“You have no idea, do you?” How can she not know how amazing she is? I hold her close, afraid she’ll slip away.

“About what, Austin?” The bleakness in her voice is a knife to my stomach. I want to tell her, but I won’t say the words out loud. If she hasn’t realized she’s too good for me yet, I’m not going to be the one to mention it.

“Elizabeth, you’re hot,” I tell her instead.

She laughs awkwardly, not believing me.

“I’m serious. I mean, in a nerdy, naughty librarian sort of way, but yeah. You’re pretty hot.”

“Seriously?” she questions and I can’t help but laugh. She’s so much more than just hot. She’s a weird little goddess I can’t get out of my head. She doesn’t have any idea of the power she wields.

“Yes. Seriously.” There’s zero doubt in my voice.

“So, if I’d asked you out, you would’ve said yes?” she challenges.

In all honesty, probably not. I don’t date. And if I did, Elizabeth isn’t my type. She’s too…everything.

“I guess we’ll never know.”

I think back to the first time I saw her, sitting across from me at that table in the library, nervous enough to faint and not able to control that smart mouth of hers. I’d be lying if I said she took my breath away. But if I’m honest, there was something about her even in that first meeting that made me curious about her. Hell, I’m not even sure what I would’ve said if she’d asked me out. Maybe it’s a good thing she didn’t.

We’re both quiet again, happy to pretend to watch the movie.

“Okay, fine. I might as well just say it,” she blurts out as if she was in the middle of a conversation with herself that she just decided to include me in. “I need a favor.”

She’s fidgeting with the blanket, twisting it in her fingers over and over again. She has the worst poker face.

“Oh yeah? Another proposition?”

She takes a deep breath and all at once rambles, “Is there any way you’d think about coming to a dinner party at my father’s house this Sunday? He’s insisting you come, which is entirely your fault.”

“Because I’m too charming for my own good?”

Cue another eye-roll.