Capturing Peace (Sharing You 0.50)

I started to turn into Candice and whine that I wouldn’t know what to wear but was interrupted by my own huge yawn, which made me sound more like Chewbacca. I covered as much of my face as possible with the hand that wasn’t holding the rose and laughed awkwardly. “Oh my word, that’s embarrassing.”

His laugh was deep and rich. “It’s late and I stopped you from going to sleep. If for some reason I don’t see you for the rest of the week, I’ll pick you up at seven on Friday. That sound all right?”

“That sounds perfect. I’ll see you then, and, uh, thanks for my rose.” Before he could say anything else, I turned the doorknob, gave him a small smile, backed up into the room, and shut the door in his still-­smirking face. “Holy hell,” I whispered, and let my forehead fall against the door.

“Tell. Me. Everything!” Candice practically shrieked, and I turned to narrow my eyes at her.

Like she hadn’t been listening.

“We’re going on a date Friday. That’s about it.”

“That is so not all that was said, Rachel! Ohmigod, did you swoon when he said all he’s seeing is you?”

“Swoon, Candice? Really? This isn’t one of your romance novels.” And yeah . . . I did kind of swoon. “And that’s exactly why I’m not telling you. You eavesdrop anyway, so what’s the point in going over it all again?”

“Because I want details of how he looked at you and how you reacted to him.”

Oh dear God, this was going to be a long night.

WHY BLAKE THOUGHT we wouldn’t see each other the rest of the week was beyond me, because sure enough he was the first person I saw when I walked into the athletic center the next afternoon. And surprise, surprise . . . he only had four girls around him that day. That wasn’t including the one he was stretching out on the ground.

Candice’s constant talking faded out as I watched him explaining why he was stretching those particular muscles. But I knew the girl wasn’t paying attention; all she could care about was that he was practically in between her legs.

The girl on the ground said something I couldn’t hear, and the runway-­beautiful, mocha-­skinned girl standing closest to me practically purred as she reached for his forearm, “Well, that’s just because Blake’s so good with his . . . hands.” The other four girls started giggling and I wanted to gag.

Blake’s head shot up and I realized I must have actually gagged out loud. Whoops. Our eyes locked for a few seconds before he quickly looked at the girls surrounding him and his position with the one on the floor. When he looked back at me, his blue eyes were pleading, but I just shook my head and walked off toward the back to get my out-­of-­the-­classroom part of my course over with.

“Hey.” Candice nudged me. “Don’t get upset about that. They aren’t the ones who have a date with him on Friday.”

“I’m not upset about that.” I was upset about the fact that that pissed me off. What, did I expect him to change overnight just because we were going to go on one date? Or did his words last night really have me thinking I’d imagined his robot bimbo herd all year? And sheesh, why did I care at all? I didn’t even want to go on a date with him! Not really . . .

An hour and a half later, I’d successfully avoided his gaze, which I could feel like a laser on my back. But when I turned to put some equipment away, he was right there and there was no way I could avoid Blake in all his real-­life Calvin Klein model–ness.

“You’re mad,” he said, and began taking the equipment out of my arms and putting it in the closet.

“Um . . . not? And I can put this away myself.”

“Rachel, I told you. I only see you.”

“Yeah, no, I heard you.” As soon as everything was put up, I turned away, only to quickly turn back around and face him. “Look, Blake, I don’t think Friday is a good idea.”

“Why isn’t it?”

“Well, it’s—­you know . . . it’s just not. So thank you for your offer. But once again, and hopefully for the last time, I’m not going to go on a date with you. If you ever move back to California, I really hope this doesn’t make family dinners awkward.”

The corners of his lips turned up slightly. “All right. You done for the day?”

This was the first rejection he’d taken well, and it threw me off for a moment. “Um, yes?”

“Let’s go then.”

“Whoa, wait. Go where? Its Wednesday, not Friday. And I said no anyway.”

“You said no to a date with me. The date was on Friday. So we aren’t going on a date. We’re just going to go walk, hang out, whatever you want. But it’s not a date.” He stepped close enough that we were sharing the same air and his voice got low and husky. “If you want to call it something, we can call it exercising or seeing Austin. You can hardly count that as a date, Rach.”

I was momentarily stunned by the effect his voice and blue eyes had on me. “Um . . .” I blinked rapidly and looked down to clear my he

ad. “I’ve lived here almost three years, I don’t need to see the sights.”