“Yup. For the next three weeks.”
“Cool—I’m planning on going every time you play. I still can’t get over how good you are. You know, you could forgo this teaching thing and explore music.” His eyes filled with pride and my heart melted.
“Thanks, TJ. That’s sweet.” I glanced at Aaron and wished I hadn’t. His fists rested on the couch as he glared at us.God, this is hard.“Education is a sturdy career. Solid. A demand for it will never go away. I need the consistency.”
He sighed. “Yeah, I get it.”
“On the other hand, I could get replaced with computers and robots soon. So maybe I should say to hell with it and form a band. Travel the world. You guys could be my groupies! Yes! I would be more famous than you. Maybe you could form a fan club.” I cheered, all of them chuckling.
“Greta’s G-Thangs?” Jeff attempted, getting booed. “G-Moneys?”
“Nah, those suck. What about…” Tanner stuck out his tongue, thinking. “Greta’s Gang?”
“Oh, I like that one.” I pushed myself up closer to him. “Greta’s Gang. Rolls off the tongue, yeah? What you think, Ronnie?”
“G-Spotters.” He deadpanned. “Greta’s G-Spotters.”
Then we all burst out laughing. Even Aaron’s stoic face curved into a grin. I wiped tears from my eyes and shook my head at him. “I think we have a winner.”
“I’ll make the shirts.” Aaron stretched his long arms over his head, a sliver of his tight abdomen sticking out. My throat became heavy. “I think we need an episode ofThe Sopranos.Nothing gets me more excited for Italian than mobsters.”
“Oh, not again.” I got up and switched the cable to hook up to our premium channels. “You and your mobsters.”
“I vote we have Italian Mondays,” he yelled, Callie and Zade joining in. They agreed and now, I succumbed to the fate of watching mob shows and eating pasta on Mondays.Not a rough life.
An hour later, we sat around the table stuffing our faces. Dinner tasted like a small piece of heaven. The six of us laughed and passed the food around like a damn sitcom. I smiled at my group of friends, my heart constricting with how much I loved them.Damn it.Aaron kicked me under the table and I gave him a pointed look.
“You had a weird look on your face, Gabs.”
“Yeah well, I had a brief lapse of emotions.”
“PMSing? Great.” He crossed his eyes, a small smile on his lips.
“Asshole.” I kicked him back, harder than he had. But he caught my foot in one large hand. He rubbed it with the hand not shoving food into his mouth and he winked. I tried to remove it, but he held on. It was our little secret.
I forced myself not to react to how he softly traced my bare foot. He rubbed the base, and my eyes closed in pleasure. It felt amazing. I never knew my foot could turn me on.Interesting…We needed to explore that later. He kept his hand there for ten minutes, teasing me beyond reason, and I wanted nothing more than to throw the dishes on the ground and have him fuck me senseless. All from him touching my foot.
I needed to get a grip.
His knowing eyes didn’t help either. They kept widening and heating at me. I swore everyone at the table had to know. They had to. Aaron was emitting sex waves as we spoke. Tanner broke me out of the trance. I turned to look at him and hoped my face wasn’t flushed. “Come again?”
“You said you have a weekend off in three weeks, yeah? I say we all go camping or take a road trip. You guys down?”
I nodded, looking at Callie. “I’m down.”
“Hell yeah, what about you ass-hats?”
Zade and Jeff agreed but Aaron’s stare stopped me. He looked down at his plate, shoulders sagging and body deflating. My heart wanted to reach over the table and squeeze him. “Aaron?”
“I’m going home that weekend.”
His words silenced us all. Home meant hell for him. We knew that.Fuck the rules.I reached over and squeezed his hand. “I’ll go with you. It’s part of the plan, yeah?”
His sad eyes warmed for a second before he nodded. My eyes stung. He clenched his jaw before replying, “Okay. I’d like that.”
“Shit.” Tanner sucked in his lip making a wet, awful noise. “Now I feel like an asshole.”
“Don’t. You didn’t know. Go camping.” Aaron waved him off, but he was hurting. “It’s fine.”
