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“That I’m your new bestie.”
A combination laugh and snort escaped her as she stood and headed for the kitchen, needing to escape the sincerity in his eyes. “Besties, huh?”
He stood and followed. At least she’d distracted him away from that darn laptop.
“Come on,” he said.
“What do you want from me?” She opened the fridge, searching for something easy to prepare for dinner. Gus seemed a little loopy with all his friend talk. Probably from his lack of food.
He stepped up behind her and leaned close to her ear. “Say it.”
She closed the door, finding nothing appealing, and moved around him on her way to the pantry.
Once again, he followed her, stopping in the doorway with a smile on his face. “I don’t usually have girls that are friends, except Adelia. You should feel special.”
There it was. That cockiness that had irritated her from the beginning. “I’ve simply been polite, Gus, because we have to be able to get along if we’re going to make it through a year together.” She glanced over and saw a flash of something cross his face, but then his cocky smile returned.
It flustered her, and though she was looking at the shelves of ingredients, she couldn’t seem to focus on what she was seeing. She stepped forward to leave, but he didn’t move to the side to let her by.
“Move, please.”
“I know what you’re doing,” he told her.
She looked up at him then. “What’s that?”
“Lying.”
“About?”
“We’re friends now, whether you admit it or not.”
She shifted her eyes to a package of pasta on one of the shelves.
“Would it be such a bad thing, Mer?” he asked.
She sighed at his use of the nickname again. “Fine. We’re friends. Now move.”
“Yes!” He raised his arms in the air in victory.
She rolled her eyes just before the oxygen was squeezed from her lungs when Gus wrapped those thick, muscular arms of his around her back, pulling her into a hard hug.
“Man, you caved much quicker than I thought you would.”
Pulling away, she gave his bicep a whack, trying not to think about how good it had felt to be in his arms.
“Want to order pizza and watch a movie?” he asked. “That’s what friends do, right?”
“Sure.”
His stomach growled loudly, and they laughed. “I guess I should’ve eaten something today.”
“You think?”
Gus ordered the pizza and headed to his room to shower since he had pretty much rolled out of bed before sitting in front of his laptop all day.
Merritt puttered around the house and straightened up. As she was getting out plates, glasses, and napkins, her phone rang. She didn’t recognize the number but answered anyway.
“Hello, this is Merritt.”