Page 8 of Watch Me

I shrugged and picked up my glass of juice before walking to the other side of the island to sit next to her. “Sure, why not? It’ll be like old times.” Ismirked.

She bobbed her head and chuckled slightly. “Old times that used to lead to not studying or doing homework.”

That was true. After school and before our parents arrived home from work, we’d hang out andstudy. We were each other’s firsts—in more than one way.

“You never complained,” I remindedher.

She threw her head back, laughing. “No. No, I didn’t.”

Her laughter made my palms itch to touch her, to pull her into my arms and feel her lips on mine again as I kissed her. Instead, I said, “So, tell me what Reagan Hunter has been up to the last twenty-some-odd years.”

She took a deep breath. “Well, I graduated from Stanford, moved to Denver, got married, had Maddison about a year later, and have just been doing the mother thing since then. She kept me busy.”

“And now you live here?”

“Yeah. Moved far away from my ex and closer to Maddie.”

“And me,” Istated.

“And you, but I didn’t know you still lived here. What have you been up to?” Reagan took a sip of herjuice.

“As I mentioned earlier, I became a cop, then got married, had my two boys, dedicated most of my time to the job so I could one day be chief like my father was, got divorced, and then went to a bar that has a reputation for people finding their soulmates.”

“What?” she asked, dragging out the word and scrunching hereyebrows.

I chuckled. “My sister met her husband at Judy’s.”

“She did?”

I nodded and then took a sip of juice. “About three years ago. Didn’t realize that the one time I go there, I would run into the only woman I still dream about.”

She didn’t speak.

I didn’t speak.

The clock on the wall ticked …

Tock ...

Tick ...

Tock ...

Tick…

Tock.

I cleared my throat. “Let me give you my number, and you can call me if you need help with anything.”

Reagan stood to grab her purse from the table by the front door. After fishing out her cell phone, she said, “Okay, give me your number.”

I took her phone, and after I typed my number into her contacts, I sent myself a text so that I had her number as well. “I feel like we’re back in high school, exchanging numbers and shit tohelpwith homework.”

She grinned. “Yeah, it’s like we’re starting over.”

It was on the tip of my tongue to ask if she wanted to try, but I thought better of it. Instead, I handed her back her phone and said, “Would you like to go on a ride-along with me sometime?”

Her emerald eyes brightened. “Really?”