Page 75 of Tabloid Princess

I shouldn’t. I should have left. Said my goodbye there and then.

“I will be leaving though, and then I don’t think I’ll be seeing you again.” It hurt to say. I wished it didn't; it was pathetic, ridiculous, and utterly unlike anything I’d ever known.

This wasn’t life.

It sure as hell wasn’t mine.

He shifted back, cool air rushing between us and I managed to catch a lungful of breath that wasn’t a tangle of him and heartbreak. Him and desire.

“I thought this was supposed to be dinner?” I lifted an eyebrow, burying the pain of the moment inside me until I could lie by myself later and pick it to pieces.

“Ah.” A cheeky grin brightened his face and the pinched frown he’d worn moments ago evaporated. “I might have made it sound a little better than it could be.”

“How so?”

“I can’t cook, and I didn’t order in.”

“You told me you were a master cook!” I started to laugh. “I believed you.”

“I lied. Shameless, I know. And I didn’t say I wouldn’t feed you. How about toasted sandwiches? I can do them rather well, even if I do say so myself.”

I swiftly thought of Daisy and her love of a toasted cheese sandwich. What was I doing here?

“Toasted sandwiches and this rather fine wine.” I lifted my glass, pleased to see my hands weren’t tremoring like my legs. “Sounds like a banquet to me.”

I watched as he walked around the island and pulled out the makings of sandwiches. “So, you make sandwiches and talk about Tampax on television?” I teased him, surprisingly comfortable.

He grinned as he scooped some butter onto a rounded knife and lathered it onto the bread. It’s just as well I had no issues with diets or such fads. “I dropped that in just for you.” His gaze held mine. “Did it make you chuckle?”

“It would have done.”

“But?”

I nibbled my lip, unwilling to elaborate.

“Leia. You can’t leave me hanging like this… I mentioned feminine hygiene products on national television specifically because I wanted to make you smile.”

The fact he wanted to make me smile alarmed me.

The fact he thought about me while conducting a national interview had the ability to tilt my world on its axis.

“Don’t say things like that.”

“Like what? Tampax?”

“No.” I bit down on my grin. “That you were trying to make me smile, or laugh, or anything really.”

He stopped buttering the now well covered bread while he contemplated me. Then he shrugged. “Okay.”

“I didn’t giggle because I… because I was crying.” The words just forced their own way out of my mouth.

The knife clattered down. “Why?”

I lifted one shoulder. “I don’t know. Maybe because I knew you’d gone to the shelter because of what I’d said in the graveyard. It touched me.”

The air around us shifted into a tangible web of electricity. I crossed my arms across my chest in a vain attempt to ward off the tension. It didn’t work.

“Then I’m glad I did it.” That’s all he said as he then began to grate cheese into a stainless-steel bowl.