The Lineup(12)

The door swings open, Emory stands on the other side with a robe wrapped around her body, her hair a complete mess.

“Dottie,” she breathes. “What are you doing here?”

“Sure, I would love to come in,” I say, plowing right past my friend and into her kitchen where I know Knox keeps a few beers chilled.

I’m normally not a beer person, but right now, it doesn’t matter what goes into my body, as long as it’s alcohol.

“Is everything okay? You seem like you’re on the verge of a mental breakdown.”

I give my friend a slow once-over and ask, “Were you having sex?”

Emory smooths her hair down. “Foreplay. We weren’t quite at the penetration part yet.”

“Yeah, thanks for that,” Knox says as he walks into the kitchen wearing nothing but a pair of sweats.

I’m not one to gawk at my friends’ boyfriends, but it’s hard to keep my eyes off Knox as he makes his way to the fridge and pulls out a beer for himself. He takes mine from my hands, cracks the top open, then his, and follows it up with a clink of our bottlenecks. He leans against the wall of the kitchen, his fine body on fire with every move he makes.

As starting shortstop for the Bobbies, his body is fucking amazing.

Really, really hot. Emory is one lucky girl.

“This better be good, Dottie,” he says between sips.

“Need I remind you, I’m the reason you got Emory’s phone number in the first place?” Back in college, when Emory was on a boy hiatus, Knox turned to me for a little help, and I had no problem handing him the information he wanted, as long as he took good care of my friend.

He eyes me from over his beer bottle. “Damn, how long have you been holding on to that one?”

“Thought it would come in handy one day.”

“Fine.” He chuckles. “You’re forgiven.”

I look between the two of them. “So I guess the sex ban has been lifted?”

“All it took was one brush of my bare breast against his naked chest and he was mine.”

“Don’t try to be cool in front of your friend.” Knox walks up behind her and wraps his arm around her waist, placing a sweet kiss to her temple. “She terminated her lease, and then rubbed her bare breast on my chest.”

“She doesn’t need to know the details.” Addressing me, Emory asks, “Why are you pounding on our door as if you’re about to be hounded by a pack of zombies?”

“Oh, you know . . .” I casually pull a piece of paper out of my purse and lay it flat on the table. “Because of this.”

As a couple, they lean forward and take in the printed congratulations email.

Yeah, fucking congratulations!

“Oh. My. God.” Emory covers her mouth right before she starts laughing.

“It’s not funny,” I yell, snapping the paper away.

“Wait, what’s going on?” Knox asks, a pinch between his brow.

“Your girlfriend, my now former friend, sent me the link to Jason Orson’s Charity Hustle fundraiser, my assistant accidentally donated to it on my behalf, and according to this email, I won.”

Emory laughs some more, at least giving me the respect of turning to Knox’s chest so I don’t see the pure joy written all over her face.

“You mean you won a date with Jason and his sister?”

“It’s with his sister?” I ask, not realizing that little tidbit of information. “That makes it even worse.”

“Yeah, he didn’t want to be accused of anything inappropriate, so he signed on a witness. But wait, how on earth did you win? I heard thousands of people entered. He raised over two hundred thousand dollars for his charity.”

“She donated . . .” Emory’s voice dies off from being pressed against Knox’s chest.

“She donated how much?” Knox asks.

“Ten thousand dollars.” His eyes widen and his mouth drops.

“Damn, girl. Are you crushing on my boy?”

“What? No,” I say with outrage, even though, yes, there has been crushing in the past. Now it’s more like an appreciation for the male form. For the most gorgeous, muscle-upon-muscle, delectable, drool-worthy male form of Jason Orson to be specific . . .

No crushing.

No lusting.

Did I say lusting? I mean, there has been absolutely no lusting. And before you even ask, NO, I have not looked at the towel pic since that first day, or any picture for that matter. I have better things to be doing with my life.

Okay . . . maybe the other night, I perused the shirtless pictures again, but just because I couldn’t remember if I saw a birthmark near his armpit or not and it was driving me crazy.

For the record, no birthmark.

And no tattoos. I found that out last night when I wanted to clarify that as well.

And then this morning, when I was wondering if he was really bulging or not in that towel . . . okay, FINE. I’ve looked at pictures of him every day since Lindsay and Emory sent that damn link. Are you happy? Well, you may be happy, but I was more . . . delirious after my battery-driven-while-imagining-licking-Jason-Orson’s-abs orgasm. Or two.

“I have not been crushing on him. Ten thousand is my normal donation amount. It was a mistake, a miscommunication, and because of it, I’m stuck in the middle of one giant clusterfuck.”