Page 33 of Romancing the Grump
“Seems like you’ve done this before,” Nathan says, nodding toward the cups.
“Only about a million times,” I say. “My twin is a weirdo who doesn’t like to eat blue food, so we’ve been dividing M&Ms since we were kids. I get yellow, orange, and blue, she gets red, brown, and green.”
“Why blue?”
“A traumatic incident when we were six involving a stomach virus and a blue raspberry iCEE.”
“Sounds…painful?” Nathan says.
“And gross.” I hold out one of the cups. “Doyouhave any problems with red, brown, or green?”
He takes it and immediately pops a green M&M into his mouth. “Not even a little bit.”
I don’t know why it makes me so happy that he’s willing to eat an M&M. Maybe because he’s a professional athlete who only ate salad while his teammates scarfed down two enormous pizzas, and this makes him seem a little more normal? Granted, it was the second time we ate tonight, and I have no idea what he ate when we were at Chipotle. He could have had two burritos for all I know.
“After you ate mostly salad at dinner—second dinner—I wasn’t sure you’d want an M&M.”
“Peanuts are full of protein,” he says. “They’re allowed.”
I smile. “I tell my sister all the time that peanut M&Ms don’t count as dessert because of the protein. It’s also the reason I can eat oatmeal cookies for breakfast. Becauseoatmeal.”
He chuckles, giving me a small glimpse of his smile and making me wish for so much more. “You wouldn’t believe some of the stuff we eat on the road. We can’t always be picky, so we opt for gettinganykind of calories over getting the right kind.”
“I guess fuel is fuel?” I say as I eat another M&M.
“So, what’s it like having an identical twin? Hearing her voice earlier—you guys sound exactly alike.”
“Hearing her voice…oh, you mean when you eavesdropped on my private conversation,” I tease.
Nathan keeps his eyes down while he eats another M&M, then looks up, his expression sheepish and utterly adorable.
It really,reallyisn’t fair for him to be so gorgeous. Especially not when he’s here, in my hotel room, and we’realone.
“When Iaccidentallyfell through a door that wasn’t locked and wasn’t closed all the way,” he says.
“Uh-huh. Whatever you have to tell yourself.”
“Were we talking about Lucy? I’d love to hear more,” he says, and I roll my eyes.
“Lucyis my favorite person on the planet. We talk every day. Usually more than once. And we pretty much tell each other everything.”Which is why I was telling her about you.
“Do people get you mixed up?” he asks. It’s not lost on me that right now, Nathan is the one asking the questions. He’s the one trying to get to knowme, which feels strange and exhilarating at the same time.
“You know, for being a guy who doesn’t like to talk, you sure ask thoughtful questions.”
He holds my gaze as he pops another M&M in his mouth. “I can communicate well…when I want to.”
A blush creeps up my cheeks, but that wasn’treallya compliment, was it? If he’s about to ask me a legal question, of course he’s communicating well. It’s in his best interest.
Itisinteresting to hear this though. I’m guessing people often assume Nathan’s reticence is due to a lack of ability. But that’s clearly not the case.
“Her hair is shorter now,” I say, “so unless our hair is up like it is in the wedding photo I showed you, it’s easier to tell us apart. But yeah. When we were really young, we could even trick our parents.”
“Are your personalities the same?” Nathan tosses the last few M&Ms into his mouth and leans forward to set the cup on the nightstand. The first time I ran into Nathan outside the Summit, his eyes were light, bright blue. But here, in my lamplit hotel room, they look more like the deepest part of the ocean, a dark, fathomless navy framed by those thick lashes that make me ache with envy.
My eyes inadvertently drop to his lips, and for a split second, I let myself think about what it would feel like to kiss him. To run my hand across his beard and…no. Nope.
We’re killing the crush, not feeding it thoughts like that.
