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An unwelcome pull in my chest made me frown. She was going to send me into cardiac arrest with a smile on her face.

“I never take an hour for lunch,” I explained.

“Why not?”

I swallowed hard, forcing myself to sit with her question. “I just don’t. An hour is too long away from work.”

“Anhouris too much time away from your desk? That’s only sixty minutes, Rome.”

“I’m aware of how time works, Goldy. I got twenty minutes, tops.” I gave her a pointed stare and waited for her rebuttal. I couldn’t believe I was bargaining with this woman. How had she flipped my rejection into a negotiation?

“Make it thirty.” She said, her voice firm as she fixed me with the most determined stare.

My jaw flexed and I averted my eyes. Not because I didn’t want to look at Goldyn, but because Lottie’s gaze was burning a hole in the side of my face and I didn’t know what to tell her. “Fine.”

A triumphant smile dominated her pretty features. “I know the perfect spot. Come on.”

She didn’t wait for me before she turned around and headed for the door of the shop.

Making sure I had my phone and keys, I headed out after her.

“Enjoy your lunch date,boss,” Lottie called, her voice a little too chipper.

“It’s not a date,” I pointed out, pushing the door open before Goldyn could lift her hand to touch it.

She bounced out onto the sidewalk and her floral scent hit my nose, sparking twin flames of desire and frustration within me.

“Hmph. Don’t hurry back.” I didn’t look at her, but I couldhearLottie’s smug expression and I knew a matching smile sat on her face as she watched me follow behind the woman I was supposed to ignore.

Outside, Goldyn walked right past my car. And she didn’t stop until she got to that death trap she called a vehicle. She tossed me a look over her shoulder from the driver’s side until I closed the space between us, hating myself a little more every time I gave in. I did not want to have lunch with this woman. But my feet had a mind of their own, carrying me to her while my heart knocked out a rhythm that made me too aware of my proximity to her.

“I’m supposed to trust you to take me somewhere in this van?”

“Would you rather I driveyourcar?”

‘Why do you have to drive at all?”

“Because I’m the only one who knows where we’re going.”

Instead of verbally admitting defeat, I walked over to the passenger side, squinting against the sun. When I tried the handle, nothing happened.

“Hold on, that door only opens from the inside.” Her voice was muffled as she climbed into the driver’s seat.

“Jesus Christ.”

She stretched across the seat and popped the handle from the inside. “Okay, now try it!”

Thirty minutes and this would be over. That was just ten minutes three times. I could do that. And then I could go back to pretending this woman didn’t turn my world on its axis every time she walked in the room.

Thirty minutes came and went while we were waiting for our food. But it happened so quickly, I didn’t notice. Goldyn brought me to Lucky’s Tavern, claiming the burgers and fries would change my life. And here I was, five minutes past the cutoff I gave her, not really giving a fuck. We’d talked about everything in the past half hour and I still didn’t know how she’d gotten so much out of me. It was a gift. Or a curse.

“Are you dating anyone?” She asked, her eyes intense as the question hung in the space between us.

“Why do you care?”

“Because it matters.”

“Does it? This whole conversation won’t really matter in three months, will it?”