My heart is threatening to pop out of my chest as I turn around. I should be terrified of what this could mean. What I feel for him, what I’ve always felt despite everything, should terrify me. It doesn’t. It just feels … right. After a few minutes, I get hot, throw his arm off, and scoot away from him. He doesn’t say anything, but when he starts running his fingers softly through my hair and over my scalp, I’m convinced I’ve somehow jumped into an alternate dimension.
39
JOSSLYN
Tate: heads up, it looks like I’ll be at your parents’ house on Titus’ bday
I feel myself frown. Titus’ birthdays are either dinner at fancy restaurants or ordering takeout at the house before he disappears into his office to work. He’s been so busy lately that I just assumed the latter would be happening, and since it’s not until a couple of weeks from now, I haven’t even brought it up.
Me: ????
Tate: two big cases. meeting over dinner
I groan as I set my phone down and focus on the espresso I’m making on the stove. Titus has a one-track mind when it comes to his cases, and if he’s working on two right now, this checks out. When he’s extra stressed, he literally brings his job home and holes up in his home office with his employees and sometimes partners, depending on the case. At the end of the day, it doesn’t matter. Tate and I were civil when we broke up the first time. Then again, there was no bad blood between us then.
I’m whipping up sugar as the espresso finishes brewing, whenFinn appears. My eyes nearly bulge out of their sockets. He’s in shorts and a t-shirt, tapping his phone as he brings a muscled arm up to run his fingers through his unruly hair. The sliver of skin between his shirt and the elastic of his boxers makes my mouth go dry. The sound of the espresso brew finishing snaps my attention back to the stove. My heart is pounding, my hands shaking, as I focus on my task.
The two boyfriends I had before Tate were both athletes. I’m used to toned bodies. I’m used to muscles. I don’t stare at the guys in the park when they take off their shirts. But this guy … I find everything about him annoyingly sexy. I hear when he sets his phone on the counter, and from the corner of my eye, I see him walking up to me. He wraps his arms around me and kisses my head.
“How’s your headache?”
Even his groggy morning voice is sexy as fuck. I’m not sure my libido can handle this. I should really kick him out and end this right now. I clear my throat and set everything in my hands down, as I turn in his arms.
“Gone,” I say.
The warmth in his eyes makes me take a step away from him. I can't have him act this way and this just be a casual hookup. I can’t play house with him if it’s not real. My guard is already down, and if I keep falling for him and he breaks it off, I think it might kill me. He frowns.
“Why are you being like this?”
“Like what?” he asks, but his expression is wary, his guard up.
“Nice,” I say. When he doesn’t respond, I add, “I can’t figure out if this is some sort of prank, or if you got hit hard at practice.”
He opens his mouth, shuts it, opens it again, and glances over my head. “Is that coffee?”
I press my lips together and stare at him for a moment before sighing and turning around to pour our coffee. It takes me longer to explain the difference between a cortadito and café con leche than it would have been for him to answer my question, but I do it anyway. When I’m done, I bring out overnight oats—which he alsohas questions about—and fruit, which is thankfully self-explanatory. Finally, we take a seat on the barstools—me with my café con leche and him with just straight-up coffee. He drinks his in two sips and starts eyeing the espresso maker.
“You know you’re going to be wired all day, right?”
“Because of this?” He laughs, looking at the cup. “I drink black coffee every morning.”
“Cuban coffee hits different.”
He raises an eyebrow. “You have a full-size mug.”
“Withmilk. We went over this already.” I take a sip, lower my mug, and watch Finn stand up and pour himself another cup. He really has no idea how potent this stuff is. He remains standing, so I pivot my chair toward him.
“So,” I say. “We should talk.”
“Every time you use those phrases—‘we should talk’ and ‘I can't do this anymore’—my chest tightens,” he says quietly, almost as if he doesn’t want to admit it.
I inhale sharply and place my mug on the counter so I don’t drop it.
“I don’t know what to make of that,” I respond.
“I was at dinner last night when I found out where you were,” he says.
My stomach caves in. He could’ve been at dinner with anyone, but Damian told me they’d all made plans to have dinner together the day before at the golf course. All of them. “Single women included,” Damian pointed out when he told me. Which, under normal circumstances, I wouldn’t think twice about, but he’d already told me one was flirting with Finn. Thinking about him flirting back or considering taking one of them home makes me feel sick.
