Page 66 of Duke, Actually

“No, he was taking a break and the shop was full, so he couldn’t find anywhere to sit. I invited him to join me. I’ve gotten to know him pretty well in a small-talk-at-the-cash way—he knows which roast I prefer, and I know he’s a stand-up comic.”

“No wonder you rejected him.”

“He’s actually really funny,” Dani said, aware that she was digging her own grave. “I’ve googled him—some of his gigs are on YouTube. It’s really smart humor.”

“Is he ugly? Is he an assault to the senses?”

She shook her head. “No. He’s pretty cute. Young.” There was her excuse. “Too young.”

“What does that mean?”

“Twenty-four.”

She thought he was going to rebut, but he asked, “So how do you get from sitting in the coffee shop together to potentially getting it on?”

Her face heated. “I don’t know. He kind of... strongly implied that there was a standing offer.” When Max started to object, she added, “Not in a gross way. In a flirty way that gave me an out.” She shrugged. “Which I took.”

Max looked at her for a long time. “Why? Here we would seem to have the perfect man. You know him—well enough, anyway. He’s funny and smart. He has a job. He isnottoo young, at leastfor your stated purpose. As far as we know he sometimes eats plants.”

Dani smirked. “He’s a vegetarian, actually.”

“See! He’s perfect!”

She hated talking about this, even with Max, who was the easiest person in the world to talk to. It made her feel cornered, afraid, even. Just like she’d felt in that coffee shop.

Max set a mug of coffee in front of her, sat down, and beamed his cobalt eyes at her—into her soul, it felt like. “Tell me what’s really happening here.”

He wasn’t going to let her off the hook—of course he wasn’t. “I don’t know. I think I want to have sex. I mean, Idowant to. I have the...” She waved her hand around in the air. He copied her gesture with his eyebrows raised questioningly. “Sex feelings,” she finished lamely.

A corner of his mouth quirked upward. “You have the ‘sex feelings’?”

God. This was mortifying. “You know what I mean.”

He smirked and made a “continue” gesture.

“But when I get into a situation where the idea of having sex is no longer theoretical, the sex feelings...” She wiggled her fingers and let her hand float up above her head.

He mimicked her again, taking the hand he’d been using to gesture for her to keep talking and letting it float up, too.

“They disappear,” she said. “Okay? Are you happy?” He actually looked pretty happy, probably because he enjoyed mocking her. “The sex feelings get replaced by panicky ones.”

His face sobered. “Perhaps you’re not ready.”

“Oh, I’m ready. I am so ready, you don’t even know.”

“So what is the problem, then?”

Was she going to tell him the truth? Well, why not? Relentless honesty, right? “I think I’m afraid I’ll get my heart broken again.” She winced as soon as it was out.

He wasn’t as surprised as she would have expected. “I thought you were post-love.”

“I am! But what if I have sex with one of these guys, especially one of the decent ones, and...”

She didn’t realize she was making yet another gesture until he mirrored it. “Is this the ‘I had sex with this relative stranger one time and his moves blew my mind so much I accidentally fell in love with him’ gesture?” he asked.

“Uh, I guess so?”

“I’m sorry. I’m not trying to make fun. I’m trying to understand. When you rejected HarlemHipster, you said itwasn’tabout the risk of heartbreak.”

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