I’m planning to rest up for my pitch with a lazy morning in bed, but the sun is only just rising when I wake up, adrenaline pumping in my veins. I need to get up, get out, do something, but Olivia is still passed out beside me, so I sneak out and go for a long, sweaty run along the beach, picking up coffee and bagels on the way back.

When I get back to the room, Olivia is sitting cross-legged on the bed, freshly showered and dressed in shorts and a black silk T-shirt that shows off her figure. “There you are. I ordered breakfast, figured you’d want a good start before the pitch.”

I look at the table—and spy two cups of coffee and a pair of sesame bagels. “Great minds,” I say with a grin, holding up my own bag before ducking my head to kiss her. Olivia trails a hand through my hair and I feel a wave of satisfaction. It’s crazy how easy it is to be around her, how compatible we feel after such a short time. And not just in bed, either—although I won’t lie, the sex is pretty fucking amazing.

“Did the run help?” she asks now. “That’s what you were doing, right? Trying to chill out before your pitch?”

“What?” I frown, shoving a straw into my iced coffee more roughly than I necessarily mean to. “What makes you think I’m not chill?”

“Well, I mean, I have eyeballs,” Olivia says with a smile. She sets the coffee down on the nightstand and reaches for my shoulders, her delicate fingers digging into the tense muscle there. “You are one big knot, my friend,” she says. “We gotta get you out of your head somehow.”

I flick my gaze up and down her body. “Oh yeah?” I ask, unable to hide a dirty smile. “What’d you have in mind?”

Olivia makes a face. “Not that,” she says with a giggle. “Or, I mean, maybe that. I haven’t decided yet. But how did you used to focus before games back when you were playing football?”

“Honestly?” I say, a little sheepish. “Old school Xbox.”

I’m expecting laughter, but Olivia just smiles. “So let’s do that,” she says.

I raise my eyebrows. “What, now?”

“Sure, why not?” Olivia bounces up off the bed and pads over toward the TV. “There’s a console in the entertainment unit, I think. I mean, I’ll be honest with you, I couldn’t tell an Xbox from any of the other ones with a literal gun to my head, but . . . ta-da!” She holds up a controller. “Will this work?”

It’s a PlayStation, actually, but it’ll sure as shit get the job done, and I grin at her sweet expression. “Do you know how to—?”

“Not specifically,” Olivia says with a shrug. “But let’s be real, I can’t be any worse at it than I am at golf.”

I laugh at that, I can’t help it. “OK.”

We spend the next forty-five minutes killing animated zombies and fighting bloodthirsty motorcycle gangs. Olivia is terrible, but she doesn’t seem to care. By the time I beat her for the fourth straight time I have to admit her plan worked—I’m feeling relaxed and ready, the tension drained right out of my body.

“You could have let me win once,” Olivia teases, flopping backwards onto the bed with a hand flung over her face in mock despair. I like how secretly goofy she is, how willing she is to look silly for the sake of the people she cares about. I never would have guessed before this week that she had this side to her.

“You would have hated that,” I point out, pressing a line of soft kisses along her belly where her shirt has ridden up.

“You’re right,” she admits, sitting upright. “Come on, we don’t want to be late.”

She drives me over to Mason’s office with the top down and the radio playing loud. “My dad asked me to pick up flowers for the rehearsal dinner,” she says as we pull up in front of the tall steel and glass building, “but I’ll come pick you up on my way back?”

“Works for me.” I kiss her once, then again more deeply, licking my way into her mouth until she gasps. “Wish me luck, beautiful.”

I’m opening the door when Olivia reaches out and lays a hand on my arm. “Ryan,” she says suddenly, her eyes wide. “I—” She breaks off.

“Hm?” I pause, my mind already on the boardroom waiting for me. “What’s up?”

Olivia hesitates, then shakes her head. “Nothing,” she says, leaning over, and she kisses me one more time. “Knock ’em dead.”

The pitch passes in a total blur, but judging from the applause and backslaps at the end, my guess is that it went more or less OK. Better than OK, in fact. “We’re in!” Mason tells me, bursting out of the conference room a few minutes later with a massive smile on his face. “The team loved you, and they love the idea of PowerBar. We can’t wait to be a part of it.”

Holy shit!

“You won’t regret it,” I tell him, shaking his hand enthusiastically. “I’m going to be working 24/7 to make this business a success.”

“I don’t doubt it.” Mason grins. “I’ll be honest,” he continues as we head outside into the humid, sunny day. “I always say the best way to get to know a person is to look at the company they keep. As soon as we met Olivia, Arianna and I both knew you had a good head on your shoulders.”

“She’s incredible,” I agree, unable to keep the shit-eating grin off my face. My head is swimming, the adrenaline still pulsing through my veins.

“One of a kind,” Mason agrees. “Don’t let that girl get away.”

“I won’t,” I promise. “Listen, we’re in town for a few more days, if you guys want to bring the boat down to Key West. We’d love to see you and Arianna again.”

“The feeling’s mutual.” Mason holds a hand out. “I’ll be in touch.”

Olivia pulls up a moment later, the tiny backseat overflowing with a million different kinds of flowers, busting out the open windows and blocking the view out the back. “Vanessa called,” she says by way of grim explanation. “She was having a hard time making up her mind. Then she raises her eyebrows. “So?! How’d it go?”

I shake my head. “Total disaster,” I deadpan, but I can’t even keep up the charade for ten full seconds. “I’m kidding,” I confess, my face breaking into a smile. “We’re in.”

Olivia lets out a delighted shriek, scrambling out of the car and throwing her arms around me. “Oh my God,” she says, her voice muffled against my neck as I lift her off her feet. “Ryan! Congratulations. This is amazing. And nobody deserves it more than you.”

I squeeze her tightly. I want to keep holding onto her forever. I never want to let her go. “I couldn’t have done any of it without you,” I tell her, and I’m surprised by how emotional I feel.

“You would have figured it out,” she says as I set her gently down on the sidewalk. “But I’m so glad I could help. All part of the service,” she says brightly, and her words make me come down to earth with a bump.

The Agency. Our contract. She’s right: she promised she’d help me out with the investors. That was why I agreed to this crazy set-up in the first place. Quid pro quo, tit for tat.

But is this still just a job to her—or more?

I start to ask, but Olivia’s phone starts buzzing like crazy.

“Vanessa,” she says with a sigh. “We should get back and rescue Hallie before there’s a total meltdown.”

“What time is the rehearsal dinner?”

“Seven, so we’re cutting it close to set up.”

We get on the road, but when we reach Key West and pass a souvenir shop on the boardwalk, an idea suddenly occurs to me.

“Wait one sec,” I say, pulling over. “I’ll be right back.”

I hop out and head into the small, crowded shop, where I scan the cluttered shelves stuffed full of snow globes and key chains until I spot what I’m looking for. “Do you want it personalized?” asks the girl behind the counter, holding up a neon pink paint pen.

I grin. “You bet I do.”

Olivia is finishing up a call when I get back to the car—I should have known she’d be the type to use every scrap of time as efficiently as possible—and she smiles at me curiously as she says goodbye. “What was that all about?” she asks, before dropping her phone back into her purse.

“I got you a present.”

“You did?” Olivia glances back at the scruffy exterior of the souvenir shop, which advertises both boogie boards and an on-site tattoo artist on a sandwich board outside. “In there?”

“Uh-huh. Close your eyes,” I instruct, “and give me your hand.”

Olivia raises her eyebrows but she does what I tell her, holding her palm out obediently. When she opens them again and sees what I’ve placed there—a cheap fake-gold ring topped with a seashell that’s been dipped in bright purple glitter—she laughs out loud.

“What’s this?” she asks.

“I saw guys selling them on my run this morning and couldn’t get them out of my mind,” I explain. “I know there’s no replacing your mom’s ring. But at the very least I wanted you to have something to cover up that weird tan line on your index finger. Or turn it green, at least.”

Olivia swallows. “Jerk,” she says, but she’s smiling. Then her eyes get misty and she looks away. “Thank you” she says, slipping it on and holding her hand out to admire the butt-ugliness of it. “Seriously, Ryan. It means a lot to me.”

You mean a lot to me, I want to tell her, but I kiss her instead. The ring releases a shower of purple glitter every time she moves her hand.

“You don’t actually have to wear that thing to the rehearsal dinner,” I tell her as we head back to Larry’s house. “If I know you, you’re already thinking about when you’re going to discreetly slip it off.”

“Are you kidding?” Olivia laughs. “It’s basically the most tasteful addition to my wardrobe I’ve had all week.” She grins. “It’ll go great with my non-bridesmaid dress.”

I laugh, slipping an arm around her shoulders as we cruise along the beach road, a weird, unfamiliar lightness inside my chest. It feels like the night after winning the Super Bowl, and at first I figure it‘s because of the deal with Mason and finally landing the investment I’ve been chasing all year, but then I realize it has to more do with the woman in the passenger seat beside me. Logic says we hardly know each other. Rational thought says it’s way too soon. But I meant what I said in the hammock that night—I believe in trusting my instincts. And my gut already knows the truth.

Olivia’s the one.

The only question is, does she feel the same way about us?