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Still, it made me grin. I knew Xander wasn’t a fan of PDA—he’d made that pretty clear early on.

However, he must have thought this was what boyfriends should do, so he put forth the effort and did it.

It was endearing, in a way. This was another tiny crack in his icy exterior, which I’d been chipping away at for the past four weeks.

Progress!

Catching my expression, he rolled his eyes with a lopsided smirk. “Don’t make it weird,” he said, pulling away from the desk. “See you later.”

“Bye, handsome,” I replied just before he turned away, raising his eyebrows ever-so-slightly.

I heard a frustrated grunt escape from his mouth as he left the studio, but I could tell there was a smile behind it.

Scrunching my nose, I watched the back of his head until it disappeared through the studio doors into the hallway.

I’d been trying out a lot of affectionate nicknames on Xander, testing to see which ones made him squirm the most. He really disliked the southern ones—sugar pie and darlin’ and honeybun—especially when my Tennessee drawl came out.

As for Xander, the most I’d gotten out of him was shortening my name to Jill.

“The Gardners’ again, huh?” Graham asked, eyeing my hands as I gathered my notes. Maybe he hadn’t been ignoring us. “Am I going to have to call in a noise complaint?”

He was trying not to smile, but the crinkles in the corner of his eyes deepened.

Just last week, Graham moved into the house next to Owen and Sarah Gardner.

In fact, last week he had some furniture delivered in the middle of our Friday night gathering.

The guys paused their poker game to help him with a massive sectional the movers left on his porch.

Owen even invited him over after, but Graham insisted he was too exhausted to join us.

“ And he said he’d ‘ruin the vibe’, ” Owen had said when the guys returned.

“ And he’d be right, ” was Xander’s response.

I chuckled at Graham as I tapped my papers against the desk. “You’re going to have to get used to our backyard summer shenanigans, Graham. You might as well join us tonight.”

His hands returned to his pockets as he gave a quick nod to Chase, our field reporter, who’d just returned from covering a ribbon-cutting ceremony downtown. “Well,” Graham said, “I appreciate the invite, but I’ve got papers to grade and I’ll have the kids tonight.”

“Papers to grade?” I asked, removing my lapel mic.

He gave me a half-shrug, looking into my eyes. “Yeah, I’m teaching a summer journalism class over at White River College. Actually,” he said, glancing down at his watch. “I need to head that way shortly.”

“Wait. You’re a… professor?” How did I not know this?

He gave me an amused glance, as though my reaction was unwarranted, but all I could think about was Graham Harlowe amidst the backdrop of academia.

My imagination ran wild before I could stop it: him in a tweed jacket with elbow patches, a pair of reading glasses perched on his nose, maybe even a pipe in his hand.

Not that he smoked, but it seemed like something Professor Harlowe would do while explaining the ethics of investigative journalism.

I swallowed, trying not to imagine Graham that way.

I’d always had a sort of quiet crush on him.

Well, not exactly quiet, considering how many times Meghan covered her ears when I gushed about how sexy he was.

He was her editor at the time, and she didn’t want to hear it.

But ever since Xander and I had made things semi-official, I’d pushed aside my attraction to Graham.

Oh, and crushing on the CEO of your company was probably frowned upon.

“Adjunct professor,” Graham clarified, pausing to clear his throat. “Corrupting the minds of tomorrow’s journalists, one naive student at a time.”

I rested my hands on my hips. “Wow. I think I’ll start calling you Professor Harlowe.”

“Please, even my students don’t call me that.”

“What do they call you?”

“Mostly just Mr. H. Or, according to last semester’s student survey, ‘a cringey millennial who needs to get laid so he’ll stop assigning so much homework.’”

I couldn’t control the burst of laughter erupting from my mouth. “Stop! Is that true?”

He gave a deadpan nod, his expression stoic besides the twinkle in his eyes. Running his hand through his tousled hair, he deadpanned, “I mean, I only memorized every word of that feedback because it cut so deep. I hastily assigned five additional discussion boards and cried myself to sleep.”

Suddenly, I was biting my bottom lip without even realizing it.

There was just something about his casual, self-effacing humor that made me smile internally.

Graham often spoke like he was leading an improv class or performing a dry stand-up routine, and he never stumbled over his delivery.

It was part of the reason I loved having him around.

“You poor thing,” I said, shaking my head at him as I reached for my pen. Giving it a few clicks, I said, “Well, if you need a break from grading papers, consider wandering over to the Gardners’ for a drink.”

“Thanks, but something tells me Meghan and Xander don’t share your enthusiasm for my presence. Besides, I’ve got a long night of being ignored by mean teenagers ahead of me.” He took a few backwards steps away from the desk, saying, “Anyway. Have a good weekend, Jill.”

Damn it . He was going to have to stop it with the sexy self-deprecation. I had a boyfriend.