Page 61 of The Plus One
“Like it?” Indira asked, giving a quick twirl. She was dressed for Halloween in what appeared to be a… bee suit? The potato-shaped sack had a zip up the front with alternating shiny black pleather and fuzzy yellow panels, the whole thing filled with stuffing to create a giant bumble butt, all of which was cinched right above her knees.
The stuffing continued its trajectory after she’d stopped turning, the bottom of the suit whipping around her and making her laugh.
“I’m a bumblebee,” Indira clarified, as Jude continued to stare at her in wide-eyed horror. “It’s cute,” she added, crossing her arms over her chest and frowning at him.
Jude’s eyes flicked to her face. He was certainly losing his mind. That was the only reasonable explanation for the fact that Indira’s ridiculous, shapeless mass of a “costume” was close to giving him a heart attack.
But it was so fuckingadorable. Andcute. And the silliness of it mixed dangerously with Indira’s potent sensuality, the sex appeal she radiated in waves that seemed designed purely to draw Jude in. Tempt him endlessly.
Things had changed dramatically for Jude after camping—like the entire trip had shifted the tectonic plates of his heart, creating a devastating earthquake that made constant thoughts of Indira rattle through his mind. Not that he hadn’t been thinking about her before. But now… well, now, the knowledge of her touch, the snug and perfect way her palm fit against his, what it was like to have her looking down on him, her legs straddling his body, were all imprinted on his skin.
Not things he seemed capable of forgetting. Even for a second.
Which was bad. Very,verybad. But he had trouble reminding his cock of that fact.
“I’m not exaggerating when I say I’ll kill you both if you let anything happen to my home tonight,” Collin said, his voice (thankfully) derailing the horny trajectory of Jude’s thoughts as Collin walked into the room and pulled on his jacket. “It will be a slow death. Merciless. One that involves hours-long PowerPoint presentations about my lawn-maintenance procedures.”
Indira rolled her eyes. “Collin, when you say stuff like that, it makes me want to vandalize your yard myself.”
“I mean it,” Collin said, pocketing his keys and fixing Indira and Jude with stern stares. “Jeremy and I have had to work every Halloween since we moved in here, and the housealwaysgets egged or TP-ed since we can’t pass out candy. But you two are now officially on trick-or-treater management, which means the destruction of my property won’t happen again. Right?”
Jeremy had already left for a scheduled surgery in the late afternoon, and neither would be home until tomorrow.
“That whole thing sounds like a you problem, not an us problem,” Indira said, waving a hand between herself and Jude. Something about thatusmade Jude’s heart flip in his chest.
“It will most certainly be ayouproblem when you’re the ones cleaning it up. You have one job: feed these rabid animals masquerading as youths enough candy so they don’t attack my home.”
“Did you ever think that maybe the reason you’re a target isn’tbecause you don’t pass out candy, but more because you’re a crotchety old man stuck in a thirtysomething’s body?” Jude said, feeling a light and bubbly sensation through his torso and arms when Indira grinned at him, a golden thread connecting their chests as they joined forces in teasing the hell out of Collin.
Collin’s eyes flicked back and forth between Indira and Jude. He pursed his lips. “I liked it better when you two hated each other. At least then I knew peace.”
“We—No—”
“There’s not… No way… Fake…”
Indira and Jude spluttered over each other, making Collin’s rather innocuous joke one hundred times worse and painfully awkward.
“Oooookay,” Collin said, narrowing his eyes.
Jude and Indira made the mistake of guiltily glancing at each other at the same moment.
Which was so silly! The whole thing was ridiculous! They weren’t a thing! They were nothing! Maybe they were… kind of friends? Jude seemed to be doing an okay job managing that without hurting her. But then again, the past few years had shown him just how capable he was of inflicting lasting damage.
“You two are so weird,” Collin said at last, looping his scarf around his neck and heading toward the door. “Protect this house by whatever means necessary. I don’t care if you have to stand out there and pour sugar straight into their mouths, just guard my lawn like you would your own child.”
“I bet dentists love you,” Indira yelled right before he shut the door.
Jude let out a small laugh before a piercing silence cinched around them.
Indira and Jude looked at each other for a beat before shooting their gazes in opposite directions, Jude squinting up at the corner of the ceiling where a miniscule crack was forming, Indira scuffing her toe over the floorboards, bee costume swaying gently.
After the camping trip, they’d slowly—cautiously—tiptoed intomore familiar territory. A few quiet minutes sipping coffee together in the morning before she left for work. A movie watched by all four of them on nights when Collin and Jeremy weren’t on-call. Some über-polite texts asking if the other needed anything from the store.
It was all dismally controlled and restrained, and while Jude knew the friendly distance was necessary—ideal, even—each sterile interaction chipped even further at the painful fissure in his chest. Ever since their kiss there was always a buzzing sensation right below his skin. A cord of tension—a twisted rope wrapped around both their waists, tugging them closer no matter how far away they walked from each other—that had the memory of her feel just within reach. It had taken all his self-control not to kiss her again that night under the stars.
This was the first time since then that they were by themselves in the house and actively choosing to be in the same room as each other. Jude felt like a teenager being left alone with a girl for the first time: clueless and awkward as fuck. Also, desperate to get closer to her.
Which was BAD. And he needed to STOP IT.
