Liza: NO.
Liza: I just meant, no, I’m not at the arena. I’m leaving class now.
Blue: How about Drip? I can be there in ten.
Liza: That works.
Liza: And do not open it. I’m serious. I have a project on there and I don’t want you to mess with it. It’s very important.
I send off a quick pic of my bag with her computer tucked safely inside. I haven’t lied. Yet. And I don’t really want to. I just want to hand off her computer and then scrub the images on Liza’s laptop from my brain. If I don’t, I won’t have to worry about her supergluing my jock. I’ll die of blueballs before I ever step foot onto the ice again.
6
Liza
I’m standing in the middle of a coffee shop, but I’m not here for a drink. With all the adrenaline coursing through my body, the last thing I need right now is caffeine. I should probably grab a table just to keep myself from pacing as I wait for Blue. A glance at my phone tells me he should be here in three minutes, but when I feel a blast of cold air from the open door, I know he’s here. It doesn’t matter that Drip is packed with people right now, my eyes seek him out through the crowd.
He’s easy to spot because of his height, and as he dusts a few wet snowflakes from his hair, I can’t help but let my gaze roam over his broad shoulders. Even a bulky hoodie and a pair of sweatpants can’t hide the outline of his toned physique. But I cannot be sidetracked by hotness right now. I’m on a mission to reclaim my laptop, and I won’t allow myself to be distracted.
I watch as Blue looks around the room, and I congratulate myself for not jumping up and screaming to announce my presence, or worse, plowing him over so I can grab my computer and rush out of here. Instead, I calmly wave him over like I’m not on the verge of panic right now. When I realized that my laptop was not only gone, but in Blue Freaking Halliday’s clutches, Inearly lost my mind. I’m so close to regaining my sanity. When my laptop and all its salacious contents are back in my hands, the world will right itself and I’ll be able to breathe again.
“Thanks,” I say, as soon as he’s within five feet of me. I barely resist the urge to thrust my grabby hands out in front of me because Blue’s a notorious prankster and I don’t need him to decide to start a game of keep away in a crowded coffee shop with a million eyes looking on.
He plasters a smile onto his handsome face, but doesn’t look me in the eye. “Oh yeah, totally. It’s no problem. I guess I grabbed yours instead of mine this morning because I was in such a rush. And thanks for cleaning up after Hazel. I’m seriously sorry you stepped in her mess. I mean, not like I put it there or something because that’s fucking weird, but just because, you know, she’s my cat. Anyway, then I had that test, so I never even looked at my laptop. Like, not at all. The prof makes us take paper pencil tests like it’s nineteen ninety-five or something. Then I went to the library to study and to work on this project for my Econ class. I needed my computer for that, but I got your text right before that, so it’s all good.”
He smoothes a hand over his hair before setting his bag onto a nearby table so he can fish out my laptop, but when he hands it to me, he still won’t meet my gaze.
The rat bastard.
“You opened it,” I state plainly. There’s no reason for me to dance around the truth when it’s completely obvious. His cheeks are crimson right now, and even if they weren’t, his word vomit and lack of eye contact are practically broadcasting his guilt.
“What? I swear?—”
“You opened it,” I repeat, hissing my words as quietly as possible. It’s mid-morning, and apparently everyone on campus needs a pick-me-up before lunch, because this place is crawling with students and professors. It’s unlikely anyone will hear meor be able to discern what I’m saying, but I’m not risking any more exposure—especially now. “You opened it after I specifically told you not to.”
Blue doesn’t even bother lying. The man knows he’s been caught. “I thought it was mine! I sat down to work on my project and I thought I was opening my own tabs, but no. They were yours. I wasn’t snooping. I had literally no idea that instead of evaluating spreadsheets this morning, I’d be staring at a,” he looks from side to side before whisper-shouting, “wall of dicks.”
Oh shit.I’d forgotten about all of the various searches. My stomach starts to plummet, imagining what he might have seen, but then I realize those dicks could very well have saved my ass. Maybe he only saw that one tab, and not the rest. Maybe I can explain it away as a mistaken google search. An autocorrect nightmare. I’ll tell him I was searching for chicks. Yes, little fluffy chicks. Or wicks! I’ve suddenly developed an interest in candle-making during the spare time I don’t have. It’s barely believable, but it’s better than Blue knowing the truth.
“I swear, Liza,” Blue says, looking earnest for once and not like the practical joker I know him to be, “it was an accident. I figured Ollie was pranking me with the dicks and the vibrators, and I was honestly pretty impressed. But as soon as I saw your sex journal, I?—”
The word is barely out of his mouth before I reach up and cover his lips with my palm. I will not think about how plump those lips are or how his mustache tickles the inside of my hand. Nope. I can separate the hot hockey hunk body from the entitled ass who’s lucky enough to be inhabiting that body. I’ve been doing it for six months now.
His fingers gently encircle my wrist, gently peeling my hand away from his face. “There’s nothing wrong with recording your, uh, thoughts. I mean, you do you. Uh, while you’re literally, you know,doing you.”
I want to smack that damn smirk right off his face.
“Whoa,” he says, putting his hands up immediately. “I’m teasing you. It’s not a big deal. Everybody does it. Hell, I think we should normalize it a lot more. I mean, that’s probably why?—”
If Blue says one more word, there’s a really good chance I’m going to strangle him. No one here seems to be paying us much attention, but that would probably change if I suddenly had a six-foot-four, two-hundred-and twenty-pound dead weight on my hands.
“It’s for psych,” I tell him, trying to keep my voice low and even. “Well, it’s for the psych department. They’re doing a study, and I’m participating. I’m not just taking sex notes about myself.”
The big guy just shrugs. “It wouldn’t matter if you were. I’m serious. Whatever you do with your body is your business, and no one else’s. That includes me, obviously.”
“Okay,” I say, sighing with a mix of relief and exhaustion.
“Okay,” he says, like he’s making sure the matter is really at rest. “So, uh…do you want a drink or anything? I’m sure they’ve got something with hazelnut in it.”
