The Bookworm's Guide to Dating (The Bookworm's Guide 1)

Ivy gasped, dislodging the empty chip packet from her bump. “It was Josh!”

“Sssshhh!” Frantically waving my arms, I looked around the store. Which was stupid, because I knew the store was empty except for us. Saylor and Holley were on their lunch break while I kept Ivy company.

“Oh, my God!”

I drew a chair up next to her and pleaded with her. “Don’t say anything.”

“Who am I going to tell?” she asked, holding her hands out. “Well, Kai, but you figured that.”

“You can’t tell Kai! He’ll tell Colton!”

Her lips drew into a little ‘o’. “Ooh, he doesn’t know.”

“Of course he doesn’t know, Ivy! It only happened last night!”

That ‘o’ became an ‘ooh.’ “How did that happen? Holley told me you kissed, but I thought that was the end of it. Because, you know. Your brother.”

I winced. “Can we stop bringing him up? This is a sensitive subject.”

“Tell me, tell me!”

I ran through everything that had happened. It wasn’t until I got to the part about everyone being at Bronco’s that I realized she was really out of the loop, so I delved into a little bit more detail until I’d finished the entire story.

“What are you doing to do?” Ivy asked after a moment.

I shrugged. “We don’t know. As far as everyone—and I mean everyone—is concerned, he’s still setting me up on dates.”

“How the hell are you going to date other men and then go home and bang him?”

“Ivy. That’s not helpful.”

“I know, but I’m hardly a relationship expert myself.” She pointed to her bump. “Hello. One-night stand baby.”

“Yes, but you’re now engaged to him, so that’s irrelevant.”

“Ssh, Kins, don’t be picky.” She flapped a hand at me. “Have you spoken since?”

I shook my head. “I had to open the store this morning. We’ve texted, but we haven’t had a chance yet. I don’t know how much time we can spend together before someone gets suspicious.”

“Hmm.” Ivy tapped her finger against her lips. “Well, tonight is easy. If he owes you a date, you can have him go to your place under the pretense of you both working together to find a date and reevaluate your wants and needs like you did before.”

Slowly, I nodded. That could work.

“Then at the very least you can talk and decide where you want to go from here. I don’t think anyone will be suspicious about that.” More finger tapping. “After is where it gets questionable. You obviously don’t want to date other guys right now, right?”

I shook my head a little. “At least not until we’ve figured everything out.”

“You’re probably gonna have to go out of town to spend time together until you come clean. If he’s dating too, you can lie and say you both have dates, but use towns in the same direction. You won’t be able to hide it forever, but for now… You can probably buy yourselves a couple of weeks to get a handle on everything.”

“It might not even come to anything,” I said, getting up and straightening the new releases table at the front. “So it’ll all be moot.”

“Do you want it to?”

“To what?”

“Come to anything.”

I shrugged one shoulder, doing my very best to look unbothered. “I don’t know,” I replied, spending way too long fiddling with this book stack. “Maybe.”

“That’s a yes.”

I peered back at her over my shoulder. “That obvious?”

“Yes.” She grinned.

With a sigh, I turned back to her. “It’s just... weird. Like this is Josh, you know? He accepts all my little weird quirks and doesn’t care that I’m awkward and love books and go on bookish tirades about Harry Potter and all the other things that matter to me.” I paused. “I know it’s not like I’m old, but I feel like I’ve waited forever to meet someone who just… gets me. It’s strange to think he could have been there all along.”

“Maybe, maybe not.”

“What does that mean?”

“He’s been there all along, Kinsley,” Ivy said, meeting my gaze in earnest. “Maybe that’s why he gets you. Nobody but him ever took the time to figure you out. Even if neither of you realized it was happening.”***I was dying.

It was the only explanation for the cramps that had me doubled over and hissing into my throw pillows on the sofa.

Seriously. Nothing was touching these cramps, and I was about to get a coat hanger and rip out my own uterus and flush it down the toilet.

Ooh, no.

It’d probably clog the pipes.

The point remained, regardless of the method of disposal.

I was so over it, and it was day one.

My dinner had consisted of an entire bag of salt and vinegar chips—a family sized one, thank you very much.

And I wondered why I bloated on my period.

Really.

The familiar sound of Josh’s truck pulling up outside my house made me groan. I’d told him not to come over because I wasn’t feeling well, and I wasn’t in the mood to figure out our clusterfuck of a situation tonight.