Dopplebanger (Meet-Cute #5)

Chapter 3

THREE

I stared at her hand on mine for way too long. It wasn’t just the way her soft skin warmed mine, but how it’d ignited a sensation I hadn’t felt in a long time.

When I’d woken up to find a Post-it note from Evan, reminding me of the time and location of this meeting, I knew I had to shut this whole thing down. I’d clean up yet another one of his messes—the last, I vowed—but not in the way he’d dictated. It was supposed to be quick and easy. Just tell her that I wasn’t Evan, and then explain she deserved a lot better than my brother. He was obviously stupid if he didn’t realize this girl was a catch.

But her mouth was off and running before I could make sure it was her. The more she said, the more I wanted her to talk. As I’d accidentally mumbled, I got why Evan had called her a sexy, redheaded hurricane of energy and brains. One minute she was spouting off advice on how to sell people on brain-vacations, and the next she was talking about the sun and a peanut plant.

The dots connected, my brain taking a few extra seconds in its sloggy state. “Wait. You’re allergic to peanuts? But peanut butter is amazing and pretty much my favorite food ever.”

She scrunched up her forehead. “Yeah. Remember how we couldn’t eat at that Chinese restaurant near the harbor because they use peanuts in a lot of their dishes and eating there might make me go into anaphylactic shock?”

“Right.” I took another gulp of coffee. “The hangover is making my thoughts… not so great.” For example, I’d just said that sentence. The truth was, the hand she still had on mine was messing with me. Along with her energy and the way her mind worked, and holy shit , she was pretty. Her long red waves gleamed in the sunshine, she had these full lips that my lips wanted to explore, and every time she smiled, two dimples popped in her cheeks.

Don’t even get me started about the way she’d moaned when she’d bit into her muffin. I’d neglected my personal life the past year or so as I’d worked to ensure my desired career path, and it’d been a while since… well, since I’d been this close to a girl this hot.

“It’s also making your voice sound a little different, I think. Rougher, maybe?” Her eyes went to the top of my head, and I froze in place, as if moving might make the truth of who I was show up in one of those thought bubbles. “Did you do something different with your hair?”

“Sure,” I said, not because it was a good response but the first thing that popped into my head as a possible answer.

That earned me the smile with dimples. “Are you positive you’re not still drunk?”

I nodded, although at this moment, I felt pretty damn buzzed.

She leaned across the table and pushed her fingers into my hair, and I forgot how to breathe. Tingles erupted as her fingernails dragged over my scalp, and I wanted to grab her wrist, haul her over the tiny table, and kiss the hell out of her. “It looks like it grew a couple of inches in the past few days. How is that even possible?”

“New… hair gel. I mean, it makes it look longer; it’s not Rogaine or some kind of black market product or anything.”

Her laugh danced across my nerve endings and echoed through my chest. “Are you sure you haven’t been searching the black market? Because that would clear up the questions I had about your browser history.”

A flash of panic hit me, even though I was fairly certain I didn’t have anything to feel that guilty for, and of course she was only joking. “Hey, don’t knock it till you try it.” I gave in to the urge to touch her and wrapped my hand around her wrist. I resisted hauling her over the table, but just barely.

Her eyes met mine, and then her delicate throat worked a swallow.

“For example, name something you want that’s not easy to find.” Right now, I was thinking a girl like you , and my thoughts had no business going there.

She tapped the finger of her free hand to her chin, and I could practically see the moment the light bulb went off in her head. “I’ve always wanted a pet unicorn.”

“I’ll have my black market associates make a few calls.”

My heart battered my ribcage as my gaze dipped to her lips, and I was about to do the opposite of breaking up with her on behalf of my brother. “Anyway,” I said, releasing her wrist and wanting to kick my own ass when she slid back into her chair.

It’s for the best.

I didn’t know how to start, and we were already way past me admitting who I was, so evidently I’d be doing this as my brother. Now that the moment of half-truth arrived, I found it harder than expected to tell her that we needed to break up. Especially since if it was up to me, I’d vote for getting to know her better.

Her phone chimed before I could start parting words I didn’t want to say, and she lifted it. “That means we have fifteen minutes to…” She peered into my face like she wanted to find answers to questions she didn’t know how to word, and I got the scrunched-up expression for the third or fourth time today. Clearly she sensed something was off, but couldn’t put her finger on it. “To finalize our road trip plans so we’ll be ready to go bright and early tomorrow morning.”

Gwen nodded to herself, almost as if she needed to agree. With something she’d just said—the woman was a puzzle I wanted to put together, but I doubted I’d ever get all the pieces.

She dug into her laptop bag and pulled out her computer. “I checked out the route options like we talked about and made a list of sights we might want to see. Or we could just make it a straight shot if you want to cut the trip down to a day.”

If it meant spending more time with her, I wanted to see every damn sight from here to… My brain struggled to find it, but I was almost sure it was Pennsylvania.

She swiveled the computer screen toward me and came around the table to stand beside me. My attention snagged on the scoop neckline of her shirt. The dark purple contrasted her pale skin and emphasized her curves. As she leaned over the keyboard, I couldn’t help but notice the way her jeans hugged her ass, and my eyes did a quick sweep of her long legs before coming back to all that amazing hair I wanted to run my fingers through.

“Is your muffin okay?” she asked, eyeing it. “I can grab something else if you’re not feeling it.”

“No, this is great.” I lifted it and forced myself to take a big bite, one that triggered my gag reflex, thanks to the time Mom made me eat blueberry muffins when I had the flu. She’d insisted on seeing if food would make me feel better.

Spoiler alert: it hadn’t.

I took a giant swig of my coffee to wash the blueberry nastiness down as Gwen pointed at highlighted places on the map. “This website lets you save your trip. I kinda have this thing with lighthouses, and I’ve always wanted to go the one on Cape Hatteras. It’s the tallest brick lighthouse in the US, and the view’s supposed to be amazing.”

“Then we should definitely stop there.” What was I supposed to do? She’d said it with such longing in her voice, and I didn’t want to be the jerk who let her down.

Maybe I could just explain that my brother is an immature, blind idiot, but that I’m single and available. While Evan didn’t want to stay in a relationship with her, he cared about her, and that alone meant she was off-limits. Hell, the fact that he’d ever dated her meant she was off-limits.

“We’d shave off a couple of hours if we went to another lighthouse that’s not so out of the way, even if the others aren’t guarding the graveyard of the Atlantic. Like there’s one?—”

“You expect me to settle for a different lighthouse after hearing a fact like that?”

Her smile shot me right through the heart. She clicked on the icon, adding it to our trip. “Okay, so once we get to Pennsylvania, I figured we could stop at Philly and check out the Liberty Bell. I saw it once, a long time ago, but I care more about how the country was formed now. Or, if you’re more into chocolate, there’s always Hershey…”

I had a slight obsession with how the country was formed, even before law school, and I’d never been to Philadelphia. “No offense to chocolate, but I can get that anytime. Definitely the Liberty Bell.”

The excited way she clicked it made me think she preferred that option. “Okay, so backtracking a bit to before our Philly stop… Save time and go up through Delaware, which I’m sure is a very pretty drive? Or swing through D.C.? It’s about an hour difference, but with traffic and stopping to see the sights, it’d probably add closer to three.”

Three extra hours with her, on this road trip I was apparently taking? Sign me up. “D.C.”

She added it in and studied the map. “Thirteen hours in two days… Looks doable. And if we get several hours and sights into the trip and decide we need to shorten it, we can do that, too.”

“Perfect. Plus, we’ve got the Camaro to speed things along.”

She tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. “I thought we were going to take my car? I don’t want you to have to put the wear and tear on yours, and?—”

“We’re taking the Camaro. I insist.”

“That’s probably the safer option, since my car’s been extra temperamental lately.” She glanced at the time and began gathering up our trash. I pushed out my chair and stopped her with a hand on her arm.

“I’ll get it.”

Touching her was a mistake—an amazing mistake I wanted to do again and again. Energy crackled in the air between us, and our gazes caught and held. Less than an hour together, and my resolve to do the right thing had crumbled. I could only imagine how many times I’d want to kiss her during thirteen-plus hours of traveling, not to mention the days we’d be in her hometown. Not just kiss her, either. Desire thrummed through me as I thought about pulling her close and getting my hands on her curves.

This is a bad idea. Abort, abort, abort! I quickly gathered everything and then returned to the table.

This was it. The moment I needed to break the news that the road trip we’d just planned needed to be a solo mission, but that I wished her the best and hoped she got to see everything she wanted to. She’d hate me and that’d suck, but the hatred would be aimed at Evan, and that… well, it didn’t make me feel any better. I understood all too well why he didn’t want to have to see her sad face when he broke the news.

How could I already care so much about how she felt?

And how could I already be experiencing such strong emotions for her?

Just do it. The Band-Aid method would’ve been easier if I’d done it the second I’d shown up, the way I should’ve. I cleared my throat, gearing up to let her down as easy as I could.

But then she put her hand on my biceps and pursed her lips together, looking at me like a problem she didn’t know how to solve. I had a feeling she solved most everything she put her mind to. “Can you hold still for a second?”

A strange request, but with her peering up at me with those big hazel eyes, she could ask me just about anything and I’d agree.

Her fingers wrapped tighter on my arm as she tipped onto her toes. Is she…? Oh, God, she’s moving in for a kiss.

Apparently I, like my brother, could also be a tool when it came to women, because instead of stopping her, I let her press her soft lips to mine. The reaction was instantaneous—heat flooding my veins, burning off the last of the hangover haze as every cell in my body went on high alert.

I wrapped my arm around her waist, fitting her tighter to me, and parted her lips with my tongue. Then I swept it inside, indulging in my first taste. I told myself it was also my last taste, which heightened the urgency to claim every inch of her mouth while I could.

She gasped, her chest rising against mine, and I drove my hand into her hair and angled her head so I could deepen the kiss and hold on to the amazing sensations rushing through me for a few seconds longer.

Minutes. Let’s make it minutes…

She wound her arms around my neck, closing the last inch of space between our bodies. If I didn’t need to breathe, I’d never let go, then it could still count as one kiss.

On second thought, who needed to breathe?

Not me, not with our mouths and tongues perfecting the way they moved against each other.

Her moan vibrated against my lips and I was about to lose the last remaining thread on my control. I reluctantly released her, and our ragged breaths filled the air between us.

She brought her fingertips up to that delicious bottom lip. “Wow. That was…” She blinked up at me. “What got into you this morning?”

You. And I want to get into you next. Whoa. That thought was way too far, and more proof that I’d taken this entire situation too far.

But what was I supposed to do now? Be like P.S., you and I are over?

I couldn’t do that. Not when I was thinking that this was far from over.

This was just the beginning.