Page 92 of Back in the Saddle

It was rude, but I didn’t stop to introduce them to Eric.

And it told you where my head was at that I also didn’t stop and ask where the hell they stored all that shit. We all had small storage units that came with our apartments. But no way in hell those baubles would fit in one, much less that humongous pile of boughs.

We were again holding hands, and I was tugging Eric toward the stairs to Luna’s place, when I called back, “Hey, guys.”

We made it to Luna’s door, and I only got one knock in, my hand raised to keep doing it, when the door was pulled open by Harlow.

“Oh my God!” she cried. “Get in here!”

She then tugged my free hand, and I was in there.

Since Eric was attached to me, he was in too.

“Oh, uh…hey there, Eric,” she greeted timidly.

“Hey, Harlow,” he replied.

Luna’s pad was a study of Urban Outfitters with CB2 and West Elm thrown in. She had much the same UO design aesthetic as Raye, but Raye’s coordinating stores were Anthropologie and Z Gallerie.

And now, shoved into her pad were Luna, Harlow, Raye, along with Cap, and oddly, Knox (Cap and Knox’s inclusion didn’t give me warm fuzzies), me and Eric.

It was a lot of people for not a lot of space.

More, there was Jacques, Luna’s French bulldog, who usually adored me.

But he was sitting on Cap’s lap when we arrived, and he jumped off and made a bee-line not to me, but to Eric.

I watched Eric pick him up, and I watched Eric scratch his ears as Jacques bathed Eric’s freshly shaved jaw with his tongue.

Now I was jealous of a dog.

“Sit down.” Luna took me out of my covetous thoughts by shoving me in a deco-inspired, russet velvet tufted swivel chair.

“She didn’t finish her coffee,” Eric murmured to Luna, but his gaze was shifting from Knox to Cap.

Oh yeah.

He didn’t have warm fuzzies either.

Though, a weak one fluttered in me that he noticed I didn’t finish my coffee.

“Got it,” Raye jumped up.

“You guys are freaking me out,” I informed them.

“We got confirmation on this intel too,” Cap told Eric.

“What intel?” Eric asked.

“Yeah, what intel?” I demanded.

“Hurry up with that coffee,” Luna ordered.

“Coming, coming,” Raye called from the kitchen.

“Just tell me!” I almost shouted.

Cap sat in Luna’s mod curve, yellow couch at the end closest to me. He angled his body my way and leaned his elbows into his knees.

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