How to Not Fall for the Guy Next Door - Meg Easton Page 0,1

enough for everyone to know everyone. So she must have that I’m new here look about her, and he was trying to figure out if she was visiting or staying.

He had pretty keen eyes, though. Maybe he was seeing deeply enough to notice that under the surface, she had a panicked my life was recently planned out, perfect, and organized and is now a big mess of uncertainty and chaos look about her.

She just gave him a smile and shifted her eyes to the case, hoping he would do the same. Her stomach rumbled again. It had been too many hours since she’d grabbed that muffin and orange juice from her hotel back in Spokane. Maybe she should forget the microwaveable soup and go up to the man and get some fried chicken or a burrito or some potato wedges. It wasn’t really what her body was begging for, but she could at least eat it in the car on her way to the inn.

After she got produce. She turned away from the warm, fried foods and turned to the apples.

Before long, she had a cart full of enough fruits and vegetables of different colors that her Aunt Helen would’ve been proud. They said you shouldn’t go grocery shopping when you were hungry. But maybe going when you were hungry after having just spent two and a half days in a car, eating nothing but junk food, was the absolute best time if you wanted a cart full of healthy stuff.

The fruit aisle had a few other shoppers in it, so she left her cart at the end of the aisle and started making her way down it. Blueberries! That’s what her body needed. She picked up a few of the plastic cases, inspecting them closely to find the ones that were the freshest. Two containers looked perfect enough that her mouth was already watering. Anxious to finish her shopping trip soon so she could ravenously eat at least one of the containers, she spun around toward her cart, and both containers of blueberries smacked right into a man’s firm chest.

Addison yelped and several nearby customers leapt back as the flimsy plastic containers burst open and blueberries flew out of them like soda from a shaken can, hitting the laminate floor with the softest pings, followed by the only slightly louder sound of the two containers following them to the floor.

“Oh no. I am so sorry.” She quickly brushed at the bluish-purple spots that a few of the more aggressive blueberries left on the man’s light blue t-shirt, as if a few swipes of her fingers would make the stains disappear.

“It’s okay.” The man gently moved her frantic hands away from his shirt. Probably because he was a little uncomfortable with her hands all over his chest. “It’s not a big deal. Really. I never even liked this shirt.”

The man’s voice was deep and rumbly, like summer thunder on the beach. Face burning, she finally looked up to meet his eyes and blushed at seeing that his face was even nicer than his considerably nice chest. And his incredibly beautiful blue eyes—which were definitely looking like his shirt should get a medal for what they did for them—weren’t angry or irritated or frustrated They seemed amused.

Amused was good. It wasn’t good good, but on a scale of one to thoroughly embarrassed at the grocery store, she’d take being the source of someone’s amusement over being the source of someone’s anger.

“Cleanup in produce,” sounded over the intercom and Addison looked over at the very unimpressed man in the deli, who now had one white eyebrow raised in an I knew you’d be trouble arc.

She forced herself to breathe. Then she cleared her throat and crouched down to pick up one of the fallen plastic containers, and then started putting blueberries back into it. The man crouched down, too, which put them in very close proximity, since they couldn’t exactly take a single step without squashing blueberries. It was several fast heartbeats before she stole another glance at him. She had been so distracted by the eyes before that she hadn’t noticed that beautifully strong jawline, or the way that, when relaxed and showing their natural state, the muscles of his face showed that they spent good portion of their time being happy.

And something about him looked familiar. She was about to ask him if they had met before, but then a gangly teenage boy came over to them with a broom