Page 40 of Edge of Control

I set the magazine back on the stand. “Thanks,” I said to the bored attendant, who looked up from her phone and gave me a confused “huh” before turning her attention back to her infinite scrolling. I crossed the street. They were just getting appetizers now.

I started to walk down the street. Slow. I had to time this just right. Had to make sure this panned out. Didn’t want Jace thinking I was a creep. Couldn’t have that.

I neared the restaurant.

Please look up. Please, just look the fuck up.

As if my thoughts pulled Jace’s head by invisible strings, he looked up.

Perfect.

My eyebrows rose in surprise.Wow. Didn’t expect to see you there.

His did the same. A brief—real—smile flashed across his face, bright as the daylight that was beginning to die all around me. So damn bright. Like a magnet, I was pulled toward him. I wanted to smack against the window, crash into it, let the glass cut me up all over. Didn’t care. Just wanted to get to Jace.

I continued to walk past. The bait was laid.

I took out my phone.

THEO: Hey stud. You look like you need rescuing. Again.

I stopped at the crosswalk. Pedestrians swerved around me, the foot traffic of the city flowing like a river around a large stone. I wasn’t going anywhere. Had to wait for my line to twitch before I could reel my catch in.

JACE: That obvious?

THEO: You looked like a lost puppy in a shelter. Please, daddy, come save me. That’s what I was getting.

JACE: Damn, you can read thoughts now too?

THEO: Only yours.

JACE: Don’t move. I’m going to ditch this guy. I’ll be right out.

The line snagged, my rod bending with the force. I smiled. That had worked out perfectly. Of course, it was the last thing I should have ever done, but then again, when was my judgment ever accurate? Might as well ride the wave of stupidity while it was giving me a high along with it.

Sure enough, Jace walked out of that restaurant. He turned and spotted me immediately.

That’s my boy.

There was that smile again.

Fucking hell.

I wanted to run up to him and kiss him like a damn rom-com film. The kind I actually despised. Like something out of a slow-mo music video by a ’90s pop star obsessed with New York, with love songs, with happy endings. And then I wanted to rip his pants off and grab that cock he’d been playing with all night, making it my toy to use and abuse. Not caring that we were in the street. That we’d get arrested.

When it came to Jace Holloway, all caution was thrown to the wind, shot in the face, burned at the stake, and tossed into a six-foot pit.

“Your timing is insane,” Jace said, walking up to me.

There was a brief moment where we were about tokiss. Where I was about to push in, crossing the space between us as if we’d been boyfriends for the last six months. Except we weren’t. We were far from that. We’d had a couple of intense nights together and a few more apart (without his knowledge), and yet I still wanted to greet him like we were high school sweethearts.

What the hell was wrong with me?

A fucking lot.

“I needed an out. That was bad.”

“Grindr date?” I asked.

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