Page 34 of I Never Stopped Loving You

“That’s a bit cocky, Mr. Anderson,” I tease.

I let his last name flow off my tongue with sarcasm. The small frown pulling at the corner of his lips makes me laugh.

“Not cocky. I’m confident I could get you to say yes, Miss Bennett…I just have to decide which way I want to do it.”

Part of me wants to ask him what the different ways are that he’s thinking of, but before I can ask him, we’re pulling into a parking lot. Neon lights flash in the window, and large glowing letters are across the whole front.

I quickly pull out my phone to send my location to Jenna. It’s just as easy as telling her where we went next, but this way she can just click it to look up the place that we’re at, opposed to me having to tell her all the details.

“Welcome to my favorite arcade.”

“You go to more than one?” I ask.

“No. But saying it’s my favorite would make you know it’s about to be your favorite too,” he says before getting out and coming to my side of the car to open my door.

“Oh yeah? How can you be so sure it’ll be my favorite?”

He holds a hand out for me to help me out of the car. He pulls me closer and wraps his arms around me.

“Well, I think Purgatory is your favorite burger now, and I told you it was my favorite.”

“That doesn’t mean it’ll work for everything.”

My hands are on his chest as I look up into those dark eyes. Like an endless, starless sky. No light. Only the dark abyss I want to get lost in.

He removes his arms from around me and begins to pull me toward the neon flashing lights.

“We’ll see, Little Rabbit.”

CHAPTER 18

NOAH

“This place is insane. I never knew this existed, and it’s less than ten minutes from me,” she says as her eyes are hypnotized by all the flashing lights.

She’s been walking around the arcade for the last ten minutes looking at all the games that are available. I can tell a couple are her favorites just by how she lingers on them. She stares at the screen and traces her fingers over the controls. We almost have two and a half hours for her to play to her heart's content, and if necessary, I’ll bring her back tomorrow.

“Which one do you want to play first?” I ask as we finish our trip around the room.

“Don’t laugh, but do you want to race me?”

“Race you? Which one, Fast and the Furious or Fury?”

“Fury, of course,” she scoffs, as if there was ever even a choice.

“What do I get when I win?”

“There you go again, being Mr. Cocky.”

“I grew up playing these games at the arcade when we used to go on vacation. I can almost guarantee I can beat you at any of these,” I say, gesturing to the room around us.

I take a step closer to her, putting our bodies mere inches apart. I tower over her, so she has to slightly tip her head up to look at me. She glances behind her at the bar, then back at me.

“Loser buys the winner a drink?”

“That’s a start.”

I wink at her as I take a step back, then turn to head to the back to Fury, but I don’t miss the blush coloring her cheeks.