Are you nervous?
Despite my apprehension, I chuckled.
God yes. I think I’m overpreparing.
Three dots appeared.
Disappeared.
Appeared again.
Explain?
WebMD thinks I need seventeen gallons of lubricant.Then I addedPlease don’t tell anyone I typed that sentence.
Three laughing emojis came back at me. Then…WebMD?
Don’t ask. And I mean that. Do. Not. Ask. See you soon.
Three dots again, cycling, cycling, until I had to wonder what he was typing.
Then finally:
I am nervous too.
Something unclenched in my chest, and I typed a reply without thinking.
Aw, baby.
The message sent before I could reconsider it. Then I stared at the screen.
Baby?
Jesus Christ. It looked so soft, so… intimate.
But the strange thing was, instead of panicking, instead of feeling awkward or exposed or wrong, intimate felt really, really good.
Luka
Warmth radiated through me.
Dean Foster—Olympic champion, destroyer of quad jumps, terrifyingly composed under pressure—had seemingly responded to impending sex by conducting research as though he was preparing for an exam. And with just a few simple lines, he’d taken the nerves I’d been experiencing ever since we left the medal ceremony and wiped them away.
I held the phone to my chest, still laughing under my breath.
Then my gaze fell back to the screen.
Aw, baby.
Two ridiculous words, and yet something inside me reacted instantly, heat unfurling low in my chest.
Then reality crashed back in.
The knock at the door shocked me into stillness, and my first illogical thought was that federation delegates had decided to invade what felt like—and had always been—neutral territory.
“Luka?”
It was Mila.
