He frowned and shook his head. “No, no data. I mean, yes, I’m looking forward to seeing it, but that’s not why I asked about dinner.”
“Oh, then what’s it for?”
I swore my dad blushed. He ran a hand over his face, and my dad sighed. “To eat.”
“Should I prepare anything?” I asked, still very confused as to why this invitation was happening. I hadn’t had a meal with just my dad in… years. “Oh, is it a family thing?”
“No, just us.”
“Um,” I said, my nerves growing like weeds after a summer rain. “Sure. Yes.”
“Great.” He smiled for a second before the same hard look I was used to replaced it. Firm eyebrows, lines around his mouth. “Do you have a favorite place to go on campus?”
Wow, what a weird question. I did, but I always went whereherequested the past few years. “Shirley’s Sinner,” I said, the dive bar that had the best club sandwiches.
“Six work for you?”
“Yeah, yeah it does.”
“See you then, Naomi,” he said, giving me a long look before heading back toward the guys.
My dad just asked me to dinner.
Me. Not Cami.
What the fuck! This was amazing. I smiled at the realization this could mean things were changing for us. Good things, I hoped.
“You still with the conscious?” Michael said, his large body coming into view from my right. I wasn’t sure what he was doing or if he heard the conversation with my dad, but I grinned up at him.
“Yes. But not for long.” I pushed myself up, but a soft grip came around my arm, and he practically lifted me. It’d be easy to just fall against Michael and let him put that wicked arm around my shoulders for the walk home.
But being out in the open with the fresh, chilled air around us, some of the magic from our little seat on the bus was lost. I cleared my throat once I stood and flashed my best grin at him. “I won’t trip once on the walk home.”
“Love the confidence, Fletcher, but the bags under your eyes aren’t really giving me reassurance. Come on, lean on me if you need to.”
We started our walk toward my apartment complex, and every once in a while, our hands brushed together. Just our knuckles. Like a quick whisper of wind over my skin and I yanked my hand back. I’d gotten my cuddles and Michael fix for the week, and I needed to regain my strength for next Friday.
Thank the stars we had two home games in a row. No more bus rides. No more excuses to sleep against him.
“I’ve been thinking—”
“My dad asked me to dinner,” I blurted out, wussing out of whatever he was going to say.
He frowned for a second, the line appearing between his strong brows before a slow smile spread across his face. “Hey, that’s great. You excited?”
“Yeah, I think so. It’s weird. He’s never done this, and the more I think about it, I’m wondering why now.”
“Maybe he wants to repair the damage he did. Maybe he wants to talk to you. The motivation might not matter. It's the fact he asked that counts.”
“Yeah, you’re right,” I said, that pang in my chest flaring up just thinking about how Michael didn’t have parents anymore. God, there weren’t any words to convey how sorry I was for him.
To make it worse, I thought about his comment from last weekend. That he didn’t have a lot of friends here and he wanted to keep me as one. If I pulled away or let my lusty thoughts take over, it’d ruin the friendship he needed. Damn, this sucked.
I wanted to kiss his entire body while also hugging him and promising I’d be there for him. That he didn’t have to lose me too when his life was so full of loss already. My eyes stung again, and I sniffed.
He snapped his gaze to mine and stopped walking, a frown stretching across his handsome face. “Hey, whoa, are you okay?”
“I’m fine,” I said, my voice cracking as my eyes stung. “Hormones, I swear.”
