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She put her hands up. “Honestly, I just don’t need the job. Things have all been great at the studio, so I’ve been getting more and more annoying at work just daring them to fire me, but they haven’t done it. If I’d realized they were this desperate, I’d have started slacking off ages ago.”

Ah, that figured. Stella would rub off on her like that. It had taken no time at all, since Stella had declared she wasn’t keen on going back and wanted to spend her whole summer break here on the island with Allison, for the two arts students to get carried away. They were volunteering to run classes at the local painting studio before the month was out, and by now, they’d both stepped up to running workshop programs and digging up money from the tourists crowding in for the summer. Allison had dropped down to working two days a week at the resort, and I guess it was no surprise she was putting in increasingly little effort on her shifts.

“Besides,” Allison said, her gaze flicking past me, “it’s… well, you know. It’s a big deal, Ryan getting back, Stella partying it up with her. Not a lot more big deals going on before Stella and I are back out of here.”

I laughed. “You’re not worried, are you? That girl’s obsessed by now.”

“Nah.” She kicked at the ground. “I mean, a little. I still don’t know whyshe’sdatingme.I feel like I’m getting pranked, and any second now, someone’s going to jump out and yellsurprise, dumbass, Stella’s got better things to do.But, uh, my insecurities aside, I mean, I’m just going to miss her. Long-distance is gonna suck.”

“Let me guess. You’ve looked up how long it would take to drive to where she lives.”

“Shut your mouth.” She huffed, slumping against the wall next to me. “Five hours, forty-three minutes. Assuming traffic is bad.”

“Oh, that’s not too bad.”

“Yeah… but that’s still only, like, weekends we get to spend together.”

I laughed as the crowd sharpened into focus around us, movement stirring from the gate. “Ah, young love. Have fun with it. Enjoy the corny things, the late-night long-distance chats, constant video calls, the excitement on Friday mornings that you’re going to see her that night. It's cute.”

“Easy for you to say when you’ve hooked a poor innocent woman into your net and she’s not going anywhere.”

I arched a brow at her. “Pretty sure you’d been the one telling me to get with her.”

She grinned. “Yeah. So? I’m just saying I’m jealous, I wishIcould hook the poor innocent woman I’m with into my net.”

“Emotionally, you’ve done great. Still need to buy you a toaster oven at some point.”

She frowned. “What? Why would I need a toaster?”

“Ah, forget it. The youth don’t know their culture.” I didn’t get to insult Allison any further, though, because that was when the crowd came from the gate, and my heart fluttered in my chest scanning the faces as soon as they came in. Didn’t take long, despite how every second felt like an eternity—there, towards the front of the crowd, her duffel bag slung under one arm, choppy brown locks dancing over tanned shoulders, was the woman I was almost embarrassingly head over heels for, the woman who’d had the nerve to go fortwo weekson an investigative reporting trip and leave me with nothing to do exceptmissher.

Unbearably cruel. I’d forgive her, though. She was damn beautiful.

Her eyes found mine in the crowd, and she lit up, pushing through the people around her and breaking out to hurry over towards me, and I found a huge, dopey grin settling over my features, leaning back against the wall about to make some clever comment that was suddenly very irrelevant when she dropped her bag on the ground and flung herself on me in a kiss, arms wrapped around my neck, lips crashing into mine with a sensation like coming home, like settling in a warm bed after a long day, like tucking into my favorite comfort food with my favorite comfort show.

“Hi there,” she said, pulling back from the kiss, eyes twinkling. I let my hands fall to her waist, resting my forehead against hers.

“Not even letting me get a word in, huh?”

“I’d been rehearsing that moment in my head for hours sitting on planes. Even better than I’d imagined it being, though.”

Allison snorted. “God, you two are corny,” she said, and Ryan glanced her way with the vague surprise of someone who didn’t know she was there but wouldn’t have done anything differently if she had known.

“You’re the one who seemingly ditched work to come watch, Allison,” she said brightly.

“Ignore her,” I said. “She was just telling me how she’s jealous.”

“Mm. She should be,” she said, settling in for another quick kiss on my lips before stepping back, reaching for her duffel bag before I swooped in and snatched it up, and she fumbled for it. “Hey! What do you think you’re doing?”

“Carrying a bag for my girlfriend, who is very traveled and very tired.”

“I’m an adult,” she laughed, hands on her hips, and I planted a kiss on the tip of her nose.

“One who likes to be spoiled. Besides, aren’t your parents here somewhere watching? Still trying to make a good impression.”

She snorted. “You know I abandoned them on the jet bridge to push ahead and find my girlfriend. They’ll be coming along. Besides… you’re good. They won’t stop talking about you. I worry they like you better than they do me at points.”

She was right about one point—they came along right as she was mentioning them, her mother pushing through the crowd first and her expression softening seeing us, and her father after, a man with a serious expression on his face just about all the time but was not, I’d learned, quite as scary as he looked. Her mother pushed over to give me a hug, gushing, “Oh—but you reallyareawfully far away, Brooklyn.”