Page 40 of Learning Curve

Ace rolls his eyes. “Julia’s dad is the reason half the celebrities in Hollywood are together, with his discreet version of the TapNext dating app.”

Finn and I are both silent. I know he thinks my family life is different from his, but I think he’d be surprised by the fact that I feel like I can relate more to him right now than anyone else in the room.

Julia blushes before shoving Ace in the shoulder. “All our parents know famous people. What’s it matter?”

“Well, fuck me,” Blake cries, shoving to standing. “That’s it. I have to go back to my apartment and cry over how uncool my parents are.” He clasps his hands and looks to the white textured ceiling. “I hear you, Lord. I’m a nobody.”

We all laugh—even Finn—at the thought of Blake Boden being a nobody.

Blake gives Finn, Julia, and me a fist bump before ruffling Ace’s hair and leaving with a flick of his hand. I sit up and shuffle my back toward the headboard as Julia removes her legs from Ace’s shoulders. “I need to go too,” Julia remarks. “I’m exhausted.”

Ace climbs to his feet, a yawn making his long limbs stretch nearly across the room. “I’m fucking wiped too. Just sleep here so I don’t have to walk you back to Delaney.”

“Scottie and I can walk together,” Julia suggests, to which Finn pipes up.

“You can both sleep here. Scottie can sleep in my bed, and I’ll take the futon.”

I start to protest the idea, but Finn scoots up on the bed so my legs are crunched into him and his eyes are on mine. “People saw you with me tonight. People who lost a lot of money because I beat Donnie. I don’t want you walking out there by yourself.”

My head jerks back. The thought of someone being mad enough at Finn to hurt me never even occurred to me. He looks at Julia. “Same for you. I’ll feel better if you guys just sleep here and wait for daylight.”

Julia shrugs. “Fine by me.” She turns to Ace. “Do you have a T-shirt I can sleep in?”

Ace digs in his closet and tosses out a shirt, and Julia smiles at me as she trots into the bathroom to get changed.

Finn looks at me as I shift awkwardly to take my shoes off. “Do you want a T-shirt?” he whispers gently, seeming to sense that I’m absolutely losing my shit inside. It took a year of dating Dane before I slept in his bed for the first time, and I wasn’t feeling nearly the things I am now.

My whole body aches with the tease of arousal.

My nod is shaky, but it’s a yes, nonetheless.

Finn climbs off the bed and reaches into a drawer on the side of the bed, pulling out a neatly folded black T-shirt and tossing it to me. I pull it to myself gratefully, a small smile curving the corner of my lips upward.

It smells clean, but it has a hint of him too. Like maybe he’s worn it enough that the wash cycle never quite gets rid of his scent.

The bathroom door clicks open, and Julia emerges, the bottoms of her bare legs the only thing left in the dwarf of Ace’s huge shirt. Her own clothes are in her arms, and she drops them at the foot of Ace’s bed before climbing under the covers.

Ace is about to go into the bathroom to change himself, when Finn jumps up and grabs him by the back of his shirt between his shoulder blades. He looks over his shoulder back at me. “We’ll go use the hall bathroom. Scottie, you can use ours.”

Julia giggles as Finn drags Ace out the door and then smiles at me as I climb off Finn’s bed on nervous legs. I close the bathroom door behind me and lock it, and then I pause to stare at myself in the mirror.

My lips are flushed, a slight lingering tinge of Finn’s blood collected at the edges. I run the faucet to clean myself up, brushing my teeth with my finger and using the toilet, and then change into Finn’s shirt, leaving only my underwear underneath.

My heart races, and my fingertips tingle with adrenaline.

At this rate, it’s going to be daylight by the time I’m able to fall asleep.

Carefully, I open the door to the bathroom and walk over to Finn’s bed, dropping my clothes at the foot of it just like Julia did. Ace is back from the bathroom and in bed with her, and I swear, the two of them look like they’re already passed out.

Finn isn’t back yet, so I climb quietly into his bed and pull the covers up to wait for him. The door creaks open gently, and he steps inside in a pair of lounge pants and a clean T-shirt. Unlike the one on me, it fits snugly across his muscles.

He smiles gently as he flips off the overhead light and tosses his clothes in his hamper at the head of the bed and then turns, his destination of the futon clear. Impulsively, I reach out and grab his wrist, stopping his momentum.

“You can sleep in the bed with me,” I whisper. “It’s not that big of a deal.”

I’m a liar. It’s a huge deal, but I want him to anyway.

“Are you sure?” he asks.

---