The Right One

Twenty six

Perfect timing, Raymond thought as Hope's call came through just as soon as he stepped out of his car.

"Hi."

"You left me on read," was the greeting he got in return.

Right. They'd been texting until he'd gotten distracted by work and forgotten to text her back.

Raymond hummed, unperturbed by the storm he could sense coming on. She'd obviously called to sulk, but that was fine with him; He just loved talking to her either ways, all ways. "Hm. Just as expected, hearing your voice is the highlight of my day."

There was a second pause, followed immediately by a scoff. "That's not going to work on me."

Raymond's brows rose even though there was no way she could see. He could have bet his entire fortune that she was smiling. "Are you saying you've gotten tired of me then?"

Deciding not to answer, she asked instead, "Are you still at work?"

"No--"

Click.

For a moment, Raymond stood,  surprised at how abruptly she'd hung up on him. Was that payback? He chuckled, a thought on how he'd have to get a manual to understand her running through his head.

Balancing his bag on his shoulder, he headed for the door, exhaustion from the day's work finally catching up with him. It'd been a long day, and coupled with how he'd barely gotten a speck of sleep courtesy of what was becoming frequent late night calls with Hope, it was very much expected.

A smile crept over his face immediately he stepped into the house; a warm feeling he'd already accustomed to a specific someone washing over him. He briefly scanned the room, before abruptly turning around and yelling, "Boom!" erupting a scream from Hope whose hands were raised, probably to tap him, or God knows what else she had running through her mind.

The look on her face had him wheezing in silent laughter.

"It's not funny!" She whined, smacking him hard on the arm.

"Hey!" It took a few seconds for his laughter to reduce to a small smile instead. "Why would you even get scared? You were the one hiding behind a locked door."

She pouted, taking on a stance he immediately recognized as her preparing to make an unreasonable argument. "Exactly. I was, but you weren't supposed to know that. I was the one supposed to jump out from behind and scare you."

"Yeah? When I gave you a key, it wasn't so you could hide behind a locked door to 'scare' me either but then things don't usually go the way we expect them to, do they?" he retorted, everything about his stance breathing sarcasm.

More than a little pissed to be on the losing end, Hope scowled, crossing her arms indignantly. "How did you even know I was here? I locked the door and even made sure I called to erase all suspicions."

So that was it. An endearing smile overtook his face and Hope just knew he was about to say something cringe worthy. "I don't know, Hope. It's like my whole system just gets alerted whenever you're around me. Is it because I'm crazy about you?"

Hope scoffed in a bit to hide the heat now growing in her cheeks, muttering words that had no coherence even to herself.

His smile shifted into a knowing smirk as his free arm wrapped around her waist, pulling her slightly closer as he whispered, "Mm. Has anyone ever told you that you have a very peculiar scent?"

"Good peculiar or bad peculiar?" She demanded, leaning back to watch his face as he answered. A slight frown marred her face and Raymond almost died right there just from how cute she was.