Two Weeks to Fall in Love

21. Two Weeks to Survive the Dinner

Noah Archer had almost kissed me.

There was no way I was misreading that situation. But, then again, the last time I thought he was caressing my hair, all he was doing was removing leaves from it. It's not like it would have been the first time I had misinterpreted stuff.

The reason I was even doubting that was because Noah was acting perfectly normal. No lull in the conversation, that charming smile on his face, the modicum of a nice guy.

I, on the other hand, was internally freaking out. Every time I looked at him, my eyes somehow drifted to his lips and the heat returned to my cheeks. It was even worse when he caught me looking and for a few seconds a smirk pulled up his lips before they returned back to the pleasantly charming smile he seemed to reserve exclusively for parents. The Smile™.

"Is everything okay with you, Sky?" Mom asked suddenly, pulling me out of my thoughts. "You've been awfully quiet."

"Yup, no, yeah, totally fine, just busy eating, mmmm, yum," I said and stuffed some more casserole into my mouth for emphasis.

Mom's eyebrows raised, but she shook her head, clearly not wanting to get into anything in front of our guest.

And while she didn't know why I was acting weird, Noah certainly did. His eyes were on me, head tilted slightly to the side and that all too familiar smirk on those sinful lips. I stared at him, narrowing my eyes, and refusing to look away.

I instantly regretted it. It felt like the next bite he took was unnecessarily sensual, and it didn't help that he was maintaining eye contact with me.

Oh sweet baby pandas, why was it so damn hot in this room?

Swallowing hard, I grabbed my glass of water and downed it in one gulp.

Before he had even swallowed the last piece of food, my mom jumped in with her usual, "Would you like some more, Noah?"

He just smiled and nodded – not that he had any other choice considering my mom was already grabbing his plate.

"Thank you so much, Serena. I can't remember the last time I ate such delicious homemade food," Noah said as my mom piled food onto his plate.

Kiss-ass. I shovelled another another fork full of casserole into my mouth to keep myself from grumbling in protest.

"Oh, that's so sweet of you to say. I'm sure your mom is an excellent cook as well." Mom beamed at him, innocence in every gesture but I knew the truth.

Noah was being interrogated without a single question being asked. The answer to this little remark could easily be, 'oh, no my father is the one that cooks,' or if it's his mom, it would give him an opportunity to offer more information. And if he simply breezed past the question, she would get suspicious.

When I was younger I used to think my mom was a spy because she always seemed to know everything. It took me a while to realize that most times I ended up giving her information without even realizing it.

I grinned, chewing on a piece of salad as I carefully looked from one to the other. If I knew Noah, he was going to give a half-hearted remark, breeze past the question and make that was going to be tha–

"She used to be an amazing cook, the best really – no offence to you, of course, but there's nothing quite like your mom's cooking to fix a bad day," Noah said. I gaped at him. Mom nodded encouragingly. "But, as much as she loves to cook, she hasn't had time for it lately, so the task usually falls on our live-in housekeeper. She's a lovely lady but... well, let's say she wasn't hired for her cooking skills."