“And you should see the two of them together out on the sand. Nothing makes your ovaries get all happy than seeing a hot guy with a kid,” she explained, and I grinned and then I pictured Jax with a kid, and there was a quiver somewhere down below. “Anyway,” she went on. “We’re leaving in a couple of days, but I swear, I think I could live at the beach.”

I really needed to get my ass to a beach at some point.

“So tell me about things in the great state of Pennsylvania. Is everything cool?”

“Well, yeah, things have been . . . they’ve been great,” I told her, glancing at the stairs. “I’ve, um . . . I’ve met a guy.”

There was silence.

And more silence.

I frowned. “You there?”

“Yes. Yes! You just caught me off guard. You went from things are good to there’s a guy and I was waiting for, you know, more detail.” She all but shouted the last word. “Like lots of detail.”

With another glance at the stairwell, I told her about Jax and our date tonight. I ended my impromptu confession with “So, yeah, I’m pretty sure he likes me.”

“Well, duh. Of course he does. So the place is called Apollo’s? Hold on a sec,” she said, and then her voice sounded farther away. “Hey, Jase, look up Apollo’s outside of Philly. What? Just do it.”

Oh my God.

“Back to the liking-you thing. Why would you be surprised that he likes you? Brandon totally liked you, but you—”

“What?” I interrupted her. “He did not.”

“Oh, yes, he did. It was cute. You were all quiet when he first started coming around and he was always looking at you, but then you really didn’t pay any attention to him. I thought maybe I read you wrong and you weren’t into him.”

Teresa was smoking crack.

“Do you like him?” she asked suddenly. “Because Jase just looked up Apollo’s—and, by the way, Jase says hi.”

“Hi,” I mumbled back.

“She says hi!” she yelled and then, “He says the place looks pretty classy. Do you like him, Calla?”

I closed my eyes and nodded. “Yeah, I like him. I really do.”

“Good. I can’t wait to meet him. And to see you. But I really want to meet him.” She giggled when I laughed. “I’m happy for you. Seriously.”

Sighing, I then admitted something kind of scary. “I’m happy, too.”

I got off the phone after making a promise to give her the details, and it was when I tucked my hair back behind my ear, I felt it—the awareness of not being alone.

Oh no.

Biting down on my lower lip, I twisted around and saw Jax standing at the bottom of the stairwell, already dressed for our date. Dark denim jeans and a white button-down. He looked damn good.

He was also grinning a smug little grin. “So you like me? You really do?”

I groaned, cheeks heating. “Shut up.”