Page 86 of Save Your Breath

“You still think I’m going to back out at the last minute, huh?”

“I just mean the whole speech thing,” I clarified, sliding my hands over the railing with my eyes set on the horizon. I knew there were already eyes on us, camera lenses zoomed in as far as they could go, shutters clicking, dollar signs rolling in the eyes of the paparazzi we’d tipped off. So, I forced a smile that I spoke through, pretending like I was having the time of my life.

“Why, don’t think I have it in me?”

“I just don’t think it’s necessary.”

“You’re so grumpy today.”

I huffed a laugh in my chest at that. Grumpy. That was one word for it. And really, the only word I could think of that was close to what I was feeling.

Was there a word for slightly hungover, wholly fulfilled by how much fun I had last night, confused about my feelings for my best friend I’m now about to pretend to get engaged to, andcompletely frustrated over his deflection of my questions last night and his seeming frustration that I’d asked at all?

There’s a challenge for you, Webster.

I couldn’t keep up with my thoughts last night, but they’d run rampant like little hellions, and kept me awake long after Aleks dropped me off. I thought about the night with Aleks, how much fun I’d had, how good it had felt to let loose. But then I’d think about the pier, about how not once, buttwice,I’d thought maybe, just maybe, he was going to kiss me.

He seemed close enough to do it.

He seemed like hewantedto do it.

But that just showed I was still a naïve girl who knew nothing at all, because hehadn’t.And why would he? There was no one around to perform for.

If the last time I’d asked him to kiss me wasn’t proof that he didn’t want to, I didn’t know what was.

But… he was so damnconfusing.He was flirting with me on that pier, wasn’t he? The ice cream, the way he held me when I almost fell…

Was it really just a joke to him?

Did he honestly feel nothing?

And then he shut me out when I asked about wanting a family. That was what infuriated me most. I knew he let me in more than he did anyone else, but he still kept me at a distance in times like that, as if he didn’t trust me with the real answers.

I blamed that tornado of thoughts and my lack of sleep for how touchy I was now.

But inside, I knew it was also because Aleks was about to fake propose to me.

And I had no fucking idea how I felt about that.

Aleks slid up behind me once I was positioned at the bow, his arms wrapping me up tightly as he widened his stance and bent low enough to rest his chin on my shoulder.

I knew it was all for show, but it didn’t stop my heart from thundering in my chest at the way it felt to be held by him, didn’t stop my next swallow from being so damn difficult to take that I gave up completely.

“Doyoustill want to go through with this?” he asked softly in my ear.

My nostrils flared, two truths battling for dominance inside me. On the one hand, I absolutely did not want to do this. I didn’t want to subject myself to more pretending with Aleks when I had so many not-so-fake feelings for him tearing me up. Just hearing him say last night that what he wanted didn’t matter, that love and marriage and having a family wasn’t in the cards for him…God, it made me want to prove him wrong.

It made me want to hold him, and kiss him, and tell him I…

What?

Love him?

My stomach soured with the thought of saying that out loud, though my heart kicked in my chest with the fact that it was true.

I did love him.

I always had.