Page 57 of More Than Just Friends

‘Kind of relieved if I’m honest,’ Noah blew out a breath.

My brows shot up. Relief was the exact word I’d just thought about.

‘I thought you really liked Kayleigh?’

‘She was nice. But I wasn’t really attracted to her.’

‘But she’s an underwear model!’ My face crumpled with confusion. There was no way he could mean that. Especially after we got a full-frontal view of just how perfect she was.

‘She was pretty, yes,’ Noah admitted. ‘But there’s a difference between someone being attractive and being attracted to them. I just didn’t feel that spark.’

‘No?’

‘Not even a little bit,’ he replied, and his eyes locked with mine.

‘Have you ever felt that before, y’know, those sparks?’ I asked, my pulse racing.

‘Only once,’ he said without hesitation.

‘So why did the relationship end?’ I racked my brain trying to think of which of his exes it could’ve been.

‘Sadly, it never even started.’

Noah’s eyes were still firmly fixed on mine and a wave of electricity crackled in the air.

Whoa.

What was happening right now?

Then the realisation hit me.

Wait. Was he talking about me?

An hour ago, I would’ve dismissed it. I would’ve bet my life savings (which after this trip were probably hovering around a grand total of about two pounds fifty, but still), that the answer to that question was a hard no.

But now, there was a teeny-tiny seed growing in my mind that it might be a possibility. Even if it was only a 1 per cent possibility, that still counted, right?

I started weighing up the evidence to support this crazy theory.

Kayleigh had claimed that Noah was ‘obsessed’ with me and Sammie had always said she thought he fancied me, but that was just their opinions.

When it came down to it, there was no hard evidence to support those delusions. All I saw was a kind and supportive friend.

If anyone had proof that he wasn’t interested, it was me.

I’d had crushes on Noah on and off over the years. Mainly when I was in my early teens and my hormones were all over the place. But especially during the summer before we started uni.

We spent a lot of time together. I hoped that maybe something would happen, but then one night when we were at a party together, I’d overheard him telling his friend point-blank that he didn’t see me like that.

Those words are still seared into my brain. ‘She’s like my little sister. Doing anything with her would be weird.’

He went on to insist that we’d only ever be friends.

And yeah, I knew that was a long time ago and I get that people can change their minds, but that wasn’t the case here.

We’d always lived so close together. Either on the same street or at most a five-minute walk away. That was always our thing. But then Noah moved to the other end of London, for no apparent reason.

Okay, he started a new job, but there were millions of flats that were closer to his job and closer to me, but instead he chose one that was so far away, it might as well be on the moon.