The Allure of Dean Harper (The Allure #2)(58)

She cleared her throat and hid it as best as she could. “That was nothing. Just a…dumb game we were playing.”

I opened my mouth to reassure her that I hadn’t seen all of it as the front door opened behind us.

“Jo, I know I said I was going to run errands, but the bakery downstairs had a sale on croissants, so I had to stop and get some.” The three of us turned toward the door to see Lily walk into the apartment clutching a brown bag full of croissants in her arms. “And then I couldn’t keep walking around with a bag of croissants, right?” She dropped her keys in a little bowl by the door, dropped the bakery bag on the kitchen table, and then froze in place as her gaze met mine.

“What the ever-loving f*ck are you doing here?” she asked, narrowing her eyes with a fierceness I hadn’t seen in weeks. I forgot how quickly her claws could come out.

I laughed and then quickly stole back the sound. Laughing wouldn’t make her less angry, even if she had just said something funny.

“He came with me—” Julian began, thinking he could throw me a lifeline.

“I came to help fix your dishwasher,” I said, crossing my arms.

She shook her head. “We don’t need your help.”

I stared as she waltzed over to the dishwasher to prove her statement. She locked the door, pressed a few buttons, and then the dishwasher emitted a noise that sounded distinctly like metal scraping against metal. I cringed as it echoed around the apartment.

She smirked and shot me a glare. “It’s supposed to make that noise.”

She paused the cycle, opened the door, and pulled out a fork bent into three different directions. “See? It’s clean.”

I held back my smile. I missed her so much. This. The fiery woman who wasn’t afraid to challenge me every step of the way. She infuriated me, but I’d trade it all to have one more fight with her, one more indignant glare from her bright brown eyes.

“Lily, do you want to, ah, come with me into the bathroom really quick?” Josephine asked with a clear strain to her voice.

Lily titled her head, trying to piece together what she meant.

Josephine cleared her throat and wrapped her hand around her neck, rubbing back and forth a few times. When I glanced back at Lily, her eyes were wide. Josephine’s warning clicked for her at the same time I noticed a familiar ribbon hanging around her neck. It dipped down into her black tank top, tucked away so that I couldn’t see the bottom. I didn’t need to; I recognized the medal right away.

“How did you…?” I asked, stepping forward and reaching out for it.

Lily stepped back. “I went. I was there at the ceremony. Not for you specifically,” she said, swallowing down her nerves and trying for a new approach. “I saw you leave the medal.”

I smirked. “You were in the bathroom?”

She squeezed her eyes shut and shook her head. “No. It wasn’t like that.”

This was it, the only second chance I’d ever get. Lily still cared about me. She cared enough to wear my medal around her neck.

The medal and that ridiculous jar told me everything I needed to know.

It wasn’t over.





Chapter Forty-Nine


Lily





I was doing my best to devour the entire bag of bargain croissants when Josephine set down two cups of coffee on our kitchen table.

“Did you check with the nunnery in Sweden to see if they had any openings?” I asked, shoving more of the flaky pastry into my mouth before I’d finished my question.

She studied me over her coffee cup. “You aren’t religious.”

“I could be, Jo. After this afternoon, I’m willing to try anything.” I shook my head.

“It wasn’t that bad.”

HA.

I glared at her. “HE SAW THE JAR. He saw me wearing his medal like a freaking crazy person!”

“He didn’t technically see the medal, only the ribbon…”

I dropped my head so that my forehead rested against the edge of the table. “Jo. He ran out of this apartment so fast I thought there would be a Dean-shaped hole in the door.”

She grimaced. “I’m not going to sugarcoat it. It was bad—really bad—but you still have a trillion guys in the city to date. Just because Dean thinks you’re psycho doesn’t mean every guy will.”

“I don’t want to date any other guys.”

I don’t want to date any other guys.

It hurt worse every time I repeated it in my head.

I wanted Dean.

I wanted the one man who now definitely wanted me locked up in a mental institution.

Lovely.

…



In a normal situation, I’d go through the stages of breakup grief and move on like I had from every other man in my life.

Stage One: Eat a bag of croissants. Done.

Stage Two: Try to land the role of next season’s Bachelorette. The producers never emailed me back.

Stage Three: Consider, but don’t actually make, a major life change…like a belly button ring or a tattoo. In the end, I parted my hair slightly more to the left.

All three stages were complete, it’d been three weeks since Dean had walked—no, ran out of my apartment, and I still couldn’t stop thinking about him. I no longer wore his medal, but I did sleep with it under my pillow. I touched it every night before I went to sleep, just to confirm it was still there.