“Yeah.” His arms gave me a squeeze. “I see this. You’ve shifted ten pounds that looked better when it was on your ass and tits. You’re in a tee and jeans and not your fancy-ass clothes and heels. You lost the glasses and got contacts. The only thing I like, babe, is the hair. Looks good longer and lighter.”

He liked my hair.

I tried not to let that make me feel tingly but it ended up more like me pretending I didn’t feel the tingles that made me feel.

“Brock, seriously, can we talk about this later?”

“Where you movin’?” he asked, telling me that no, we couldn’t talk about it later.

“I haven’t decided yet,” I lied, and the pulsing hum of his humor and good mood went flat as his eyes narrowed.

“Christ, Tess, did the three months you spent lickin’ your fuckin’ wounds erase the four months we spent together so you don’t remember you can’t pull shit over on me?”

My eyes narrowed too and I informed him, “That was not cool.”

“No, what was not cool was you taking three fuckin’ months to lick your wounds and makin’ me haul my ass to you, but we’ll talk about that tonight.”

I felt my body go stiff. “If that’s why you’re coming over tonight then don’t bother.”

“Okay, no,” he said on a low rumble. “I see this shit shook out some sass in you, babe. My Tess was sugar sweet from the minute my eyes hit her to the minute I kissed her good night. I know what happened was fucked and it fucked with your head, so I’m willin’ to ride that with you. But you gotta know now, once we clear a bump, you’re not draggin’ us back time and again so we become intimately acquainted with it. We’re over the bump. We move the fuck on. We’re agreed I’m over tonight, nine o’clock. We sort shit out we shoulda sorted out three months ago and see where we are. But right now, you’re tellin’ me where you’re movin’.”

“We didn’t agree to anything, Brock. You said you were coming over. I want to have coffee.”

“Don’t shit me, Tess. You’ll bag on coffee.”

“See!” I cried. “Is this sinking in that maybe I’m trying to move on in a variety of ways, including moving on from Jake Knox slash Brock Lucas?”

Way, way, way wrong thing to say.

I knew this when one of his arms got tight, the other one slanted up my back, his hand cupping the back of my head as he leaned deep into me, pressing me over the counter, and his face got in mine.