the last week trying to make things right, looking to show her that I wasn't always a rude, obnoxious prick. The way it looked now, I hadn't done nearly enough.
But there was still time.
I told her, "Don't move."
Without waiting for a reply, I exited the car and circled around the front of the vehicle to the passenger's side. I opened Anna's door and waited while she got out, looking confused and unsettled.
By the end of the night, I vowed, she wouldn't be unsettled anymore. As far as the confusion, hey, welcome to the club. This was new ground for me, too.
I wrapped a protective arm over her shoulders and teased, "Don't worry. I promise to be on my best behavior."
"Oh." She gave a shaky laugh. "Yeah. Me, too."
And she was.In fact, she was almosttoopolite as we claimed our table and started with drinks – wine for her and beer for me. When the waiter offered us bread, she declined it entirely and glanced around as if looking for enemies in disguise.
Or maybe she just didn't like that everyone was staring. By now, I was used to it. Until yesterday, she'd seemed to be noticing it less, too.
