He Dated Me for My Sister novel · Chapter 23 of 24

Chapter 23: Rule Two

The bed hadn't come yet, so we made one on the floor.

Rhys dragged the mattress from the hallway into the living room.

He set it down in front of the window, where the snow was still falling.

I threw the sheets over it, and the blue vase sat on the sill above us.

The radiator clanked twice.

"Is it going to do that all night?" Rhys said.

"Probably."

"I can fix it."

"Later."

I put my hand flat on his chest and pushed.

He sat down on the mattress and looked up at me, dark-eyed, with his stupid scarred forearms.

"I have a confession," he said.

"Now?"

"I never returned the last cookbook."

"Rhys."

"It's under the bed. It's the one with the pickling chapter. I owe the library nine dollars and fifty cents."

I started to laugh and couldn't stop.

I laughed until my knees went, and I came down onto the mattress in his lap.

He put his arms around me and laughed into my shoulder.

Then we both stopped, because I was close enough to see the exact brown of his eyes.

"Hannah," he said.

"Say it."

"I love you."

"Again."

"I love you."

"I love you too," I said. "I've said it twice already, I'm going to say it a lot, and I need you to stop being careful."

His hands slid under my sweater.

They were warm, and they went slowly up my back, over every bone of it.

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