AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Liam stepped back, and I let out a slow, uneven breath. “I’m gonna go shower at my place and bring back some stuff.”
He was staring down at the floor when I stepped out of the kitchen. My heart jangled in my chest. I registered its uneven beats and racing thumps.
This would not do. Not on day one. I opened the slider and paused. “No bullshit?”
Liam’s eyes locked onto mine.
“I’m really nervous to live under the same roof as you, Liam. Most of the time, I’m completely convinced that you hate me.” My voice cracked on the wordhate, and I cursed this little moment of honesty. “I think we’re liable to kill each other if we don’t figure out the right way to do this,” I continued.
His jaw clenched.
“I don’t ...” I paused. “I don’t want to mess this up.”
When he didn’t answer, I ducked my head and started out of the house.
“I don’t either,” he suddenly said, quiet and demanding. I stopped, my hand still on the door, my head swiveling slowly to stare. The thick line of his throat moved on a swallow. “And I don’t hate you,” he added in an urgent tone. “I never have.”
My hand dropped to my side, and I turned to face him. “Never?” I repeated incredulously. “You’veneverhated me?”
Then Liam’s face took on an entirely different cast. He could hardly meet my eyes. His jaw was tight, and he shifted on his feet.
He was nervous.
I was tempted to take another picture, because this needed to be recorded for posterity.
“I’d love a few more words than this,” I prodded gently. “Because for a decade I have operated under the assumption that you can’t stand being in the same room as me. You could hardly look at me for years.”
Liam’s eyes closed, and his chest expanded on a massive inhale. The kind you took when you were mentally prepping for something big.
“At the beginning, I couldn’t,” he ground out. “But not ... not because of that.”
My brow furrowed.
“I didn’t hate you,” he said again, his voice low and fierce, and absolutely nothing about that fierceness was computing in my brain.
“You certainly didn’t like me.” I crossed my arms over my chest. “Which was fine. I didn’t expect—”
“Ididlike you,” he interrupted hotly. “That was the problem, yeah?”
His eyes weren’t closed anymore. They were wide open, blazing with intensity—and locked straight on mine.
Something invisible cinched itself tightly around my ribs and squeezed.
“When I met you ...” Liam continued, voice halting as he chose his words. “I got over it. It was ... just a little thing, and I don’t want you to think I’m still ...” He stopped, then blew out a hard breath. “But I liked you, Zoe.”
My breath was coming in short, shocked little puffs. My mouth hung open, and my cheeks were hot. “You ...”
I couldn’t even say it, let alone wrap my brain around what he was telling me.
“Fuck,” he muttered, swiping a hand over his face. “I’m bollocks-ing this up. I shouldn’t even be ...”
Weren’t we a pair? He was stumbling over his words, and I couldn’t find a single friggin’ one.
“You liked me?Liked meliked me?”
He gave me an exasperated look, but holy shit, there was a spark of warmth buried in his eyes, and it was just enough to snap me back into the moment.
“Liam, I . . .”
