Page 115 of Love You Like That (Excess All Areas 4)

“I promise. The R-rated ones are for my own personal collection.”

“Alex?” The voice over his shoulder made his skin prickle.

“One second,” he said to Zoe before standing to face Ollie. Shit, he’d forgotten he worked nearby. It had been Ollie who had suggested they went to this restaurant. He stood but didn’t say a word.

“Alex. Hey.” Ollie glanced around him to look at Zoe and Alex stepped to the right to block his view.

“What do you want, Ollie?”

“I just wanted to see how you were doing. I didn’t realise you were back in Manchester right now.”

“Quick detour. Anything else.”

Desperate behaviour was a big turn off.

“If you’re in town, there is a group of us going to the—”

“No. I’ve got a gig tonight. Look, Ollie. I’ve been nice about this, but just…fuck off, yeah?” He turned his back on Ollie and sat back down on his seat, reaching for a piece of chicken before taking a bite.

“Ex?” Zoe asked.

“Yeah. One who can’t take a hint.”

Zoe glanced over to Ollie’s table. “He’s cute. I can see why you dated him. Shame he turned stalker.”

Alex fumbled his chicken and just looked at her.

“What?” she asked, reaching for a napkin. “Do I have sauce on my face or something?”

She accepted him for who he was. Without missing a beat. “People aren’t always cool about exes,” he said.

Zoe shrugged. “We all have them. Unless you’re the virgin who was dared to attend the sex club in book four in a bid to lose her virginity. She had no exes. But the rest of us do.”

“Would it freak you out if I told you I was falling in love with you?”

She smiled so infrequently, that it was a glorious thing when she did. “If I told you I felt the same, would it freak you out?”

“No.”

“Cool. Because if you’re falling in love with me, you’d let me have the last Katsu prawn.”

“Because I’m falling in love with you, I’m telling you to eat it.”

Zoe picked it up between her fingers and bit into it with a grin that caused sauce to dribble down her chin. “Done,” she said, spluttering as she wiped her face.

Yeah.

He was.

---