I give him my most Nordic glare, but he stretches up on his tiptoes to pat my cheek with an amused smirk. My hands go to his hips automatically, but the look from Nacho has me sliding them into my pockets.
“Trip told me to let you two know he’s ready to backhoe this level if you’re just going to be hanging out.”
He punctuates this with a finger gun and walks off with my granola bar, whistling. Speechless, I turn to my friend-slash-former-fuck buddy, gesturing at the thieving imp.
Nacho clicks his tongue at me, shaking his head.
“What?” I grumble while zipping my—practical, thank you very much—fanny pack.
“You two are flirting with each other.”
“Like hell we are.”
“To be fair, he’s better at it than you are,” he says, yanking on my—admittedly unflattering—bucket hat.
“That’s not what’s happening here, Nacho,” I protest. “We’ve gotten closer as we work on the plans for our trip, and I admit he’s impressed me, but we are friends. Roommates.”
“Roommates,” he says, cracking up. “Yeah, like no one’s ever heard that one before. So you haven’t tapped that sweet ass you keep staring at?”
My hand shoots out, gripping the join of his neck and shoulder, but only because I have—barely—enough self-control not to choke him outright. His eyes drift down to my hand as he raises an amused brow.
I wonder what I ever found attractive about him in the first place.
Pushing him away from me, I spit out, “Fuck off. I’m not staring at his ass, and no, I haven’ttapped that.”
Fucking menace.
“But you’ve thought about it.”
I draw my chin back.
He doesn’t know what goes on in my mind.
“I’m betting his little beatdown fired you up,” Nacho says, popping his brows.
“Who told you about that? And no, it didn’t.”
He snorts. “Are you kidding? Ant is tellingeveryone. Keeps saying it was the best night of his life.”
“That teeny, tiny jackass.”
Nacho pats my belly. “Big, toppy guy like you letting a little guy get the best of him? I bet you’d love the opportunity to show his tiny ass who’s boss.”
“Hey, you liked it when I was a toppy asshole in bed,” I snap back. “Besides, I don’t think about him that way.”
Mostly. At least not while I’m conscious.
…Okay, sometimes when I’m conscious, but I’m not proud of it.
“He’s gorgeous, amigo. How could you not? Especially since you’ll be going on this little murder spree across the country with him. He once admitted to me he gets super horny when he kills.”
Don’t choke him, Erik.
“Why the fuck would he tell you that?”
Nacho shrugs. “I dunno. But hey, if you’re not interested, me and Bram have been thinking he’d be a perfect little spit roast—”
Nacho is on the ground, grabbing his jaw as he throws his head back in laughter. I look down at my reddened knuckles and…fuck.
