Page 38 of Goal Line
I lock eyes with him in the mirror. “Do I look ready?” I have a big pink Velcro roller sitting at the top of my forehead and am holding a curling iron above me as I curl a lock of hair. I’m in a tank top and my pink striped pajama shorts.
“You always look great, Evie. You don’t have to do all”—he waves his hand in a circle near my face—“this.”
I want to tell him to stop saying things like that, but I don’t want him to know how much his compliments affect me. He’s a pro-level flirt and knows what to say to women to make them swoon. I’m sure he doesn’t even mean it.
“I’ll be ready in, like, five minutes. How’d you even get in?”
“Your dad let me in,” he says.
“I didn’t think my parents were back yet,” I say, suddenly worried that my half of the conversation could have been overheard. My parents went to the farmers’ market down near the harbor, and I didn’t hear them return.
“I’m not sure if your mom is home, but your dad definitely is. He’s got the baseball game on and asked if I wanted to grab a beer and watch it with him.”
“I hope you let him down gently?” I say, feeling bad that Dad’s just hanging out watching the game by himself, while Luke and I are about to head out to dinner. But we have important details to work out if this is all going to happen as planned.
I spent more time with my parents over this past week, knowing we’re about to drop a major bomb on both our families this weekend. However they feel about the bomb, itwillmean that I’m staying in Boston permanently. After nearly a decade of living on the opposite coast, I hope they’ll be happy about that. Especially when this baby arrives. We’llhave plenty of family time together for the first time in my adult life.
“I did,” Luke says.
“All right, do you mind maybe watching the game with him for a few minutes while I get dressed?” I ask, hoping that the maxi dress I bought two weeks ago still fits okay.
Luke’s chest shakes with silent laughter at my request that he leave while I change. “What do you think it’ll be like when you move in with me? I don’t always walk around fully clothed. Are you going to be weird if I’m hanging out in just my boxers?”
“Yes!” I practically screech, and then I throw in an “Ewww,” so that he thinks I’m grossed out by the idea.
I haven’t let myself think too much about the day-to-day experience of living with him. The thought of walking into the kitchen in the morning and finding him in his boxers, pouring a cup of coffee is . . .not something you can think about right now, my brain screams at me. But goddamn, now that the mental image is there, it’s hard to get out of my head.
“Okay,” Luke says with a dramatic sigh as he heads toward the door. “I’ll try to stay fully clothed at all times so I don’t gross you out.”
I can tell he’s teasing. Heknowshow good he looks, clothed or unclothed. But I’ll keep pretending that I don’t see the appeal. Maybe eventually, I’ll even convince myself it’s true.
Chapter Seventeen
LUKE
“There’s something Christopher said to me a few days ago, and now I can’t get it out of my head,” Eva says, looking over at me from her lounge chair next to the hotel pool in Las Vegas.
“Oh yeah?” I ask casually, keeping my eyes focused on the pool as my shoulders stiffen. “What’s that?”
If he said something that hurt her, I’m going to smash his fucking face. Seeing him a few days ago when he was in Boston was harder than I expected. The fact that she had feelings for him, even though nothing happened as a result, makes it impossible for me not to hate him.
How could someone be so stupid as to be offered Eva Wilcott’s heart and not want it? Meanwhile, I’d give anything for her to feel more than friendship toward me.
She rolls onto her hip so she’s facing me, and I turn to look at her.Fuuuck.
Even with her bikini on, you still can’t really tell she’spregnant. The high waist of her briefs covers any emerging bump, but the way she’s practically spilling out of the top is proof that her body really is changing. The crease of cleavage between her breasts has my mind racing with possibility. I glance back up at her to find her eyebrows raised.
“Did you just check out my boobs?” she asks with an incredulous laugh.
Shit, I thought my sunglasses would hide that.
“I’msorry, but are they growing exponentially? I think pretty soon they’re going to need their own zip code.” Hopefully if I joke around with her about it, she won’t notice the bulge growing in my swim trunks. I may need to cover myself with a towel.
“Men,” she mutters and shakes her head before sitting up and swinging her legs over the edge of the chair so she’s facing me. She slips her arms into her coverup and pulls it closed in front of her as she says, “I need to head back up to my room, or I won’t have time to get ready for the awards ceremony.”
“I’ll walk you up,” I say, throwing on my T-shirt. I swipe my hat off the table and put it on backward to hold my sweaty hair out of my face. I’m pretty sure it’s the same temperature here in Las Vegas as it is on the face of the sun. And all the people who walk around saying, “But it’s a dry heat, so it doesn’t feel as hot!” are out of their minds.
Once we’re back inside the magnificently air-conditioned hotel and heading toward the elevators, I ask, “So what did Christopher say that you can’t get out of your head?”
