Blurred Lines (Love Unexpectedly 1)

Lance is a studying machine by night, but by day, he has a cushy job as an accountant at a local investment firm, and it pays way better than my entry-level marketing gig, so he lives in a newish high-rise apartment building, complete with a doorman.

The broad-shouldered blond guy behind the reception desk gives me a wide smile when he sees me come in. “Ms. Blanton. It’s been a while.”

You’re telling me.

“Hey, Erik. How’s the wedding planning coming?”

“Oh, you know. Lots of education on the various shades of pink. The latest discussion is whether or not she wants to have a bustle on her dress. Do you have any idea what a bustle is?”

“Unfortunately I do. My cousin got married last summer, and it took four of us bridesmaids to figure it out.”

He shakes his head. “I don’t even want to know.”

“You absolutely don’t,” I say with a laugh, as I proceed to the elevators. “You mind letting me up?”

He hesitates for only the briefest of moments, and I feel a little stab of unease. While Erik’s job is making sure that no guests show up at a resident’s place unannounced, I’ve been on Lance’s approved guest list since he moved in. Usually Erik just buzzes me up.

For a terrible second, I wonder if Lance has taken me off the approved list, but then Erik does his thing and calls the elevator for me, so I figure I just imagined the whole thing. Hopefully.

“Wish me luck,” I mutter to nobody, as the elevator doors close.

Lance’s apartment is on the twelfth floor, and I make my way to his front door like I have a million times before. But unlike a million times before, I hesitate before knocking.

I shake off the weird sense of foreboding and give a determinedly perky knock.

My shoulders relax the second he opens the door. His reading glasses are perched on his nose, the way they always are when he’s deep in studying.

He looks the way he always does.

Although usually his expression is a little more happy and a little less surprised.

He shoves his phone in his back pocket and shakes his head, almost as though to orient himself to my presence. Only then does he smile. “Hey!”

There’s the tiniest wiggle of warning still clinging on in the back of my mind, but then he smiles wider and gives me a long hug.

It’s okay. We’re fine. He’s just been busy.

I tilt my head toward him, lowering my eyelashes just a little to look at his mouth in a way that I know from experience drives him crazy, but he’s already pulling back.

No kiss.

Wha?

He hasn’t seen me in a week, and no kiss?

Just like that, the wiggle of warning is back.

“I didn’t know you were coming over!” he says.

Is it just me, or is his voice a little too cheerful? Like in the fake kind of way. I study him carefully as I step into his apartment, shutting the door behind me.

“Sorry, I should have texted,” I say.

I expect him to tell me that it doesn’t matter, that he’s just happy to see me, but instead he sort of shrugs. At least he starts putting away some of the stuff on his kitchen counter, where he’s obviously been deep in the books. I tell myself that it’s a good sign, but I’m all too apprehensive that something may be even more wrong than I first suspected.

Nothing about this is the typical reaction of a boyfriend happy to see his long-lost girlfriend.

I start to sit on one of his counter stools, a part of me still hoping that the tension’s all in my head, but at the last minute I stand back up instead of sitting.