Page 27 of All’s Well that Friends Well (Lucky in Love #2)

LUCA

I’m pulled from a deep sleep by a buzzing sound; it’s part of my dream at first, a bee I swat as it flies around my head, growing louder and larger until it’s the size of my hand.

I jerk out of the way, and I think that’s what finally wakes me; a twinge of pain shoots through my neck, and I slap the spot, much the same way I was trying to slap the bee in my dream.

It takes me a second to figure out where I am and what’s going on, because my view when I open my eyes is not one I normally see. It’s my current ceiling, my current room, but rotated—that’s when I finally have the presence of mind to sit up, only to discover I’m sleeping sideways on the bed.

My fuzzy brain lags behind as I blink stupidly around, until it hits me.

Juliet is still in my house.

She sauntered off to take a nap last night—who takes a nap at night?—and she told me to wake her, but…I never did. I sat down on the side of my bed with every intention of getting back up.

Clearly, that didn’t happen. I fell asleep instead. Crap.

I slap around blindly for my phone, which is still buzzing. I find it pushed halfway under the neat, not-slept-on pillow, and I don’t even look at the screen before answering.

“Hello,” I say, sounding every bit as groggy as I feel.

“Mr. Slater,” a woman’s voice says, crisp and businesslike. “This is Susan Miller.”

Right—Susan Miller. The woman Rod put in charge of the—of the?—

The breakfast.

I jolt to my feet so quickly the phone almost falls out of my hand, my eyes darting toward the digital clock on the dresser.

Nine-forty-five. The breakfast is supposed to start in fifteen minutes. This is bad. This is bad, bad, bad.

“Susan, yes,” I say, breathless.

“Hello,” she says, and she sounds bemused now. “I’ve been trying to get a hold of you. I knocked on your front door, but no one answered.”

Wow. I was sleeping so deeply I didn’t even hear the door? When’s the last time that happened? When’s the last time I slept in this late, either, for that matter?

“My apologies,” I say. Then, lying through my teeth, I go on, “I just got out of the shower. What can I help you with?”

“Well, I’m in the backyard,” she says. “And the tables I set up yesterday are fine, just need to be dried off, but the ground is a muddy mess. We may have to move this event inside.”

“Inside,” I say stupidly as my mind races .

Inside, where Juliet is still asleep. Where she spent the night.

“Oh, people are starting to arrive,” Susan says, cutting off my train of thought. “Hurry down, please.” And then, without saying goodbye, she hangs up.

I stare at my phone in my hand for two seconds, which is longer than I have time for.

My attention briefly catches on a notification from my realtor—a listing he thinks I might like—but I ignore it for now.

My thoughts are whirling like a merry-go-round, until finally they all land on one thing: Juliet.

I bolt out of the room, down the hall, and into the bedroom I’ve been using as an office. I knock loudly, wait one second, and then burst in.

“Ju—” I begin, but the rest of her name dies on my lips when I see her.

She’s fast asleep, her golden hair streaming around her, my shirt askew, one arm flung over her head. Her lips are parted ever so slightly as she breathes, her chest rising and falling gently?—

A dream. That’s what she looks like. Good grief.

I storm over to the side of the bed as irrational irritation fills me, because I know—I know —that this room is never going to be the same again. Every time I set foot in here, I’m going to think of her asleep in this bed, where she fits so perfectly, so naturally.

My voice is rougher than normal when I speak, and there’s an unnecessary bite there, too. “Juliet. Wake up.”

Nothing.

“Juliet,” I say, more loudly now. I nudge her shoulder, giving her a little shake. “Come on. Get up.”

This does it; she inhales deeply, stretching and arching her back almost obscenely. I turn away, rubbing my temples. I hear her yawn, and then I chance another look.

“Finally,” I say when I see her sitting up, blinking blearily around, her brow puckered with faint confusion. “Come on. Get up. Get?—”

But I break off when I hear a knock on the downstairs door, my heart plummeting even as my pulse jumps.

I turn my attention back to Juliet, because I can only do one thing at a time. “Get up. Come on—get up.”

I can see on Juliet’s face the exact second she realizes what’s going on—her gaze darts up to me, then down at herself, and then around the room, and then her eyes pop wide.

“Oh, no,” she whispers.

I nod grimly.

“Oh, no,” she says again, and I step back as she scrambles out of bed. Her eyes grow impossibly wider as she looks at me, something like panic brewing there. “Nothing happened,” she says quickly. “Nothing happened!”

I pause, momentarily taken aback. “I know that,” I say slowly. “Obviously I know that.”

“Right,” she says with a quick nod, her voice breathless, her eyes still wide.

“Right. Of course you do.” Then she clears her throat and takes a sudden step closer to me.

“But—Luca.” My name is no more than a panicked whisper.

“It really looks like something happened.” She gestures back and forth between us—her in my shirt, me in no shirt, both of us fresh out of bed—and I grimace.

She’s correct. No one would look at us and believe nothing happened. I can barely even see the shorts she has under my shirt.

Another knock sounds at the door, louder this time; then the doorbell rings. Juliet startles at the sound, letting out a little squeak.

“The breakfast!” she says. “What about the breakfast? What do we do? I won’t let people think of me as the employee who slept her way to the top?—”

“You slept your way to a job as the janitor? ”

“You know what I mean,” she says, and although there’s more attitude in her voice than I normally hear, a glassy sheen is starting to fill her eyes too. “What do we do?”

I run rapidly through options in my head, discarding all of them almost as soon as they pop up. She can’t go out the front door; people are waiting. She can’t even sneak out the back, because people might be back there, too. And now they’ll be coming inside, it sounds like.

“Can you just hide up here until the whole thing is over?”

“I’m supposed to bring breakfast casserole!” she says, dancing on her tiptoes with the kind of frantic energy I’d expect from a live wire. “I’m supposed to bring casserole, Luca!”

I stare at her. “I thought you were bringing the peach bars?—”

“That was just an excuse to see you!” she groans, covering her face with her hands. “I just wanted to see you, you know? You said I could try to get you to fall in love with me, and number one is proximity!”

I have no response for this, and my expression does nothing to hide my shock and confusion—I gape at her for a solid three seconds as my heart pounds.

Finally I manage to force my jaw shut. I want to ask what she means about number one being proximity , but I need to align my priorities. “It’s fine. No one likes breakfast casserole anyway?—”

“My breakfast casserole is delicious,” she snaps, once again with uncharacteristic attitude. “Don’t come for my cooking.”

Wildly, bizarrely, a laugh tries to rise in my throat; I push it down, swallowing it completely when I hear the doorbell again.

“All right, fine,” I say quickly. “Your casserole is delicious. Fine.”

She sniffs, her voice prim even as her eyes remain glossy with unshed tears. “Thank you.” She swallows. “But then—what do we do?”

“Get dressed,” I say firmly. “We get dressed.”

“Right.” She nods again, sniffling, her fingers shaking as she reaches for the hem of my shirt. “Here. Take this.”

I freeze, staring at her. “What?”

“Your shirt,” she says, still breathless, her eyes still full of alarm. “Get dressed. Take this.”

By the time I can find my voice to protest, the shirt is halfway over her head.

“What are you—stop?—”

But it’s off. She’s stripped out of my shirt completely, throwing it at me. I catch it without thinking as she stares up at me impatiently, dressed in nothing but a pink bra and biking shorts.

Are those…polka dots? A pink bra with white polka dots? There’s a tiny little bow in the middle, too, and?—

STOP LOOKING, LUCA, I scream at myself.

Gorgeous. She has a gorgeous body, and I refuse to admit that I suspected as much.

“Give me a heads up next time,” I bark, whirling around to stare at the closet door instead. Then I toss my old shirt to the side. “I’m not wearing that.”

“Just put it on!” she says, already on her way out of the room.

“ No. ” The word escapes me before I’ve even thought about it.

I look over to see her stop right in the door frame, and she turns toward me.

I force myself not to shrink under her gaze, but it’s a close call—because she sees more than she should.

In fact, at this moment, I think she hears every word I’m not saying: that I will never wear that shirt again.

She understands more about me than I want her to, and I don’t know how to stop it. How can I keep her out when she insists on worming her way in?

“A different shirt, then,” she says after a second, startling when the doorbell rings, her eyes widening again. She flaps her hands at me and then disappears, calling over her shoulder, “Hurry. Hurry!”

I don’t know what’s happening right now, and I don’t think I’d be able to figure it out if I had all day to sit with my thoughts and feelings and examine them, so I don’t bother trying.

I just storm out after her, listening as she rummages around in one of the rooms. It takes me ten seconds to change pants and find another shirt; I emerge in the hallway, still buttoning my shirt, just as she does.

I blink at her. “What’s that?” I ask, looking at her outfit. “You said you didn’t have clothes here!”

She straightens her shirt and sniffs. “I said I didn’t have any warm clothes in my room.”

I gesture at her jeans and loose t-shirt, irritation welling up inside. “You clearly had stuff you could have worn,” I say. “Why did you insist on wearing mine?”

“Because!” She stomps her foot. “It’s part of the plan—do my best to look my best! And men think it’s sexy when women wear their shirts!” Her cheeks are pink as she throws the words at me, her eyes fixed on a spot over my head.

Plan? What plan? And how—why?—

I shake my head. Once again, I have no response for her. She has rendered me dumb.

“Well?” she demands, putting her hands on her hips as her gaze finally clashes with mine. Somehow her eyes are bluer right now.

I open my mouth to speak, but nothing comes out.

“ Well? ” she says again, raising her eyebrow. “Am I right? You liked it, didn’t you?”

The doorbell rings once, twice, three times, and there’s a noise that sounds faintly like someone knocking on glass, and they’re going to call the police soon?—

“Of course I did,” I say, throwing my hands in the air as the words burst out of me.

“Obviously I did.” I point at her, my eyes narrowing on the surprised yet satisfied look on her face.

“Never do it again. You are banned from wearing my clothing. And stop—stop—” I break off before spitting the words out. “Stop liking me so much. It’s—it’s?—”

Confusing. That’s the word I don’t say. It’s confusing.

I whirl away and hurry to the stairs before she can see how flustered I am, how close I am to losing it.

There’s too much going on right now, too much on all fronts, and I can’t focus on her right now.

I can’t think about the stupid pink bra or the little freckle next to her belly button or the way she looks at me, like she sees me.

Like she wants to see me, the way so few people ever have.

“Hide,” I whisper-yell over my shoulder, not trying to contain the bite in my voice. “Now. Don’t come out until it’s over.”

“Wait,” she says, hurrying after me. “Wait. Just—” She reaches for my hair, and I try to swat her hand away, but she pushes it to the side.

“Your hair is sticking up,” she says as I wait on the top step.

She licks her fingers and then smooths them over the cowlick at the crown of my head, pressing hard.

This time I manage to get her hand off my head. “You just put your spit in my hair?—”

“Yeah, well, you looked like Alfalfa,” she says. “If Alfalfa were tall and buff and handsome,” she says as I feel my cheeks heat. Her eyes light up with something dangerously mischievous. “And if Alfalfa liked the way I look in his shirt?—”

“Juliet!”

“Sorry!” she squawks, her eyes flying wide with shock at her own daring. She waves her hands wildly. “Sorry, I’m out of my mind. Go— go! ”

I turn forward again, ignoring the heat creeping up my neck and praying she’ll listen to me and stay hidden.

Either way, I don’t have time to worry. I all but throw myself down the stairs, skid to a stop in front of the door, and yank it open—where I find a group of a dozen of my employees, all looking very concerned.