The American Roommate Experiment (Spanish Love Deception #2)(115)

“Rosie?” A low voice fell close to my ear, returning me to the present.

Delicious awareness washed down over me at the realization that Lucas was right behind me.

“Yeah?” I answered, relishing in the way his scent wrapped around me.

He braced both hands on my desk, caging me in. God, I loved when he did this. “You spaced out, Ro.”

“And how can you possibly know that?”

His nose dragged along my cheek, making my skin tingle. “You were staring at the glass of water.” He let out a low laugh. “For a very long time.”

“I was thinking.”

He leaned over me a little more, resting his chin on my shoulder. “Were you thinking about me? About us?”

I blushed, my heart racing at how close to the truth he was. “Maybe.”

“Was I naked?” he asked next.

I bit my lip. “Possibly.”

“Were you naked?”

“Definitely.”

He hummed. “Ah, those are my favorite kind of thoughts.”

I turned around very quickly, placing a kiss on his lips, and returning my attention to the laptop. To my manuscript.

Lucas must have been dazzled for a moment because he didn’t say a single word. He just… seemed to need a moment to catch his breath.

I smiled to myself.

“So, Rosie,” he finally said, “when are you going to let me read it? I’ve been craving more ever since I finished book one.”

I didn’t even try to conceal how happy that made me. “It’s not ready yet.”

It took him a moment to answer. “How about just a taste? A… snippet. A teaser. It’s Tuesday, you owe it to your fans, and I’m your biggest one. Hashtag Team Rosie. Hashtag Teaser Tuesday. Hashtag Friday Kiss.”

My head swiveled very slowly. “Where did you learn that?”

His grin was big and proud, unashamedly beautiful, just like him. “I have my ways. You should know how good of a researcher I am by now.”

“You’re actually right,” I told him. Then, I turned around and smiled to myself because, whoa, had Lucas looked into the bookishphere? For me? “I’m sorry I underestimated you, Matthew McConaughey. But no teasers for you.”

No way in hell.

I was extremely proud of this first draft, but I didn’t know how I felt about Lucas reading it when there was so much… inspiration drawn from him. From us.

“Not even a peek into a spicy scene? I could help by bringing some more inspiration in there.”

Delicious warmth filled my belly, but I shook my head.

“Okay.” He sighed, but I knew it was more for the theatrics. “How many words away, then?”

My lips curled up, unstoppable. “Not many.”

His arms wrapped around my middle from behind, his face burrowing in my neck. “That’s my girl,” he said, my heart losing it just like the first time he’d ever uttered those words. “I’m so proud of you, Ro. So, so proud.” And for some reason, hearing that from him, that he was proud of me, felt like I’d accomplished something big.

Something amazing.

Something extraordinary.

That was how much he meant to me. “All thanks to you,” I breathed out, overwhelmed by my own thoughts. “To your help. Our experiment.”

“It was all you, preciosa. I didn’t write a word. You did.”



* * *



Tonight was Lucas’s last night in New York. In the States. In my apartment, my bed, my time zone. And with every passing second that pushed us closer to tomorrow morning, my mood plummeted to the ground.

Together with my heart.

During the week we’d spent together in my apartment we never discussed what would come next after he and Taco jumped on that flight and returned to Spain. For good. It had been as if none of us had wanted to burst the blissful bubble we had slipped in. And that was probably a mistake.

Not probably, it definitely was one.

But what was I supposed to say? How would I broach the topic? Hey, Lucas, I have fallen in love with you. And I know your life is in shambles, and I know you are struggling to come to terms with what you’ve lost and who you are right now, but what are we?

That would be so selfish.

Even thinking of burdening Lucas with that conversation made me sick to my stomach. All I wanted was to protect him, to make it all better for him, to see him find his way and thrive in his new life, and I knew this—a long-distance relationship with someone he’d met a handful of weeks ago—wasn’t a way to make any of that easier.

Or was it?

I didn’t know at this point. And it made me so unbelievably sad.

So yeah, my mood. Plummeting.

And Lucas noticed. Of course, he did.

That was why he had been trying to make me smile all evening. He hadn’t even held back in front of Aaron and Lina when we’d met them for his goodbye dinner. He’d held my hand, touched my back, whispered in my ear, and just… acted like the man I wanted him to be for me. Like he was mine.

Standing in the bathroom, in front of the mirror as I brushed my teeth, I checked my phone.

I had a trail of messages from Lina. Understandably so. She knew there was something between us, and I owed her an explanation. But that could wait until tomorrow, I hoped. She could deal with the fallout of my broken heart, too, if she wasn’t too mad at me. Two birds with a stone.