Ave Michaels is an out-and-proud cynical romantic who never had her heart broken (considering she has to fall in love first.)
That is until, in order to get published, she has to prove she's a versatile writer by writing a romance novel.
Throw in a...
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"In Which Reality is Getting Stuck on Incongruous Nicknames"
(Pt. 2)
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(Still) The Arm Bar (gym), Behind The Garage
8:??PM (How do you expect me to keep track of this?)
"That hardly seems fair," he remarks with a mouth-shrug.
"Join the club. 'Been saying the exact same thing since I met you," I say with a lopsided smirk.
The thought of kicking his divine ass — maybe breaking a few bonesas well — and getting my jacket back makes me smile with gleeful anticipation.
He goes back to staring at me, long enough for my facial muscles to screw up in annoyance.
He finally breaks the silence with the words I least expect to hear, "You should do it more often."
I pin him with a questioning brow.
His full kissable lips twitch. "Smile."
I squint my eyes at him, doing just the opposite. "In your dreams."
"Already did," he replies so faintly that I almost couldn't believe my ears.
Was he toying with me right now? "You"—
"Trouble!"
Barely missing a second, I sharply shove him to a reasonable distance (though the result was more of me bouncing back from the inertia) as Pops makes a beeline towards us.
"You lookin' cozy there," he says, eyeing the close proximity between the two of us. "I swear, for a minute there, anyone would think you had a lover's spat"— he stops and breaks into a guffaw — "but that would be impossible since you two just met."
"Ha! Ha! Ha!" I pretend to laugh with him while facing the blonde-haired, jacket-stealing Scottish man.
Don't even think about it, my eyes bulge with an evil-eyed glare, nose flared and lips thinned. Unless you want to kiss your job and your apartment bye-bye, keep your howler* shut.
Without batting an eye, his scarred brow imperiously slides up in response as we unblinkingly aim to out-stare each other again. I would've taken it as a win if it wasn't for the way his gaze rakes all over my face and lingered on my pinched lips.
I wiggle my lips in disdain, licking at the seams for any signs of dried drool.
"Son?" Pops looks at him expectantly, his tone deceptively casual.
Ciaran finally answers Pops with an evasive shake of his head. "Not at all, sir"— he shoots me a hard knowing look — "she was just about to show me how to spar."
