Page 39 of You Chive Me Crazy

With no time to waste, I kicked off my shoes, slid underneath the covers, and turned on my side toward the middle of the bed to prevent Lucas from being able to see my face.

Like clockwork, seconds later, the door to the Love Shack opened, then closed quietly. I kept as still as possible as I heard his footsteps come closer and closer to my side of the bed, the floor creaking underneath his feet.

“Zoe . . .”

I didn’t answer.

Lucas sighed. “Latke, I know you’re not sleeping—you’ve only been in the room for thirty seconds. That’s impossible.”

Holding my breath, I tried to stay still.

“We really should talk about things,” he said, his voice much closer this time, even softer. “On the other hand, I do happen to know your feet are ticklish.”

“Don’t you dare,” I gritted out, turning over in the bed to find him hovering above me, inches from my face.

Oh, dear. . .

He was close.

So close I could feel the heat of his body and smell his cologne, a deadly combination.

“Are you okay?” he asked, somewhat cautiously. He slid back a lock of hair that had fallen across my eyes and I almost self-combusted. “How do you feel?”

“Physically or mentally?” I asked, avoiding eye contact.

He shrugged and sat on the edge of the bed. “Both.”

I sighed as I sat up in bed. “I don’t even know how to describe where my head is right now. I’m not in pain, so that’s a good start. Mentally speaking, let’s just say that I learned some things downstairs that caught me off guard. I really don’t know what to think at the moment.”

“I get that,” he said.

We sat there in uncomfortable silence for a few moments. I avoided eye contact, afraid he would see my vulnerability.

“So . . .” Finally, I had the courage to talk about what was on my mind. “Why didn’t you tell me you’d fought for my admission into those two academies? I had no idea you’d done that.”

Lucas glanced at me. “I owed you that much, at least, and didn’t want to make a big deal about it. Then there was that tiny fact that you blocked all my calls and text messages. It wasn’t like there was a way to get ahold of you when you moved out of your housing the same day. Your roommate told me you had gone back home to your parents’ house in Washington. I was tempted to drive the twenty hours to talk with you, to make things right, but then I remembered your dad had a shotgun.”

“My dad loves you,” I said, shaking my head in amusement. “He probably would have just given you a lecture and then shared a six-pack of beer with you. Either that or he would have blamed everything on me.”

We shared a little laugh.

“Does this mean you despise me a little less?” Lucas asked.

“I never hated you, per se,” I said, mentally arguing with the angel and devil on my shoulders about the truthfulness of that statement.

He crossed his arms and stared me down with a dubious look until I gave in.

I sighed. “Okay, sure, I carried around an extremely high level of Lucas loathing and abomination, but you’ll be happy to know that it seems to be fading away slowly and steadily.”

Lucas nodded his head. “Good to know. And by the way, Rolando told me to tell you hello.”

I smiled. “Oh, wow. I haven’t seen him forever. What is he up to?”

“He’s still an editor at the magazine. A damn good one. He says that my running into you was fate.”

“Really?” I asked. “And why is that, exactly?”

Lucas shrugged. “I couldn’t tell you, but then again, he thinks everything is connected to destiny. Like how I thought about a food truck for you, and then you ended up getting one.”