Page 34 of Friend Me

She gave me a sad smile. “It wouldn’t matter.”

A relationship with Jamila had no such barriers. “Do you think he and Jamila are together?”

She shook her head. “I don’t know. I always assumed they were just good friends. But friends can become more.” She let that settle in my brain for a few seconds and then said, “Speaking of—”

She didn’t have to finish the sentence for the muffin to become an infinitely heavy black hole in my stomach.

“Either you and Tyler are better actors than I’d ever have believed, or there’s a genuine spark there.”

I looked down at my pink floral skirt. “There’s something, all right. And I—I kissed him. Later. Privately. And I tried to—I think I upset him.”

“But why, Marlee? Why would you kiss Tyler if you’re interested in Cooper?”

I traced a rose on my skirt. “It’s been three years since I’ve been that close to a guy. My hormones overpowered my brain.” Those hormones were going to fuck up our friendship if I didn’t get them under control.

“There you are.” Andrew held out a cup of coffee.

I took it from him. Black. I sipped it and shuddered at the bitterness. “Thank you.”

Alicia said, “Andrew, would you mind getting me a glass of juice, please?”

“No problem. Sis.” He grinned and took off.

Her smile disappeared when she looked at me. “The kiss? The private one?”

I set the bitter coffee on the end table. “He gave me a foot massage. I think it was some sort of voodoo. Is that a Texas thing? I could swear it felt like he put his hands on my—” I looked down at my lap.

“He didn’t.” Her blue eyes blinked wide.

“No! Of course not.” Though, for a second there, I’d wanted him to.

“And then you tried to—?”

“Climb him like a tree. But he stopped me.” I smoothed down my skirt. I’d taken things too far and pissed off my friend.

“You’re my friend, and I love you, Marlee. But Tyler’s my friend, too.” She gripped my hand harder. “Don’t hurt him.”

“I won’t. I promise.” And the only way to keep that promise was to put Tyler in the friend zone. And keep him there. With no visitation privileges to the more-than-friends zone.

My promise was still floating in the air between us when Tyler and Sam walked up. Holding a can of Mountain Dew in one hand, he extended a cup of coffee to me. “Morning.”

He didn’t look much better than I did. Scruff covered his cheeks and chin, and his eyelids drooped over bloodshot eyes. He wore a plaid shirt unbuttoned over a navy V-neck T-shirt, exposing a few dark brown hairs at the bottom of the vee. I wondered if they covered his entire chest in a mat or if they were sparse, strategically scattered across his pecs and…below. I pressed my thighs together and looked down into my coffee. He’d lightened it with milk and—I took a sip and sighed—sugar.

“Morning,” Alicia said. “Sam, did you have fun last night? I didn’t see you after the pictures.”

“Oh, I went back to the inn. I had an idea for my research. So, yes, I had fun.”

Alicia laughed. “What about you, Tyler? Fun night?”

I kept my eyes on the fluid dynamics of the swirling lipids in my coffee, not daring to look up.

“I did. Marlee’s a good”—don’t say it, don’t say it—“dancer.”

I blinked at him. A smile teased his lips when he returned my gaze. Friends. Maybe we could manage it.

“Tyler!” Jackson had approached from the other side, making me slosh my coffee. He gripped Tyler’s hand and pulled him into a bro-hug with the other arm. “Did you just get here?”

“Yeah.”

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