Page 60 of Mr. Hook-up

My cursor flashed next to his name at the top of his user profile.

Easton Jones.

My hand slapped over my mouth, my lungs now barely able to fill.

Was this a surprise?

I didn’t know.

But I knew I’d felt something.

Those eyes.

Those lips.

I couldn’t place them—or maybe I could and just didn’t want to. I didn’t believe that a coincidence like that, so real, raw, heavy, could really happen.

But it had and the reality was gazing back at me.

And now, after tonight, following a kiss so passionate my body ached, a whole new feeling was pounding through my chest.

What am I going to do?

I couldn’t sort these feelings. They were too messy. Too muddled. So I pulled my phone out of my back pocket, ignoring everything on the screen as I searched for Saara’s number and called her.

She answered with, “Why aren’t you making out with Mr.Hottie right now—”

“Saara ...”

Silence ticked.

And then: “Oh fuck, babe. What’s wrong?”

I continued to stare at my monitor, my heart leaping, trying to break through my chest, each beat hitting the back of my throat. “I knew.” I swallowed. “I think I felt it—I don’t know.”

“What are you talking about?”

I shook my head, but the name on the screen didn’t change. “First, I saw his tattoo and it clicked, but it didn’t, you know? And then he kissed me, and the second our lips touched, I was positive. I tasted it. Smelled it—that spicy scent. And once his hands gripped me, I was taken right back to that moment.”

“Slow down, start from the beginning. You’re not making any sense.”

“Easton ...” I walked away from my computer; I couldn’t look at it a second longer. “He’s Mr.Boston, you know, BostonLifer from Hooked. The guy I fell for all those years ago.”

“Shut the fuck up! No!”

I went into the kitchen and found a bottle of white in the fridge, removed the cork, and took a long drink.

I didn’t need a glass. I needed wine inside my body as quickly as possible.

“I wish I was kidding,” I whispered, wiping my lips. “Or maybe I don’t—Jesus, I don’t know anything anymore.”

“Okay, okay. Let’s think this through.”

This was why I’d called her. She would know what to do, how to move these pieces together, since everything was sticky and edgeless in my head.

I carried the wine to the couch. “Okay,” I repeated, using her word because I couldn’t come up with my own.

“You and Mr.Boston had something before you moved to Palo Alto and you were semi-obsessed with him, but the timing was all wrong and you were dealing with oodles of Mom grief and things died out.”

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