“Maybe I’m rusty,” he told her, his eyes like bright lights on the side of her face.

“You’re not,” she answered too quickly. If he hadn’t heard the mild tremor in her voice, he was as thick as a brick wall.

When she looked over, she knew a different man would be smugly grinning at her, knowing he’d gotten under her skin, given her a thrill. But not Seb Dorner. Nope. He was just looking at her, serious as could be. That plain-handsome face, all wide and open and blunt. All of it set off by his dark haircut and...she noticed, a clean shave. He really did look nice tonight. Like he was dressed up for a date. She wondered when exactly he’d decided to come to happy hour. Was it while he was getting dressed that morning?

“I wish I could stay,” Seb told her and those honest eyes of his told the whole story. No subtext. No lines. Just the truth. “But I got a kid needs tucking in at home.”

Can I come?

She sucked her lips into her mouth along with the words. “Understandable. It was nice that you came out, though.”

“Yeah,” he agreed. “Maybe I’ll try to do it more often.”

Seb tipped his glass, one swallow left, toward Via’s and they cheers-ed. Her breath caught and her eyes snapped away because was that...? Did he...? Yes, she was almost positive that he’d laid his pinky over hers for just the hottest little second when they’d clinked glasses.

But he was up and pulling his coat on, saying his goodbyes all around. He’d been gone from the bar all of three minutes when she felt that familiar buzz in her pocket.

He wasn’t around to see her nerd out over his texts so she didn’t bother stopping herself from whipping her phone out of her pocket in a flash.

Should have asked at the bar, but you’re gonna take a cab home, right?

Now that her body wasn’t tense and spotlighted and tingling like hell from his mere presence, Via could once again pay attention to the gravity-hungry dense cloud of feeling in her chest. It grew another inch and sucked the whole bar into its ravenous force field. She loved everything right now.

He was concerned about how she’d get home. What a flipping gentleman.

Grace always walks me home. We’re only a few blocks from each other.

The text reply came almost instantly. Grace is lucky.

Another buzzed through a few seconds later. Have a good night, Miss DeRosa. You made mine.

She thought of about thirty different ways to reply but all of them, all of them, said way too much. Put every single one of her cards on the table. In the end, she just went with the ever solid You, too. He could go ahead and interpret it in whatever way he wanted.

She saw the let’s-get-the-hell-out-of-here eyes that Grace was throwing her way across the table, and Via was grateful. She needed to get home, get in the bath and squee her face off.