On Thursday night, Hunter found himself on the Upper East Side, knocking on his other best friend’s door.
Nick Ballantine opened the door, and Hunter was immediately hit with two things: the wave of something spicy cooking, and the wail of a baby. The latter could have been a bachelor’s worst nightmare, but Hunter found neither unpleasant. To him, the combination felt like the smells and sounds of a home.
Not his home, not yet. But someday. Maybe.
“Don’t worry, there’s alcohol in here,” Nick joked as he stepped aside so Hunter could enter. “Unless you’d prefer to grab the goods and run for the hills,” he said, referring to the extra towels and sheets and crap that Nick and Taylor were lending him in anticipation of his parents’ and foster brother’s arrival that weekend.
Hunter’s place was roomy enough, but it was pretty solidly a bachelor pad. He had exactly two towels, one set of sheets, etc. Let’s just say he was woefully underprepared for houseguests.
“I’ll stick around. Wouldn’t miss the chance to see you in dad mode,” Hunter said, shrugging out of his jacket and tossing it over the back of a kitchen chair. “Where is your Mini-Me?”
“Bedroom. Getting changed by his mom, since I won the coin toss. What can I get you? Beer, wine? Something stronger?”
“Something stronger. Surprise me,” Hunter said.
In addition to being a sometimes writer for Oxford and a fiction writer, Nick was a part-time bartender at a swanky hotel. Nick was a true jack-of-all-trades in a way that worked out really well for his friends.
Nick went to work with his bartending tools and a bunch of liquor bottles Hunter had never seen. Hunter wandered farther into the open floor plan of Nick and Taylor’s apartment, noting the scattered dog toys, a giraffe toy on the coffee table that he was pretty sure was the baby’s, but hard to know. Instead of the beer bottle he’d have seen just a few months ago, there was a baby bottle on a side table, a pacifier beside it.
It was crazy how fast things changed. A year or so ago, this had been Taylor’s apartment, intended to be shared with Bradley Calloway. Then it had become her and Nick’s apartment, though in a bickering, platonic arrangement.
Somewhere along the line it had become what it was now. The warm home of two people who not only had formed a romantic relationship but who had a kid together. The whole thing was . . . nice.
And though Hunter wouldn’t go so far as to say he was jealous, he’d be lying if he said there wasn’t a little pang of . . . something.
“Still snowing?” Nick asked.
“Yeah. Supposed to be a few inches by tomorrow morning.”
“When do your folks get in? Think their flight will be delayed?”
“Tomorrow afternoon. I think the flight will be fine, though I do have serious concerns over how well my instructions to take an Uber from Newark will translate.”
“Yeah, New York’s not really cut out for the old-fashioned pick-someone-up-from-the-airport tradition,” Nick agreed. “Nobody has a car, and traffic’s a bitch. Your parents been to the city before?”
“Nope.” Hunter looked over his shoulder and grinned. “Let’s just say I have lots of tourist shit in my near future.”
“Then you need this even more,” Nick said, setting a tan-colored cocktail on the counter.
Hunter wandered back toward the island and picked it up, looking at the foamy top with more interest than suspicion. “What is it?”
“New flip I’m working on,” Nick replied, as though Hunter was supposed to know what the hell that was. “Honest feedback welcome.”
Nick lifted his own glass in a toast before taking a drink.
Hunter did the same. “Good,” he replied. “Excellent.”
He meant it. The drink packed a nice punch, but whatever the foam shit was negated the usual whiskey burn.
“Ooooh, adult beverages!”
Hunter whirled toward the door, startled to hear Brit’s voice.
She blinked in surprise as she came out of the bedroom and saw him. “Hey! What are you doing here?”
“Stealing these fine people’s linens for my parents’ impending visit. You?”
“Shamelessly gossiping with Taylor,” Brit said. “I haven’t been getting my fix with her since she’s been on maternity leave.”
“She still changing Aidan?” Nick asked.
“Boob-feeding. Her words,” Brit said. “Also said to tell you she’d be wanting her ‘adult grape juice’ when she gets done.”
“And she shall have it,” he said. “What can I get you?”
“Hmm,” Brit said, wandering all the way into the kitchen and leaning onto the counter.
Her gaze zeroed in on Nick and Hunter’s drink.
“What are you guys having?”
Without asking, Brit reached out and picked up Hunter’s cocktail glass, helping herself to a sip.
Hunter felt a surge of relief that everything felt normal between them after the strange end to Tuesday night’s “date.” Hunter and the rest of Oxford’s senior leadership team had been at an off-site strategy meeting for the past two days, so he’d barely seen her since that moment outside her apartment.
A moment where he’d nearly forgotten that it was Brit who was standing before him, that it was his best friend whose face he was touching, whose lips he’d wanted to taste so badly he thought he’d die from it.
Just thinking about it now made his mouth dry and his pulse quicken, but she seemed the same as ever, relaxed in his presence. Heck, barely aware of his presence.
Thank God, Hunter thought. He’d lost more than a little sleep the past couple of days worrying that they’d done serious damage to their relationship, but if it was one-sided, it would pass. If it was just him, he’d chalk it up to a freak moment, never to be repeated. . . .
She handed the glass back to him. As he took it, their fingers brushed, as they had a million times in the past.
Unlike those times, he felt it.
She did too. Brit gave a quick intake of breath and glanced up at him before hurriedly looking away.
Damn. Damn! He wasn’t the only one off-center from the other night. And yet even as he mentally cursed, he was aware of another emotion . . . relief.
No, gladness. A pure sense of masculine pleasure that she was aware of him, as he of her.
He shoved the feeling aside. This is Brit, for God’s sake.
She shifted her attention to Nick and smiled. “Any chance I can get whatever that drink is?”
“On it,” he said, reaching for his bartending tools once more. “Don’t suppose either of you two has a name for it? I’m thinking of putting it on the menu next month as a featured cocktail.”
“Nope,” Brit said, plopping down onto the barstool. “You’re the writer among us.”
“What about you?” Nick asked with a glance at Hunter as he measured bourbon into a shaker.
“Nope. Agree with Brit. Creativity’s your thing.”
“What’s your thing?” Nick asked.
Hunter grinned. “Drinking your creativity?”
“Hey, um, guys?” Taylor called from the bedroom. “Which one of you wants to come untangle my hair from Aidan’s death grip?”
“Is your boob out?” Hunter called. “I’ll do it.”
“Yep,” Taylor called back. “And it has a small human attached to it. Come on in!”
Hunter winced, and Nick laughed at his expression as he strained Brit’s cocktail into a glass. “I got this.”
Nick grabbed his own drink and went to rescue his wife from his infant son, leaving Hunter and Brit alone in the kitchen.
“How’d the team survive without me today?” he asked.
She gave a dramatic sigh. “Touch and go. But somehow we managed not to burn down the building or turn the Oxford website into a porn hub.”
“Shame about the last one.”
“How’d the training go?”
“Boring. Lots of Calloway listening to himself talk, with stale sandwiches brought in for lunch.”
“You back tomorrow?”
She smiled. “Because it means I’ll have to get my stuff out of your office, which I’ve been squatting in.”
“What’s wrong with your office?”
“Um, let’s see,” she said, counting on her fingers. “Half the size. No window. Still smells like the tuna that the last occupant apparently had every day for ten years. . . .”
“You better not have gotten Cheez-It crumbs all over my desk.”
“I make zero promises.” She used her toe to nudge the other barstool away from the counter. “Sit. Tell me about your parents’ visit.”
“They get in at four tomorrow,” he said. “Which reminds me, you game for dinner with us?”
“Sure,” she said in surprise. “I’d love to, but don’t you want the first night to be just family?”
“We got plenty of family time over Christmas. They’ve declared this trip all about New York and my life in New York. As far as I see it, that means you.”
“Oh.” Brit blinked rapidly, as though processing. “Well, thanks, I guess?”
He laughed. “Don’t say that yet. You haven’t endured the dinner.”
“I’ve met them, though. I like them. What’s the plan for the weekend?”
“If it’s cliché New York, it’s on the agenda. Top of the Rock, Times Square chaos, Statue of Liberty ferry ride, Fifth Avenue shopping, Broadway show . . .”
“Fun!”
“Is it?” he said with a joking tone.
“Oh, you’ll have the best time. When was the last time you did any of that stuff?”
“Been a while,” he admitted. “You’re welcome to tag along for any and all of it.”
Much as he grumbled, he was actually sort of looking forward to doing some of the tourist crap. He’d been thinking a lot lately about how he might not be in New York forever. He loved the city, but lately he’d been thinking about a change. A house instead of a cramped apartment. An actual yard. A good night’s sleep that didn’t involve the relentless blare of horns. Not that a departure was imminent, but he figured he should make the most of the city while he was still here.
“Let me guess what you’re really after,” Brit teased, oblivious to his thoughts. “You hope to direct some of your mother’s attention onto me so she doesn’t hound you about grandbabies?”
“Bingo. Don’t know why she’s so pushy. She’s got four already, courtesy of my horndog brothers knocking up their wives.”
“Could be worse. My parents have no grandchildren, and my little sister’s a free-spirited, no kids for me thanks type. So, you know, no pressure on me and my uterus or anything.”
“I’d like to meet your parents someday.”
“If you can figure out how to get them on a plane, much less a plane to Manhattan, let me know,” she said with a small smile.
“Does that bother you?” he asked. “That they never come to see the life you’ve built here?”
“Not really,” she said in an easy tone that made him think she meant it. “They’re pretty happy with their quiet life, and I get back there often enough. If they want to come see my life here, I’d welcome it, but I don’t need it.”
“I get it. Mine aren’t quite as resistant to New York, but my dad will absolutely make at least twelve hundred comments on the traffic. And my mom’s a lost cause. I guarantee she’ll make about a thousand comments about the air quality. It’ll be all I can do to keep her from wearing one of those masks. And I completely lost the battle on bedbugs. She’s convinced every hotel in the city has them.”
“That why they’re staying with you?”
“Yup. My parents will take my bed; Malik can have the couch.”
“What about you?”
He shrugged. “I’ll be taking my chances with the bedbugs in a hotel.”
“You can’t sleep in a hotel!”
“It’s that or my hardwood floor, and I wouldn’t wish that on my little brother, much less myself.”
“That’s stupid,” she said. “You can stay at my place.”
“Because it’s sooooo roomy?” he teased.
She kicked him. “My couch is a pullout. And we did it before, when your place was being renovated.”
Yeah, but that was before.
Before I took you on a date and had such a good time I forgot it wasn’t real. Before I taught you a little too well how to make a man want to kiss you . . .
“You know I don’t snore,” she chatted on. “And my coffee’s way better than any hotel-room coffeepot. And if you go to a hotel, your mom will just fret that you’ll bring bedbugs home in your suitcase. And—”
“All right,” he said with a laugh. “If it’ll make you shut up about it.”
“Perfect,” she said happily.
“And bonus,” Brit added as Nick and Taylor came out of the bedroom, tiny Aidan nestled against Nick’s shoulder. “That’ll give me some uninterrupted time to pick your brain on my whole seduction-lesson thing.”
“Perfect,” he repeated under his breath as she turned away to go coo over the baby. Just perfect.
He drained his drink, and Nick gave him a look as he handed the baby over to an adoring Brit. “You need another?” Nick asked, coming back into the kitchen.
Hunter glanced over at Brit, noticed she was wearing jeans. Jeans she’d contemplated throwing out for being too snug in the butt. Jeans he’d suggested she keep.
He was regretting that now. Just a few nights ago, he’d watched her try on the jeans and been able to see her objectively, as a woman trying to attract a man. A different man.
Now, however, he couldn’t seem to think about anything other than the fact that she was attractive to him.
“Yo, Hunter,” Nick said with a laugh. “You want another drink or what?”
“Yeah,” Hunter said with a little shake of his head. “Thanks.”
Brit began bouncing the baby slightly, making unintelligible adult-to-small-child noises that should have been the world’s biggest turnoff. Instead, the motion seemed to make all the most feminine parts of her bounce entirely and . . . oh hell.
Hunter bit back a groan and nearly told his friend not to bother with the drink. At this rate, all he really needed was to stuff a handful of ice down his pants to remind the lower half of his body that this was Brit. That she was not available for ogling or touching . . .
Brit turned toward him, catching his eye and giving a wide smile.
Hunter’s chest tightened, and for an awful moment he wondered if it wasn’t his dick that was going to cause him the real trouble.