Elias pats me on the back. “Good job.”
I think we smashed the ‘flirting’ thing, but when Nate shows no signs of noticing, my heart sinks. Was it all for nothing?
When we head into the locker room, I feel Elias’ eyes on me as I change and turn around to catch him checking me out. I try to give him some sort of signal to cut it out.
Abort mission. Nate isn’t paying attention.
Also, I don’t think I’ll be able to take my shirt off with his eyes on me like that.
But then I catch Nate looking at us. His gaze flitting suspiciously from me to Elias and back again.
Is it working?
Elias pumps his eyebrows and I fail to hold in a snort.
“Everything okay?” Nate asks.
“Huh? Oh, yeah, fine.”
I drive backto the frat house in my own car while Nate takes his. As soon as we get home, I slink off to my room to work on the financial reports for the next executive meeting. I’m lost in the numbers when someone knocks on my door.
Nate comes in and closes the door behind himself.
“Hey, can you talk?”
“Sure, what’s up?”
He rubs the back of his neck. Is he nervous?
“Is there something going on between you and Elias?”
Oh gosh, okay, here we go.“Why do you ask?”
“It’s just that he was being pretty touchy feely with you in practice today, and I caught him checking you out in the locker room.”
I scoff. “Come on, Nate, be real.”
“What?”
“Elias is …” I wave my hand in the air, suddenly depressed by the memory of all the fakeness. If I hadn’t asked him to, he wouldn’t have flirted with me. But Nate believed it, didn’t he?
“Elias is what?”
“You know …hot.”
His eyebrows shoot up. “So, you do like him? Ben, why didn’t you tell me?”
“I don’t …” I start spluttering. I don’t even have to lie, I could just give him this one truth—sure, I think Elias is hot. Anyone with eyeballs would agree. But I can’t get the words out.
“What about Tom?”
“Tom’s fine.”
How many times have I said that now?
Nate finally gets the message. “You don’t like Tom.”
I bite my lip. “He reminds me of my dad.”
