The rich, sumptuous scent of coffee had Tia floating upward out of a soft, wispy dream. Her body was both heavy and light, sleepy but rested. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d slept so—

She sat straight up, blinking around and whirling at the soft chuckle that sounded across the room. She groped around for her glasses and slipped them on.

Wow. Okay. She was in Elijah Bird’s house. Where she’d apparently fallen asleep. And there he was, sitting in an armchair, feet propped on the coffee table and a book in one hand.

And there she was, skimpy little tank top and form fitting pajama pants, a blanket tangled around her legs, and she was certain that her hair must be a royal mess.

The only thing that kept her from pulling the blanket over her head and pretending that none of this was happening was the coffee steaming on the table next to her.

Avoiding Eli’s eyes, Tia leaned forward and took a grateful sip. She risked a glance up at him where he sat, calm as a cucumber and a huge smile on his face.

“You make the cutest little noises when you’re waking up. Like a pouty little kitten.”

A wave of heat rushed through Tia. Okay. “Um. Bathroom?”

Eli, smile still on his face, pointed down a hallway and didn’t even pretend to avert his eyes when she stood and hurried down the hall.

Tia couldn’t believe her eyes when she saw herself in the mirror. Her hair was as wild as she had feared and she quickly unbraided it, dragged her fingers through it until it was relatively calm against her shoulders. But that wasn’t what was stunning her. Her lips were good and kissed. Full and raw and… alluring. She leaned forward and studied the faint pink scrapes along her throat, took in her hectic eyes. She looked like a woman who had been thoroughly, passionately loved. And all they’d done was kiss.

Tia opened the drawers of the small half-bath until she—thank god—found a little travel-sized toothpaste. She furiously finger brushed, splashed a little water on her face and washed her hands. Okay.

She just needed to go out there, thank him for his hospitality, and get the hell home. Once she was in the safety of her own space, she could let her feelings loose. Whatever this was, this pressure in her chest, she could fully explore it in her own house. But right now, in front of Eli, she had to keep it calm, together, and aloof.

She padded back out into the living room and was greeted instantly by his creased grin. Tia bit at her lip, but couldn’t help but grin back, just for a second.

“Thank you for letting me crash here,” she started, about to make her hasty exit.

But once again, she’d underestimated the length of his wingspan. He reached out, quick as a cat, and dragged her onto his lap. For the second time in eight hours, she was straddling Elijah Bird.

“You’re welcome,” he murmured, nuzzling his face into her neck and kissing her just below the ear.

“Oh. I…” She trailed off as one of his hands skated down her spine, rested right above her ass, on that exposed inch of skin under her tank top. “I really should go now.”

“Why?” His teeth tugged at her earlobe and Tia gasped, unwillingly pressing herself into him.

“Because we can’t just keep making out on the couch.”

“Why not?” He switched to the other ear, nuzzling and tugging. “It’s hot as hell.”

One of his thumbs, circling just underneath the edge of her tank top, alighted upon some devilishly ticklish spot on her skin. She yelped and dissolved into a girlish laugh that delighted them both.

“It was very high school,” she admitted of their make out session.

“Yeah, except this time I knew what I was doing, and in high school, not so much,” Eli smiled against her collarbone, where he was currently nibbling.

Tia scoffed. “I’m sure you knew what you were doing in high school.”

Eli pulled back from her, a smile on his face. “What makes you so sure?”

Tia’s mouth opened and closed. “Well. You were so good looking. And had so many girls after you. And…” she trailed off as Eli’s grin just kept getting wider and wider.

“And…” he prompted.

“Oh, I’m sure you can fill in the blanks.” Tia raised an eyebrow.

Eli leaned up and kissed her lips, once, with a good, firm pressure. “I’m flattered by your view of me, but trust me, I had no idea what I was doing with girls on couches. I had plenty of opportunities, but I often steered clear.”

“Really?” Tia cocked her head to one side, skepticism in every letter of the word. “That can’t be true. You had such a rep!”

“Oh, and every reputation granted in high school is based in complete fact.” Now he was the one raising the eyebrow, but it was softened with his usual smile.

“Fair enough. But you really expect me to believe you weren’t getting girls left and right in high school?” She crossed her arms over her chest and Eli absently uncrossed them and placed them around his own neck. Tia tried hard not to be charmed by the gesture.

“I liked girls, was drawn to them, and really attracted. But girls are also really good at figuring out if you’re sad. And my mom had just died. I felt like every time I tried to get with a girl, we ended up with her asking about why I was so down. And I just… started avoiding it, I guess.”

Tia clasped her fingers around his neck and leaned in for a kiss of his lips. “I’m so sorry, it didn’t even occur to me.”

“That’s okay. It was a long time ago.”

Tia bit her lip. Her mind was reeling a little bit, trying to fit this information in with what her perception had been of him. “So, you really weren’t hooking up with girls in high school?”

Eli grinned, his face creasing. “I’m flattered that you’re so astonished by this information. But seriously. Besides some kissing here and there, I went to college pure as the driven snow. You can call Kara Boswell, if you want. She can vouch for the purity of my snow, and the exact moment in my freshman year of college that she sullied it.”

Now Tia’s mouth fell wide open. “You didn’t lose your virginity until college?”

“You’re gonna give me a complex here, Tia.”

“No,” she waved her hand through the air. “I’m not saying that because it’s late to lose your virginity. I didn’t lose mine until sophomore year of college. I’m just exclaiming because that means you were a virgin at your end of the year senior party after graduation.”

“Right.” Where the hell was she going with this? And why was she suddenly blushing so furiously.

“I just, um, thought you were way more experienced than I was so I didn’t…”

Tia took her hands from around his neck and pressed them over her eyes, but she couldn’t hide the peachy tint to her blushing cheeks.

“What?” Eli demanded, pulling her hands from her face, so curious at whatever the hell she was about to say.

She shook her head.

So Eli pulled out the big guns. Finding that ticklish spot on her side again, he ruthlessly waged war. “Tell me!”

Tia yelped and howled with laughter, wiggling across his lap and across the couch to get away. But, professional athlete that he was, she was thoroughly stuck, pinned between the cushions and his large body.

“Alright! Alright!” she gasped. “I wanted to talk to you, but I thought you’d be irritated if I pulled you away from the party. That you’d think I was a dork and a waste of time because I wouldn’t sleep with you. And I was worried about cockblocking you from Sara Humphrey.”             

Eli froze above her and it was the most serious she’d ever seen him look. “I would have never, ever felt that way, Tia. Not just because you are none of those things, but because I didn’t feel that way about anybody. I know I was in the cool crowd. But I felt awkward in my suddenly huge body, and scared of college, and scared of leaving Marcus and Jay, and I had all my baggage. I was definitely not judging other people. And I was certainly not spending time with girls only because I thought they might sleep with me.” Eli picked up one of her hands, traced it down to her elbow and back, planted a quick kiss on her bicep. “And for the record, I would have loved a break from Sara Humphrey. She was like velcro that night. And I wasn’t into it. That girl was bo-ring.”

Tia, flat on her back with Eli halfway laying over her, shook her head and let her eyes blur into the past. “God. I can’t believe that. How was my perspective on the situation so skewed? I let something like that deter me from…” she trailed off again, her cheeks going pinker than before.

“Deter you from what? What was it that you wanted to pull me away to talk about?” Eli asked, his smile returning as he threateningly lifted his hands into perfect tickle claws.

Tia shook her head and covered her eyes. She was a grown woman, for god sakes. This should not be so embarrassing. And wasn’t this what she’d come over here for in the first place? Absolution of her former crush? She’d done the make out part. Now all she needed to do was the telling him part and then she could just move the hell on.

“I…” She cleared her throat and kept her eyes covered. “I wanted to pull you aside and tell you that I had a crush on you.”

“No shit?”

She could hear the grin in his voice without having to look.

“At that party?” he asked.

She nodded.

She felt Eli flop onto his side next to her. “You mean I spent that entire party dodging Sara Humphrey’s many tentacles when I could have been making out on a couch with you?”

Tia’s hand snapped down at that. “Don’t even act like you would have taken me up on the offer. I was such a nerd.”

Eli tried not to take offense at the view she had of him. As some kind of womanizing ladies man who only wanted one thing from the girls he dated. “Well, can I take you up on the offer now?”

Tia crossed her arms over her chest. “There is no offer. I don’t have a crush on you anymore.”

Eli bit back his smile as best as he could. She was just so dang cute, laying there on the couch in that skimpy tank top and huge glasses, her hair tumbling everywhere and her stubborn expression attempting to cover up her mortification.

“That’s a shame,” he muttered, leaning over her and nuzzling into her neck for a moment. “Because I have a crush on you.”

Tia froze. “No, you don’t.”

Eli lifted his head up. “Yes, I do.”

“Grown people don’t get crushes. And you don’t know me well enough to have a crush on me.”

Well, he’d just have to show her then. Eli sat up off the couch and dragged her up as well. His ribs pinched just a little bit, but he barely noticed. “Come on.”

“What are we doing?” she asked, stumbling along after him.

“You just woke up from a seven-hour nap. You’ve gotta be hungry.” They strode into the kitchen and he immediately turned and took her around the waist, lifting her onto the counter top. Luckily she jumped at the same time or else he would really be pushing his ribs to the edge. “I’m gonna make you something to eat real quick.”

“I—” She cut herself off and looked at him with big, confused eyes. She tugged her hair back from her face. “Eli, I can just go home and eat. You don’t need to do all this.”

“I want to,” he insisted, pulling out a pot and a pan and setting them on the stove. He ducked his head into the pantry. “Because I have a crush on you.”

When he came out of the pantry with bread and a can of soup, she was blushing, staring at a spot in front of her and looking thoroughly confused.

And she was thoroughly confused. This whole encounter was going completely off the rails. She was supposed to just kiss him and ditch him. He was supposed to try to shuffle her off to bed as fast as possible. And then she’d remember that he was grown up, playboy Elijah Bird, not high school Elijah Bird, and that she wasn’t interested anymore and she’d leave. Simple as that.

She hadn’t calculated an outcome where he was standing in worn jeans and a soft t-shirt, whistling while he made her soup and a grilled cheese. She definitely hadn’t thought there was ever a world where he had a crush on her. Well, he looked at her like he wanted to swallow her whole. But that was different. That was a man wanting to satisfy his man-sized needs. Not a crush.

But this version of Eli, the one who was content to just make out on a couch, who covered her up when she fell asleep, who, apparently, had been a virgin in high school. Well, she hadn’t counted on this version. And she had absolutely no idea what the hell to do with it.

The kitchen windows were open and Tia shivered as a cool breeze suddenly filtered through the room.

“That feels like rain,” Eli said, lifting his head to the wind. “Maybe we’ll get our first spring thunderstorm of the season. Hope so. I love thunderstorms.”

He turned and his brow furrowed when he saw her clutching her elbows in her palms.

“You’re cold.”

She nodded. “Yeah. And I think I should probably just go—”

“Wait.” He lifted up a hand. “Just give me two seconds. Make sure the sandwiches don’t burn!”

And then he was out of the kitchen like a shot. Tia thought about leaving. She figured it was the wisest course of action. But the high school girl who still lived in her heart refused to get off his kitchen counter.

She knew that she had things to do this evening. She had laundry and some reading to catch up on. And then there was all that insurance paperwork for her parents that she had to do. Not to mention she and Laura were going to the home to visit with them tomorrow. And Tia usually liked to have a game plan in place for that. Laura was always so emotional on those days. She had so much to do. She needed to get up, get in her car, and go back to her life.

She sighed. Well, life wasn’t long. Her parents were prime proof of that. It wasn’t going to kill her to push her laundry a few more days. She could eat soup with Eli.

He strode back into the kitchen, a pair of thick socks in one hand, a sweatshirt in the other, and a huge grin on his face.

He started with the socks. Bending down, he quickly stuffed her feet into one and then the other.

“Your hands are three times the size of my feet,” Tia noted.

Eli grinned up at her and then rose, holding up the gigantic sweatshirt for her inspection. She couldn’t help the blush that immediately swamped her face.

It was a navy blue sweatshirt with white lettering. Bird, it read. With a gigantic number seven below that. The front was emblazoned with the Waterson High logo. His high school football sweatshirt. What the athletes wore on the days before their games to remind the student body to attend. As if anyone needed reminding to come see Elijah Bird, golden child, tear up the field.

“I dug it out of the closet,” he said, grinning and pulling it over her head.

Tia sputtered as she drowned in sweatshirt, seeing no way out but to push her hands through the sleeves and her head up toward the neck hole. Eli’s grinning face greeted her on the other side. His big hand circled her neck and pulled her hair free of the fabric.

“Looks good on you.”

Tia looked down at herself, swimming in the gigantic piece of clothing. And then she looked back at him, utterly baffled. “I’m wearing your high school football sweatshirt.”

It was something she had only dreamt about in high school. To be the girl who wore Eli’s sweatshirt. As far as she knew—and she’d paid attention—he’d never given it to anyone to wear. In the teenage language of love, to wear someone’s sweatshirt meant that you were very serious about them. It was a public declaration.

“Yeah,” he nodded. “Because I have a crush on you.”

Tia’s brow pulled as he turned back to the sandwiches sizzling in the pan. He flipped them onto a plate and dumped the soup into a big bowl.

He carried everything to the kitchen table, grabbed some silverware and napkins and cups. “Will you grab whatever juice you want?”

Tia hopped down from the counter and pulled open the fridge door. Her insides melted when she saw again how many bottles of juice he’d bought for her. She selected the sparkling apple juice and brought it over to the table.

She slid into her chair and stared down at the food. A perfectly golden grilled cheese in front of her and then a huge bowl of minestrone between them. She supposed he expected them to share. Tia bit her lip and watched him pour her a glass of the juice.

“You don’t look happy, Tia.” Eli’s voice was half amused, half concerned.

“I guess I’m just a little confused. I didn’t really expect this to happen.”

“What do you mean?” He nudged her sandwich toward her and she took a grateful bite.

“This is confusing. I thought I knew what I was dealing with here. With you. But you keep flipping the script. And you didn’t try to sleep with me when we were making out on the couch. But also sitting here in my pajamas, after I’ve slept over at your house, it feels like the morning after. And now I’m wearing your sweatshirt and you’re telling me you have a crush on me.”

“I do.”

“Yeah. I just—” She waved her hand in the air. “It’s a lot to take in.”

Eli leaned back and considered her. He really didn’t like the way she’d been thinking of him. “Tia, if you thought of me as such a relentless player, that I’d try to sleep with you the second I kissed you, then why did you even come over here this morning?”

She shrugged, took another bite of her sandwich. “I wanted to just kiss you so that I knew what it was like and I could move on.”

“Ah. Crush redemption?”

“Something like that.”

Eli nudged the bowl of soup toward her. “What if I don’t want you to move on from your crush?”

Tia sighed. He was just such a smooth talker. His creased smile and his friendly eyes made it so easy to want to believe him. But Tia knew his past. She knew his history with women. He didn’t have such a track record by not being persuasive and endearing. She had no idea how many other women he’d said things like this to. And honestly, the quantity didn’t matter to her. It was the idea that this was all a game to him. Just a way to get her naked.

“I don’t know how to do this.” She dropped her sandwich and made herself look at him.

“Do what?”

“Talk to a famous, lady-killing quarterback about romance and crushes and making out. It’s all too much for me. You’re so far above me, Eli, we’re not even playing the same sport here. “

Eli leaned back in his seat and eyed her for a moment. It was one of the first times she could ever remember seeing him look just plain sad.

He cast around in his mind for the right way to explain it. He knew that, sharp as she was, evasions were only going to go down in the record books as game playing. Alright. He’d leave it all on the field then.

“I thought I was gonna die, Tia.”

Her silver eyes darkened and her hand slid across the table to his.

He cleared his throat. “I was pinned under her car, dragged for what felt like an eternity. And this little old lady was crying over me. I could hear the sirens in the distance, but I thought I was going to die. And then I woke up. In more pain than I could remember ever feeling—and I play pro football so that’s saying something. And somebody saved my life. And it was you.

“I don’t think I’ve ever seen anyone more beautiful than you were in your lab coat with your shiny hair and serious, calm face. Maybe it was hero worship at first. But I couldn’t help it. You made me feel safe.” He squeezed her hand. “Like I wasn’t going to die as long as you were there. You just looked so competent. And I wanted you around. I wanted you by me. And then you were so cute with your peanut butter sandwich in your office and still so teeth-achingly pretty. And, I don’t know, how can you explain a crush? You just do it for me. You have great hands. Like a queen’s.” He held one up and examined it for a second. Before his smile curled up and he was staring in her eyes again. “And all these different colored glasses. And you looked so, so good in those heels last night. And the way you smell makes my stomach flip.

“And then to find out that you had a crush on me in high school… Well, it just makes me want to do a bunch of stuff we could have done back then if we’d been on the same page. Like make out on a couch. Or watch a movie. Or go for a walk. I’m not trying to do anything other than be close to you. And feel the way I feel. And see what happens next.”

Oh crap. Royal crap. This was so bad. Tia wished she could snap her fingers and make herself go invisible for just a second. She needed a minute to just close her eyes and weather the storm of emotions that he’d just kicked up inside her. Her heart was racing and her palms were sweating. He kept pulling the rug out from under her. She hadn’t expected him to go and be all blisteringly honest with her. Yet, here they were. All his feelings laid out in front of her. And here she was, considering jumping into whatever the hell this was.

And that was such a bad idea. Because he was just going to see what happened next. But Tia already knew what was going to happen next. She’d catch feelings for him. Even stronger than she already had. And he would either lose interest when he realized she wasn’t going to sleep with him, or he’d keep dating her while also dating someone who would sleep with him. She wasn’t sure she could handle either outcome.

“I’m not going to sleep with you,” she blurted out and then instantly covered her face in her hands.

Eli chuckled and nudged the soup toward her again. “Fair enough.” He cleared his throat. “May I ask why?”

Tia lowered her hands and fiddled with her sandwich. Part of her wanted to tell him the truth. It would certainly make it so he didn’t have a crush on her anymore. And then she could just get on with her life, Eli-free and complication-free. But she just couldn’t bring herself to tell him that she was bad at sex. So she went for a half truth. “I’m still dealing with a break up from last year. And I just can’t have that kind of complication right now.”

“You still love him?”

Tia’s eyes, silver-bright with surprise, shot up to his. “No. It’s just that he—”

“Left a mark,” Eli supplied, taking a drink of his juice. “And you’re still moving on from it.”

She took a bite of the soup and then dragged the bowl toward her when she realized how good it was. She missed Eli’s smile. “More or less.”

“Fair enough,” he repeated. Eli paused, considered his words for a minute. “I can’t sleep with you. But can I flirt with you? Kiss you? Eat food and take you on dates and stuff?”

Tia’s face pulled into a look of vague suspicion as she tried to figure out the meaning behind his words. “As long as it doesn’t get in the way of my work or my time with my family.”

Suddenly Eli felt like standing up and doing a touchdown dance. But he refrained, thinking of his ribs. “I’ll take it. So. Diehard, The Notebook, or Love and Basketball?”

“What?”

“For our movie date tonight. Which one do you want to watch?”

And that’s how, twenty minutes later, Tia found herself holding hands with Elijah Bird, under a blanket, watching a movie. Like they were in high school again.