“I like that about you.”
“Oh yeah, what else do you like?”
Meemaw would have given Kinsey the look if she’d been around to hear such blatant compliment fishing, but Griff just grinned at her.
Finally, he looked up at her, an intensity in his gaze that nearly knocked her back against the velvet booth. “Everything.”
Then he let go of her hand and reached for the next card on the deck, and they were back in the world of hypotheticals while she was desperately trying to process that one single word and understand why it had left her absolutely 100 percent hopeful.
By the time the apple crumble and vanilla bean ice cream were served and their guide had taken Griff’s credit card to settle their bill, they’d somehow scooted close enough that they were hip-to-hip in the circular booth. They reached for the last card on the table at the same time, and when his fingers brushed hers, awareness of him—the way he smelled of cedar and old books, the flash of a red swirling design that showed beneath the open V of his unbuttoned collar, the frisson of something more that was just under the surface like an octave that wasn’t audible to the human ear even though a person could feel the sound’s vibration—swept up her arm, leaving her wanting.
Her breath caught.
Griff grumbled something she didn’t catch and pulled his hand back, flexing his fingers. Sure, it had sounded like he’d said her name, a desperate, hungry rumble of consonants and vowels that had her heart beating fast against her ribs, but that interpretation had to be the wine. It couldn’t be reality. This wasn’t a real date. She had a fake fiancé, after all, and Griff had a bet to win.
“What’s it say?” he asked.
Oh yes, there it was, hard reality with its sharp edges here to scrape her up.
Her hand shook as she read the card. “Would you rather be compelled to high-five everyone you meet or compelled to have twenty minutes of small talk with anyone in a blue dress?”
“If it’s you in a blue dress, I’d talk for an hour.”
Kinsey had no idea what to say to that. The words seemed to flow between them—even at brunch the other day—but around others, he was about as chatty as the stump in the middle of Meemaw’s front lawn. And now? All the words in the world disappeared for her. He’d make small talk with her for an hour?
The silence stretched between them, thick with possibilities—or was it that she wanted it to be? Right now, she couldn’t tell.
And just as Griff started to open his mouth, Ganton returned, rubbing his hands together with obvious glee as he set the settled bill and card on the table.
Griff closed his mouth, and Kinsey let out the breath she’d been holding. She couldn’t process what that meant—or more correctly, what she could allow it to mean so she could stick to her how-to-be-successful-in-Harbor-City plan.
“There’s a message for you, sir,” Ganton said.
“Figures it wouldn’t just be dinner,” Griff grumbled as he took the paper and read it. “It’s a dance class.”
She grabbed Griff’s arm, holding on to it to keep her steady as the world got all wobbly. “I’ve got to warn you, I’m about as coordinated as my cousin Amber after she’s done the head-on-the-end-of-a-bat-spin-around thing between innings at a minor league baseball game. She took off for first and ended up in the catcher’s lap. They dated for about a week after that, but it didn’t work out. No shocker. Amber is all about keeping her options open.”
He just stared at her for a second, and then the right side of his mouth curved upward. “I got you.”
“No, I don’t think you understand. I’m awful.”
“I had five years of dance classes,” he said. “My mom thought it would help me open up around people. I barely talked at all before that.”
Despite her nerves at the absolute embarrassment she was about to be, she giggled. “Did you just make a joke?”
He didn’t answer, just took her hand in his as they walked out onto the sidewalk and into her worst nightmares.
Chapter Nineteen
Griff
A half hour later at a hole-in-the-wall dance studio and Griff knew one absolute truth—Kinsey hadn’t been lying. Grandma Betty’s attack goose Maurice had more dancing skills than his fake date.
Their dance instructor had tried her best, breaking down the thirty-second TikTok dance into individual steps. Kinsey had each one of those, but putting them together? The woman froze and seemed to forget which was her right and which was her left.
It shouldn’t have made him love her a little bit more.
It did anyway.
He was so fucked.
“I’m so sorry; it’s not you, it’s me,” Kinsey said to their instructor, who looked like she was ready to hit the nearest bar. “I’m just not made for dancing.”
It wasn’t that—it was just that her brain moved faster than her feet. Knowing Kinsey, she was probably working out the final step combinations in her head while her feet were trying to carry out the opening move. There was only one option to cut through all of it.
“Can I try something?” he asked, scrubbing the back of his neck with his hands, trying to figure out what in the hell he was thinking because this was not going to get him any closer to his end goal of falling out of love with Kinsey.
The dance instructor let out a relieved sigh, obviously ready to give anything a shot at this point. “Sure.”
He glanced over at Kinsey and raised an eyebrow in question. She nodded, lifting her chin and straightening her shoulders as if he was going to go drill sergeant on her and yell her into dance submission. Instead, he stepped into Kinsey’s dance space.
They locked gazes and, even with the same thirty-second music clip playing on repeat in the background, all Griff could hear was the sound of his own blood rushing in his ears. This had to be the most foolish thing he’d ever done in his life, but there wasn’t a damn thing that would stop him—not even knowing better.
He took her right hand in his, lifting it so they were holding hands at shoulder height. Clamping his jaw tight and keeping his gaze firmly planted on the wall just over her shoulder, he pushed past the awareness building at touching her, the sizzle and spark that shot straight to his balls. Then he reached around her and let his other hand rest lightly against the middle of her back.
She sucked in a sharp intake of breath, and for one brief balls-in-a-vise-grip moment, Griff thought he’d hurt her or fucked it all up. He jerked his attention to her, an apology already on the tip of his tongue. It never made it past his lips.
Kinsey, her cheeks flushed, was looking up at him, her pupils dilated with desire and her soft pink lips parted as if in anticipation for the kiss he was desperate to give her.