thought would forever sink inside her, making her stomach flutter and lighting her nerves on fire. A sensation she hadn’t felt in a while.
“Good.” He nipped at her bottom lip, then glided up her jaw to her ear, his mouth hot and tempting. “I hated having to leave you back there.”
“It’s okay. A tiny flash in time, compared to the whole of life.”
He gave a short laugh. “Very philosophical of you.” He traced his hands down her arms, to intertwine their fingers. “Your plans for tomorrow night haven’t changed, have they?”
The shift in subject snagged her floating thoughts, and they started to fall. “As in, my nights are yours? No. My nights are still yours.” They promised each other to make this work. They had to take time away from their jobs and set aside their evenings.
“Good.” He kissed her nose, and then her lips again. “We have dinner plans.”
What?
“With Liz.”
Disappointment mixed with anxious anticipation crashed around Chloe. “No. We promised.”
“We promised evenings were for working things out. She’s part of the plan.”
“No way.” Chloe pulled from his grip. She couldn’t name everything that swirled inside, but confusion and hurt were present. And hope. What the hell was that doing there? “Why?”
“You said you wanted to experiment. She was the catalyst. She’s free tomorrow. We’ll never see her again.”
Except apparently Liz was one of Utah’s wealthy elite. Not that Chloe and Jordan spent a lot of time with those people. “I didn’t mean with her.”
“Why not?”
Because… Because— “I don’t know.”
“Okay.” Jordan’s expression shifted to impassive, but sympathy filled his words. “Not her, then. I’ll have the hotel desk send a note up to her room, telling her never mind .”
And that was that. Was Chloe going to do this every time? Pick fights with Jordan because all they ever did was talk about experimenting, and then back away from any opportunity, terrified of what might go wrong? “I’m nervous; that’s all.”
“Don’t be. It’s not like there’s any sort of guarantee she’s interested. But if she is, don’t you want to find out?”
She couldn’t ignore the wild flapping churning her insides. “Yes. Dinner it is.” Please don’t let this be a mistake. Or a disappointment. Or absolutely incredible .
*
Liz stood at the back of the darkened panel room in the convention center, watching the K.M. rep bounce through the launch news about individual-level licenses for their animation studio. Mercy had helped them pull together amazing video to go with the demo, and the audience cheered with each new snippet of information.
Her phone vibrated, and she pressed Ignore without pulling it from her pocket. She swore, every credit card company on the planet picked today to do a marketing push. Her voicemail and email were full of messages that were probably spam reminding her about the different rewards programs she got with her cards. All things to sift through and delete later.
“They love you,” she said to Jonathan.
“We’ve got good marketing behind us.” He leaned against the wall next to her. “Tell Mercy we’ll be back for more.”
“Of course.”
“Do you have plans tonight?”
The question knocked loose the wave of uncertainty Liz had tried to ignore since Jordan and Chloe rescued her from that guy, and it tumbled with a thunk into her gut. “I do. I’m sorry.”
“No worries. You should see the city while you’re here. As long as you don’t bill me for it.” He gave a light laugh as he pushed away from his post to stand in front of her.
She’d seen L.A. several times in her life. It lost its sparkle after a few visits. “No sightseeing for me. The Rinslet team invited me to dinner.”
“Really.” His tone fell flat, then a tight smile flitted back in. “Be careful with that group.”
“Why?”
“Their thing , marketing-wise, is making a spectacle. Don’t let