All the time.
“Hey,” I say while looking up from my computer. “Let me finish this email real quick.”
“Sure thing. Want me to shut the door?”
“Yes,” I say, my voice laced with desperation.
“That yes has some meaning behind it, and given the fact that the boys got home last night, I’m guessing there has to be something in that beautiful brain of yours that you need to tell me.”
“You are correct.”
While I finish typing, Blakely shuts the door and sets up lunch for us at my desk before taking the seat across from me. We both ordered the southwestern chicken salad with extra guacamole. It’s a go-to for us that we nearly get it once a week.
I press send, and then I turn toward her. “He felt up my boobs this morning.”
“What?” Blakely shouts and then catches herself and leans forward. In a whisper, she repeats, “What?”
“Technically, we were both sleeping, but he still felt them up and had a huge hard-on, and I might have rubbed my ass against it and guided his hand down to my shorts.”
Blakely fans herself. “Seriously? Were you sleeping still?”
“Yes, and we both woke up before anything serious could have happened, but oh my God, Blakely, I’ve never wanted anything so bad in my entire life. He, of course, sprang out of bed and muttered some apologies before retreating to the shower.”
“Oh, he totally masturbated.”
“Yeah, I heard him when he came, and it was so fucking sexy. I, uh . . . I might have done the same.”
“Jay-sus. To be a fly on the wall in your apartment this morning.” She pours her dressing over her salad and then mixes it around with her fork. “What happened when he came out of the shower?”
“I took a shower, we both had a bagel, and then I came to work.”
“Did you talk about it?”
“Nothing other than more apologies.” I groan while I squeeze a lime over my salad. “It was as if he was totally humiliated that he even touched me. He could not have gotten out of bed faster.”
“Oh please, I bet you if he’d had his own way, he’d have finished what he started.”
I shake my head. “No, he doesn’t see me like that. I can tell. He’s very standoffish around me. Sure, he gives me hugs—”
“And sends you flowers and calls you every night and texts Winnie and me to check on you.”
“Because he’s concerned about the baby.”
“No, because he’s concerned aboutyou. Why can’t you see that?”
“Because that’s not how we are. From the beginning, we said this was all going to be a friends thing. Sure, there’s attraction there, and of course, I couldn’t be hornier at the moment, thank you, hormones, but he doesn’t see it that way.”Doesn’t see me like that anymore.
Blakely just shrugs as she forks some salad into her mouth.
“What is that?” I ask. “What’s that shrug for?”
“I think there’s more to it.”
“I don’t think—”
There’s a knock on the door, and I call out, “Come in.”
The door parts open and Eli sticks his handsome face into my office. Freshly showered from his morning skate, his hair still looks wet, and he’s wearing a black long-sleeved Agitators shirt and black jogger capris. The man can more than pull off the look.
