Chapter 20

“How?”

“She caught me staring at you,” he confessed, and Jude pulled a face.

“What? Lame, she’s my stepsister, she’s meant to be on my side, not yours.”

“Yeah, well, that’s why you can tell her. ‘Cause she keeps secrets. But nobody else. Not yet.”

“Okay,” Jude said, then that grin flashed into being again. “So, um…see you tomorrow? I’ll text you some plans or something.”

“Okay.”

“Okay!”

Anton wanted to laugh at how utterly, painfully awkward it was, and the way Jude loped away backwards and nearly walked into a woman with a buggy, and—and—

He couldn’t laugh. Because he just wanted to explode, or scream, or just die, right there, die as happy as he was ever going to get, because…because…

Jude Kalinowski had asked him on a date.

Someone—anyone—had asked him on a date, that was a big enough deal. But it wasn’t anyone. It was Jude. Friendly, funny, fuckable Jude.

Yeah, Anton was pretty sure he was going to die. And it would be totally worth it. 7