Page 68 of We Met Like This
“We both know what your normal Sunday coffee outfits consist of and it’s not a shirt with buttons.”
I ignored her and stood when I realized he hadn’t seen us in the back corner yet. My movement caught his eye and he had the nerve to smile at me. His smile made my insides squishy. It really was going to be hard to ignore the physical connection we had.
“Hi,” he said. “You two look like you are fully functional today.” He slid onto the bench seat next to me. I picked up my tote that was between us and put it on my opposite side. His scent immediately clouded my senses.
Sloane was in a chair across from us. “Fullyis up for debate,” she said.
“Shhh!” A guy at the next table over hissed in our direction. He was on his computer typing away.
“This isn’t a library, dude,” Sloane said.
“Are you a writer?” I asked, disregarding his annoyed face. “I’m a literary agent if you’re looking. Tell your friends.”
“I’m taking a test,” he said, like we should’ve known that.
“Again,” Sloane said. “A library would’ve been the better choice. Or noise-canceling headphones. Do you have a pair of those?”
His bushy brows went down and he turned his attention back to his computer screen.
I tried not to laugh, but I did lower my voice when I said, “I need business cards.”
“So you can hand them to anyone typing on a computer? You need to learn the talent of discernment. You want clients,but not just any clients.” She nodded disgustingly toward the test taker. “Good ones.”
She wasn’t wrong. “I need a website,” I said. “And online posts. Lots of posts. Do I need TikTok? I’m not good at TikTok.”
“Stay off TikTok,” Sloane said. “You’d be addicted to that in hours and become completely useless.”
“Rude,” I said.
“I know someone who can help you with a website,” Oliver said.
“Who?” I asked.
“Someone who designs things on computers for a living,” he prompted.
“Oh! You? You’d help me?”
“We’re friends, right?” he asked in that sincere voice of his.
“Yes, you’refriends,” Sloane said, emphasizing the word way more than one should emphasize any word. When I’d told her our decision the night before to slow things down, get to know each other a little better, become friends first, she’d given me the most perplexed look and said, “Friends with benefits?” I had responded with, “I wish.”
“You’re a terrible person,” I said to her now. To Oliver, I said, “Thank you. I’m just desperate enough to take you up on the website thing. Wait, how much do you charge?”
He laughed a warm throaty laugh that made my heart gallop. “Only the friend rate.”
“Which is?” I asked.
“A coffee.”
“Sold,” I said, and stood, ready to march to the register that second.
He stood as well, after me, as if he had just remembered we were sitting in a coffee shop and I could pay my half of thebargain that second. “Not now,” he said. “After the work is finished and you decide if it’s worth a coffee or not.”
“If it’s not worth a coffee, we’re both in trouble,” I said, and stepped around the table.
He cut me off, his fingers brushing down my left arm as he did, hovering just short of my hand. “Just wait. I don’t want to… I can’t… Just wait.”
I raised my hands in surrender and said, “Fine, I will not buy you coffee today. But if you don’t let me buy it after you complete the work, due to however those half sentences you just uttered ended, we will have beef.”
