The Exception to the Rule (The Improbable Meet-Cute, #1)

by Christina Lauren

You’d come back just to see me? From: c.sun16@email.com To: t.sol18@email.com Date: February 14, 2024 Subject: Re: Happy Valentine’s Day! Without question.

It’s an underwear-shredding smile. The seductive smile of a man who gives good dick.

😂😂😂

No matter how fantastical it sounds, it feels like we were destined to run into each other in some truly unbelievable way.

He walks around the hood and sees me at the same time I see the cupcake box in his hand. Forget flowers; give me a cupcake and it’s a perfect date. After all this time, he remembered?

“Is it really you?” I ask into his neck. “Yeah. It’s really me.”

he cups the side of my neck with his non-cupcake-holding hand and leans in. “Too soon?” he asks, breath minty, his lips only an inch from mine. “I don’t normally kiss before the first date,” I tell him. “But you’re the exception to the rule.”

Subject: What did you say . . . . . . when I asked you to marry me exactly at midnight? From: t.sol18@email.com To: c.sun16@email.com Date: February 14, 2026 Subject: Re: What did you say . . . You’ll never forget what I said because I think you are still deaf from how loud I screamed YES into your ear. Are we still going to be emailing each other from the same couch on Valentine’s Day in fifty years? From: c.sun16@email.com To: t.sol18@email.com Date: February 14, 2026 Subject: Re: What did you say . . . Without question.