Mr. Wrong Number(22)

She was holding out her dirty plate, her eyes asking permission to dump the dirty dish on me, and I immediately regretted my decision to look at her. Because she looked the same. Long, dark hair, green eyes, pink cheeks—the same Liv I’d always known.

But now she was cross-contaminated with little bits of Misdial. Instead of just seeing the face of Jack’s sister, my brain kept loading up things I knew about her, like the fact that she preferred shoulder-biting, frenetic sex against the wall to a sweet romance.

Shit.

I looked back at the sink; I needed time to absorb this jarring turn of events before I laid eyes on her again. “That is the rule.”

“Seriously?” I saw in my periphery that she tilted her head, and I could feel her eyes on me.

“Seriously. You had a big day; I’ll get the dishes.”

She said, “Wow,” but stayed put beside me.

God, I just need her to go away. “Better go before I change my mind.”

“Colin.” She was telling me to look at her with her tone of voice.

“Olivia.” I did look at her then, and she was giving me a tiny smile. I shifted my weight to one foot and hoped I looked as exasperated as I felt, because I needed her gone. I raised an eyebrow. “What?”

She nudged me with her elbow, a playful touch of her funny bone to my side, and said, “Thanks for being cool tonight. It was kind of fun until you weirded out at the end.”

She was too close, too earnest, too playful, and I was careful to keep my voice level as I said, “Sure. Now go to bed, Olivia.”

She slow blinked another grin. “Sweet dreams, Colin.”





6





Olivia


My alarm went off, and everything inside me wanted to ignore it and sleep in.

But I couldn’t risk it. I couldn’t risk jeopardizing all of the big-girl, adult things that were finally happening in my life by going back to my undisciplined ways. I had to keep the New Olivia thing going.

Besides, I could always nap on Colin’s bed after he went to work.

I put on cutoff sweat shorts and a Just Do It T-shirt with a swoosh that had worn completely away, brushed my teeth, and pulled my hair back in a ponytail. Five minutes later I was riding the elevator down to the lobby, adjusting my earbuds while clicking on my favorite running playlist.

And then I was off.

The morning sun was just starting to come up and the city streets were quiet; it was a perfect morning to run. And the running itself actually felt good for once. I was killing the game, jogging four whole blocks without stopping, when I nearly ran over a dude who was tying his shoe. I came around the corner like a shot, really feeling my stride, when all of a sudden—boom—there he was in the middle of the sidewalk. I tried to sidestep with a graceful, deer-like leap, but ended up tripping over my own feet, sprawling out over the sidewalk, and landing on my knees.

Hard.

“Shiiiiit,” I hissed through my teeth.

I looked down at my knees and they were both skinned and starting to bleed like I was a fallen kindergartener at recess. And they hurt so screamingly bad that I wanted to bawl. I rolled over so I was sitting up, and tried not to moan.

“Oh, my God—are you okay?”

I looked up and blinked fast as a handsome face and a backward hat looked down at me. I muttered to myself, “Seriously? Are you freaking kidding me?”

Apparently he heard me, because he smiled. “It’s no big deal; people fall all the time.”

How wonderful to fall like a clumsy oaf in front of a guy who looked cute and nice. I climbed to my feet, jumping up and smiling like my kneecaps didn’t feel broken and my palms weren’t scraped. “I’m fine.”

“You’re bleeding.” He had on sunglasses, but I knew he was looking down at my knees, one of which had a stream of blood running from it.

“Nah.” I waved a hand in the air and made a ridiculously perky face. “I bleed easily. Like all the time. It’s seriously no big deal. Um, have a good day, I guess.”

I turned away from him and just started running, throwing my hand up in a wave as I did my best to disappear from his sight. I sprinted down the block, desperate to put as much space between him and me as possible, but after about twenty seconds he caught up to me.

Dammit, he started running alongside me.

I didn’t even look at him. “What are you doing?”

“Running.” There was a smile in his voice as he said, “Do you always run this fast?”

Keeping with the whole compulsive-liar thing, I said, “Yep. It’s okay if you can’t keep up.”

“Oh, I can keep up.” I did glance at him then, and he was grinning when he said, “Last one to Starbucks buys?”

I didn’t have any money on me, but I wanted a coffee more than I wanted to breathe. I could see Starbucks, so I decided to go for it and said, “You’re on.”

I took off, running as fast as my legs would carry me. Thank God there were no people around at that early hour, because I was hard-charging down the sidewalk. I could hear the guy’s footsteps beside me, so I knew he was keeping up, but I couldn’t afford to look over at him or I’d fall down again.

I flew down the block, and when we finally got to Starbucks, I slammed my hands into the door like I was safe on base in a neighborhood game of hide-and-seek. “First!”