Page 21 of Pet Project

Of course, she had to pick up on that. Let the fun begin…

An hour later and thirty bucks poorer, I’m emotionally wrung out. Powering on my phone, I pull up the rideshare apps to determine if Uber or Lyft is getting my money today. With how far out of the way this office is, I’m looking at a fare of at least thirty bucks to get back home. Seeing that Lyft has the shorter wait time, I cancel my Uber request before I lose even more money and crouch down against the wall of the building to wait.

Zoning out, I let the twenty minute wait pass while ignoring the world around me. I even ignore the pings of the house group chat while they are all discussing something. It’s about dinner time, so it’s probably just Scottcalling everyone to eat. It’s not like me going to “work” is big news or anything. Maybe Eric is up to something?

The honk of a horn shakes me out of my musings and I look down at my phone to see my Lyft has arrived. I always double check the name of the driver, ever since I got into the wrong car after class one night and ended up having to pay for two trips when the other person just stole my ride and the driver didn’t bother to fix it.

My driver is… Jay?

Glancing up at the car idling against the curb, I see the disappointment on my roommate’s face as he stands in the open door of his newish car. He had to trade in the vamp cruiser last month after it finally kicked the bucket. I forgot he’s driving such a nondescript vehicle now.

There’s no hiding it now…

I shuffle toward the car and drop into the backseat in embarrassment.

“As much as I’d like to lay into you, Pup,” Jay says when he pulls away from the curb, “I’m not going to. I reckon you’re having a shitty enough day as it is if Shiloh moving out has you going to therapy already.”

“HE WHAT?”

27

DONNIE

As soon as the drama queen exited my office earlier, I went online to order a bed frame, mattress, and other bedroom furniture that I needed to be able to turn the second bedroom into a proper second bedroom. I really shouldn’t have offered it until I had already set it up, but I wanted to stop the free show happening in my place of business before I had to fire one of my best employees for saying things she really shouldn’t be saying.

Once everything was ordered, I headed up to the apartment to get to work on cleaning out the room. The furniture wouldn’t get here until tomorrow at the earliest, but I can at least get rid of the crap in the room before it does. As I open yet another box of hockey memorabilia, there is an alert for the video doorbell I installed in the alley. I only use that door when the shop is closed. But after the last year with the vandalism, any time someone is in the alley, I will get an alert.

When I open the app on my phone, I see my newroommate, surrounded by boxes, waiting patiently at the door.

What the fuck?

Racing down the back steps, I fling open the door to see Shiloh standing there with a sheepish smile on his face, worry plain in his eyes.

I look to the sky for guidance or patience or something and take a deep breath before waving him in. He does this little wiggle shimmy thing that makes me smile before he grabs a pile of boxes and bounces up the stairs. I grab a two by four from under the stairs to prop the door open and move all of the boxes into the small hallway before putting the piece of wood back under the stairs and making sure the door is locked.

Shiloh comes back down the stairs and looks shocked to see everything inside and the door closed.

“I’m sorry. I should have called first… or made sure you were home… or made sure you really wanted me here…”

Eric warned me that the Shiloh doesn’t like to be touched, so I just pick up a stack of boxes and nod for him to grab some more himself. The small lifting of the corners of his mouth gives me some warm fuzzy feelings that I’m not quite ready to explore just yet.

It takes us less than ten minutes to get all of Shiloh’s things into the apartment. For now, I put his boxes in a corner of the living room. I don’t want to risk them getting mixed up with the trash I’m pulling out of the room that I’m setting up for him.

“The furniture and stuff won’t be here until tomorrow,”I tell him as I set down the last of his boxes. “I just have to take some boxes out to the dumpster and move some stuff into storage downstairs. Then we can move your boxes into the room. You can take my bed for the night and I’ll stay in the office on the futon.”

Shiloh starts shaking his head frantically before I even finish talking, but I give him what my mom always referred to as “the look” and he stops.

“Look, it’s not the first time I’ve slept in my office. It’s fine and regardless of whether you sleep in it or not, the bed is yours for tonight.”

The gorgeous younger man stares at the floor but nods. It’s difficult to tell with his darker complexion, but I think he might be blushing again… interesting.

28

SHILOH

I can’t take the man’s bed!

Then again, he did kind of demand it.

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