“Hey, Stan. Take us to Kat’s place, okay?”
“Okay.” Stan nodded. “Have you seen the baby?”
“Yeah.” Dan glanced at me, then lifted his chin to the privacy window controls.
“Is it cute?” Stan pulled out of the garage and onto the street.
“What do you mean, ‘Is it cute?’ Of course he is cute. He’s a baby.”
I placed my finger on the button to close the window, but waited, not wanting to be rude and interrupt their conversation.
“Not all babies are cute. I’ve seen some ugly babies in my time, let me tell you.” Stan turned onto the highway ramp.
“Will you listen to this guy?” Dan appealed to me, rolling his eyes. “How many babies could you have seen? What? You hanging out in nurseries in your spare time? Judging baby beauty contests on the weekend?”
“I know people with babies.” Stan shrugged.
“What people do you know with babies?”
Without me pressing the button, the window started sliding shut.
“Let me close that for you.” Stan’s gaze met mine briefly in the rearview mirror. “Give you and Mr. I’ve Never Seen An Ugly Baby a little privacy.”
I had to roll my lips between my teeth because Dan was mumbling, “He knows people with babies.”
I wrapped my arm through his and turned my face into his shoulder, laughing silently. Dan also huffed a laugh, his hand coming to my face and encouraging me to tilt my head back.
I did, and our gazes met. His eyes were tired. But they were also happy.
“Hi,” he said, and I allowed his voice’s soft, seductive cadence to pour over me, warming me, filling my insides with delicious restlessness.
“Hi.”
He conducted a sweep of my features in a way that felt cherishing. “We need to talk.”
I nodded, suppressing dread and hope, focusing instead on resolve. “We do. I have—I mean—there’s a lot I need to tell you.”
Dan’s mouth curved into a regretful frown. “It’ll have to wait. I have to leave. I have a business trip to Australia. I won’t be home until next Monday at the earliest.”
Oh. Darn.
“When do you leave?”
He glanced at his watch. “In three hours.”
I swallowed my disappointment, my gaze falling away.
“Okay.” I would miss him. As bizarre as that sounded—since nothing between us was settled—it was true.
“Hey.” He slipped a finger under my chin, bringing my eyes back to his. After gazing at me for a long moment, he brushed a light kiss against my lips. I gripped his wrist, seeking more of his mouth, more of him, but he retreated.
Dan peered down at me, his handsome brown eyes earnest. “I’m going to miss you.”
My heart suffered a minor explosion of happiness and without thinking, I responded, “I’ll miss you, too.”
“And we’ll talk.”
“I’ll call you. All the time.”
He laughed lightly, looking at me like I was funny. I winced at the eager tone of my voice, trying to amend, “I mean, not all the time. I’ll call you when you want to be called, or we could set up a call. You know what I mean.”
“No.” He shook his head, still smiling. “You said all the time, I expect calls all the time.”
I tried to glare at him but failed.
“Just don’t call me from the bathroom.” He made a face. “My sister Colleen does that and it’s fucking gross. Called me from a new French restaurant to tell me it gave her diarrhea while she was having diarrhea in the ladies’ room. Who does that? It’s why I won’t ever touch her cell phone.”
“Is this the one who is vegan?”
“What? No way. Colleen wouldn’t touch a carrot even if it’d give her magical powers. I’ve never seen her eat a vegetable unless you count potatoes. You’re thinking of Cathy. She’s the health nut.”
“How many sisters do you have?”
“Four.” Dan glanced at his watch and cut me off before I could react to the fact that he had four sisters or ask him anything further about his family. “I have a favor to ask.”
“What? Anything,” I offered immediately.
His eyebrows pulled together and he studied me, giving me the sense my eager response troubled him. Eventually, pulling a key from his pocket, he said, “I’d like you to move into my place.”
I blinked at him, the key he held out to me, and his request. “You want—”
“I’ve been thinking about it since last week. Your uncle said this thing needs to look real, right? How real is it going to look with you still in your apartment and me still in mine? And another thing, what if Caleb shows up while I’m gone? That building of yours only has one door to the outside, easy enough to get through. Our place on Randolph has a doorman, touch sensors on the door, and a concierge with a security lock on the elevator—and that’s just the lobby level.”