Nate spots us first, eyes performing a slow crawl from my feet to the top of my head as an even slower smile spreads across his face. His hand floats upward as I walk up to him, but stops before making contact as though the movement was unconscious. Squaring my shoulders, I reach for him. As always, there’s that little bit of fear when I make initial contact, but my skin doesn’t crawl and there’s no vertigo. Relaxing, I give his arm a little tug to bring him into my personal space.
“Hi. I hope this is okay,” Nate manages to get out, a second before I kiss him.
He gasps against my mouth. Clamping a hand on my hip, he tries to pull me closer but I lean away, not wanting to take this further with an audience.
“Hi,” Nate repeats. This close, his eyes shine like chips of jade in the sunlight. I’ve truly never seen a more beautiful eye color.
“Hi,” I greet him, taking a full step backward but keeping hold of his hand because why the hell not? No sense pretending I’m not excited to see him when clearly I am.
When I glance over at Max, he’s looking distinctly smug.Luke, with an arm thrown over his shoulders, is grinning widely. I scowl at the pair of them.
“Me and Max came together,” Nate tells me, bringing my attention back to him. “Me and him are going to hit up all the games together from now on since our guys are on the team.”
I raise my eyebrows at “our guys,” but let it pass for now. I want that. I want him. I might not deserve him, and it might not work out, but fuck do I want to try. I’m sure my therapist would have a few choice words to say about me starting a relationship when I’m still trying to work on myself, but it’s hard to care about that when Nate’s green eyes are on mine, his presence a warm, steady weight beside me.
“We rode together,” Max puts in, a sly lilt to his voice. I narrow my eyes at him. “Since me and Luke are heading in the opposite direction, would you be able to drop him back off at his place, Marcos?”
Okay, Max, I see what you’re doing,I think in his direction. Shaking my head at my friend in exasperation, I turn to Nate.
“Need a ride?”
“If you don’t mind,” he replies, grinning cheekily. Feeling ganged up on, I look to Luke before realizing he will be absolutely no help whatsoever. Frankly, I’m surprised he wasn’t the mastermind for this setup.
“I don’t mind. You guys want to grab something to eat?” I offer.
Luke glances at Max, reads something on his face and shakes his head. “Nah, we’re going to head home. I’ve got to shower still.”
Oh hell, so do I. Taking another small step away from Nate, I try to surreptitiously sniff myself. I’d better drive home with the windows down. I doubt Nate’s attraction to me will extend far enough to include post-baseball-game sweaty.
“Great!” Max says cheerfully. “Glad you came with me, Nate.”
“Thank you for the invite,” Nate replies, squeezing my hand as though I’m the one who invited him. He waits for Max and Luke to stroll off together, Max held awkwardly to Luke’s side by an arm over the shoulders, before turning to me. “Sorry. We sort of teamed up on you, didn’t we?”
“Max is apparently trying his hand at being a matchmaker,” I muse. Nate grins.
“Listen, I’ll take all the help I can get.” He pulls our linked hands up and kisses the back of mine. I jolt, surprised. I can feel the phantom imprint of his lips even after he lets our hands fall back to our sides. Apparently, I’m having averygood day, because nothing about this situation is bothering me.
“Do you have plans the rest of the afternoon?” I ask him, while silently hoping he doesn’t. I want to talk to him, and then I want to strip him down—lay him out on my bed and keep him there for as long as I’m able.
“Nope.”
“Want to come back to my place?”
“Sure,” he agrees quickly, barely letting me finish the question. He looks around, suddenly impatient. “Where’d you park?”
13
Nate
Marcos seemsto only run hot or cold, there is no in-between. Some days it feels like he’s trying to ghost me, while others—like today—he acts like we’re dating. It’s not usually my style, but I’m starting to think we need to have an actual discussion about what the fuck we are doing. Every time we’re together, I become more and more certain that I want this. I want to see where things go with him, and I want him to be just as invested as I am. Either that, or he needs to tell me to fuck off.
“So,” I start, the moment we click our seat belts into place. I turn to him, trying to face him as much as the vehicle will allow.
“So,” he echoes, glancing up in his rearview mirror before putting a hand on the back of my seat and reversing the car out of the parking space. I become temporarily distracted by what this does to his bicep.
“Uhm—oh, right, so I was wondering what we are doing.”
“Going back to my place.”
