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I wanted it all.

And as if he could feel my eyes on him, his eyes snapped toward our window and for some reason, a betraying blush heated my cheeks. It wasn’t like he could look right at us withthe way the sun glared, but it made me feel like I was looking at something I shouldn’t be looking at and was caught red-handed.

“They must be the family moving in next door,” Mom said, turning her attention back to her batter. “It would be nice to finally see some people in that empty house and they look like they are a family of four as well. You should bring them cupcakes after I bake them, honey. They could use a little treat.”

“Ye…yes, Mom,” I muttered before I sneaked one last look at the boy who seemed to have returned to his conversation with that girl.

He was making me feel ways I couldn’t explain, and I didn’t want to linger any longer. “I’m going to my room. I have homework.” I quickly darted out of the kitchen before Mom could say anything else.

The thunder of rock music reverberated through the thin walls as I crossed the hallway and dashed into my room, the blush still burning my cheeks.

What the hell was that about?

I was busy casting the sixteenth slipknot on my wooden size four needle, cross-legged in the middle of my bed, when I heard a faint scraping sound.

Frowning, I looked up, and everything in my body froze when I met a pair of warm brown eyes staring intently at me. The same eyes that I’d been trying a little too hard not to think about for the past thirty minutes.

I blinked.

Once and then twice.

And he was still there.

Please don’t tell me out of all the rooms, he chose the one that had a window right across mine?

As if his gaze wasn’t just imploring the insides of my soul, he shifted, dropping his bag onto the bed, and went out the door to drag two large suitcases inside.

The entire time, I sat in the same place, watching him like a possessed fool.

Only when he set the last of his bags down and shut his bedroom door did I snap out of my trance.

My heart did the same funny feeling it did earlier.

I stumbled out of my bed, hiding my yarn and needles under a pillow as I neared the window. Like there was some invisible shining string between us, pulling me to him.

I swallowed, beating my shyness as my shaky fingers drew my curtains closed, leaving behind the tiniest gap on the edge.

And for the next ten minutes, I stood there watching him in secret as he moved around his room. The ache in my heart was growing into a deep longing.

A longing to get to know him.

A longing to have all of him.

If I thought he was beautiful before, I was wrong.

He was more than just beautiful.

He was mesmerizing.

He looked more like the teenage models that you would see on the front pages of magazines.

With all the perfect features—sharp jawline, smoldering eyes, and tousled hair.Everything.A perfect package.

Somehow, I couldn’t help but think that it wasn’t just on the outside.

That he was good on the inside too.

And just like earlier, as if he felt my heavy gaze on him, his hands paused their rummaging inside his suitcase, and his eyes sliced to mine.