She didn’t.
She blinked at the ceiling. Wow. She really was in love with him. And damn, if she’d only figured that out last night, he might still be here.
With a sigh, she sat up in bed and checked her phone. Shockingly, there was nothing. No missed calls, no texts.
Nothing.
She set the phone in her lap as an odd emotion drummed through her, one she couldn’t put words to.
Liar. She had words, several of them. She was feeling unnecessary because no one had needed her.
She swiped her finger over the screen of her phone and let her thumb hover over Keane’s name. “Don’t do it,” she whispered to herself. “Don’t . . .”
But then her finger swiped. “Whoops,” she said to the room.
Keane answered her FaceTime call wearing sweatpants and nothing else, and her breath stuttered in her chest. His hair was wet and she could only imagine how delicious he smelled.
He took in the shirt she was wearing and his eyes darkened.
“You left your T-shirt here,” she said and then bit her lower lip. “I slept in it.”
His smile went hot. “Commando?”
“Yes,” she admitted. “You owe me a trip to Victoria’s Secret, by the way.”
“I’ll buy you whatever you want, and also thinking of you without panties is making me hot.”
“Everything makes you hot,” she said.
“True story.” He cocked his head and studied her. “So whatcha doing up so early? Making a list, checking it twice? Tell me it’s full of your deepest, darkest sexual fantasies.”
She choked on a laugh. “No!” Then she bit her lower lip, but the question escaped anyway. “Do you have a list of fantasies?”
“Absolutely,” he said, no hesitation.
She blinked. “About . . . me?”
He just looked at her, eyes molten-lava hot, and she felt herself go damp. “Written down?”
He tapped the side of his head. “All in here, babe.” He smiled. “Unless you want me to write them down. We could mix our lists up and take turns picking out one at a time, and—”
“You want to act out our fantasies together?” she squeaked.
He just smiled and she nearly had an orgasm on the spot. “I . . . I don’t know if I can write them down,” she admitted.
“Sure you can. Close your eyes, think of something you’ve always wanted to try, and write it down.” He waited expectantly.
She stared at him. “Now?”
“I will if you will.”
Ten minutes later when her morning alarm went off, she had five fantasies written out. So did Keane.
“Time to get up,” she said.
“Babe, I’m already up.”
She rolled her eyes. “What’s it called when you sext over FaceTime?”
He flashed a grin. “Sex-Time?”
She laughed. “You just made that up.”
“No.” He smiled. “Yeah. Show me under the shirt, Willa.”
She wasn’t going to admit that his soft demand gave her the very best kind of shiver. “Keane.”
“Come on, show me yours and I’ll show you mine.”
“Is there anyone there with you?” she asked.
He turned his phone so she could see that he was in his bedroom at Vallejo Street, alone except for Pita sleeping on his pillow.
“I thought she wasn’t allowed on your pillow.”
“She’s not,” he said. “But apparently she’s the ruler and I’m just her bitch.” Then his face was back in the screen. “Show me,” he said.
She lifted the hem of the shirt high, did a little shimmy, and then dropped the material back down.
Keane’s eyes were so hot she was surprised her screen didn’t melt. “That’s going to get me through a very long day,” he said, voice low and reverent.
She laughed. “You could get porn up on your phone anytime you want. Hell, you could probably get any woman in your contact list to send you nudie pics.”
“I don’t want any woman. I want you.”
Her heart skipped a beat at that. “The feeling’s mutual.”
He smiled. “Have a good day, babe.”
“You too.” And with her heart lighter than she could remember feeling, a burgeoning hope blooming in her chest, she disconnected and went to work.
Willa did think of Keane, but not about the sexual fantasies.
Okay, she thought about those. A lot.
But mostly she thought about the man he’d grown into and how much that man had become such an integral part of her life in one short month.
When an older couple came into the shop to buy treats for their miniature schnauzer, finishing each other’s sentences and holding hands like they were newlyweds, she had to ask. “How long have you been together?”
They grinned in unison. “Fifty years,” the man said. “Fifty of the best years of my life.”
“When you find the right one, honey,” the woman said, her eyes on her hubby, “don’t ever let go.”
“Ever is a long time,” Rory noted thoughtfully when the couple was gone.
Which was funny because ridiculously, Willa was suddenly thinking how much comfort was in the thought of forever . . .
She almost called Keane to tell him she thought maybe she’d figured some things out, namely that she realized she wanted in.
She wanted him.
But she didn’t trust herself not to mess it all up over the phone so she sent a short text inviting him to the gang’s private Christmas party at the pub that night, ending it with a please come.
By the time she closed up the shop and changed for the party, she hadn’t gotten a response from him, and wasn’t sure what that meant.
She walked into the pub a little off her game, but she’d made Keane wait for her to figure things out—she could certainly do the same for him.
The pub was closed to the public; tonight was just a family thing. Spence, Finn, Archer, Elle, and Haley, Pru, and Sean, Finn’s younger brother, who was doing his best to adult these days now that he’d hit the ripe old age of twenty-two.
Finn poured Willa a glass of wine. The rest of the gang was at least a round ahead of her, everyone greeting her with hugs and cheer, and she felt her throat go tight with love. She was so damn lucky to have these people in her life.