Page 60 of Tangled Up In You
To the world, I was still the All-American quarterback who was hooking up with the hottest female model in the industry.
“Thanks for everything today, Corbin,” Daniel said once at his truck. “It meant a lot to me and to all the other guys too. You’re a cool guy.”
“No problem.” A thought struck me as I walked toward my car, and I turned back to him. “Let me see your phone.” With his confusion on display, he handed me his phone. I plugged in my number before handing it back to him. “If you ever need to talk, about anything, give me a call, okay?”
He nodded. “I will.”
When I got home, I called Hunter and asked if he’d come over.
After the talk with Daniel, I felt like the worst person in the world. I didn’t deserve to be comforted, but I needed it. He must’ve sensed something in my voice, because he agreed without hesitation, even though he had a lot of papers to grade.
He dropped it all for me.
Once Hunter walked through the door, I pulled him into my arms and buried my face in his hair. And just like that, the broken pieces inside of me started to mend.
Chapter 19
Hunter
When March arrived, I realized just how comfortable I’d been in mine and Corbin’s relationship. Way too comfortable. It was hard not to be.
Corbin had been my best friend ever since kindergarten. We’d grown up together, and as our hormones started raging as teens, we’d experimented with each other, just to discover that we were two halves of the same whole. Soulmates.
With him back in Willow, with us spending all sorts of time together, I’d let my guard down—the one that used to remind me how temporary all of this was.
But as he sat across from me at the table that Sunday morning, laughing as he told me a story about his friend Austin during some after-party they’d attended, I knew I wouldn’t have given him up for anything.
Even if I only had him for one more week, one day, one more second…it’d be worth it just to know a world where he was with me.
“And then the drunk asshole fell into the pool, taking me with him,” Corbin continued before finishing off the last of his coffee. He stood and grabbed his cup before looking down at mine and grabbing it as well. “I’ll pour us another cup.”
I watched the muscles in his back flex as he walked to the coffee pot, and the view caused heat to spread to my groin.
I felt like a teenager all over again with my near constant state of horniness. Corbin just had to enter the room, and I’d instantly sport a hard-on, like he was the Boner Whisperer or something.
“I need to tell you something,” Corbin said, and his voice lacked the playfulness he’d had from his story. He carried our coffees back to the table, placing mine in front of me before taking his seat.
The sudden seriousness put a stop to my lustful thoughts and instead put an anchor in my gut. “Okay.”
“I have a photoshoot coming up,” he said, looking at me with apprehensive gray eyes. “I’ll have to travel to Florida for a few days.”
That was all? Not as bad as I feared.
“Oh, that’s cool,” I said, lifting my cup to my lips and taking a sip. “When is it?”
“I have to be there on the nineteenth, and it’ll only take like a day,” Corbin answered. He lightly tapped his fingers on the table. “It’s for a line of new swimsuits that’s going to be released in May.”
I smiled. “So you’re going to be all wet and muscled, modeling a speedo in the ocean?”
Corbin chuckled. “I don’t know what I’ll be wearing. I just wear whatever they tell me to. But probably.”
Tension rolled off him, and I knew there was more he hadn’t said yet. Was he about to tell me that he wasn’t going to return to Willow after the photoshoot? That he’d just fly back home and jump back into his old life?
“Just spill it, Corbin,” I said, tired of guessing. “I can handle it, whatever it is.”
I hope I can, anyway.
Corbin sucked in a breath before slowly exhaling, rubbing at the back of his head. “I’m not doing the shoot alone. It’s with Veronica.”
