Page 23 of The Hookup Mix-up

It takes me a moment to realize my hands are on his hips. The heat of his body makes my fingertips tingle, even through his T-shirt. What’s even more surprising is the warmth from his skin against me too, his hands holding on to my hips the same way I’m doing with his.

“Say it,” I add, though I’m not sure why I’m pushing this.

“Say what?”

“You’re a nine.”

“You’re a nine.” He cocks a brow.

“You know that’s not what I mean.”

He shakes his head. “I’m not gonna say it.”

“You’ve said it before.”

“That was different. Now it feels weird.”

I can see what he means, but still, I don’t let it go. Theo makes me act all sorts of different from how I usually act. “Please? For me? Your knight in shining armor. I did save your life, after all…and I’m your new best friend.”

He rolls his eyes. “I said friend. You added the best.”

“Please?” I grin and tighten my hold just a little bit.

He looks at me and…wait…are we closer? I can feel the heat of him against my stomach now, feel his body against mine, see flecks of gold in the green of his eyes.

“I’m a nine,” Theo says softly, almost a whisper, his breath against my face.

And damned if I don’t want to lean in, if my heart’s not suddenly beating faster, which is totally not supposed to happen. I don’t get…whatever this is. An almost kiss.

I brush my finger across his hip bone, and Theo sucks a breath through his teeth, but his hold on me tightens. Neither of us moves, we don’t part, just breathe each other’s air and stare in each other’s eyes and—

The back door of Shenanigans pushes open. “Perry!” Theo jolts away from me like I electrocuted him as Ty says, “Oh shit. I didn’t mean to interrupt.”

“You didn’t. We weren’t… I’m not… It was just…” Theo rambles, and I chuckle.

“We were just talking. I’ll be right in.”

“Okay. Sorry for interrupting nothing. I know how shitty it can be to have someone interrupt nothing.”

I shake my head. My brother is a fucking idiot. “Go away, Ty.”

“Having a brother is fun!” he says before closing the door.

“I should…go…” Theo doesn’t look at me when he speaks.

Shit. Did I do something wrong? I wasn’t going to kiss him…I don’t think. There really shouldn’t be any question because Theo told me who he is, and I need to respect that. “Sure. I need to get back to work anyway. Are we good, though? I wouldn’t have—”

“Yeah!” he interrupts with a little too much energy. “We’re great! Bye… I… Bye.” Then he ducks around the corner and walks away. With a sigh, I go back inside, hoping that whatever that nothing was, it didn’t fuck up our friendship.

I get up the next morning and check my phone for a text from Theo. He’s an everyday messager, which I have to admit would bug me with most people, but it doesn’t with him. There’s nothing there, but that’s not too out of the ordinary. Maybe he’s sleeping. Maybe he ended up going home with Autumn and stayed up all night, getting laid.

Maybe he’s going to ignore me because we almost kissed last night.

Ugh. Why the fuck am I letting myself think things like that? I’ve known the guy for a week. It’s not like we had a lasting friendship, and that’s fine by me.

I grab my laptop from the nightstand and pull up the code I’ve been working on for months but can’t seem to get right. It’s for a parental app, which I know sounds ridiculous for someone like me—a twenty-two-year-old guy with no kids, who’s never even been in a serious relationship—but I know being a single parent was something my mom struggled with. Ty’s dad sent money to help take care of me, so while I didn’t grow up as wealthy as Ty, I didn’t truly lack for anything. But my mom worked, and she had a hard time finding babysitters and things like that. I’ve done enough research to know how much of a struggle finding resources as a parent can be.

I’m not sure why I think I’m the one to do anything about it, or if this is even a good idea, but it’s something I’ve been playing around with for ages. Tech stuff has always come naturally to me. In a lot of ways, I hate it. I don’t want to have something in common with Ty’s dad. I don’t want to feel like I inherited something I enjoy from the bastard who went around getting women pregnant, not being in their lives and cheating on his wife. The problem is, I actually like tech. I love it, but I don’t know if I have it in me to ever let myself really have it.

---