Page 12 of About Yesterday (Foothills #5)

After rubbing the false sleepiness from his eyes, he reached over to the coffee table and tapped his phone screen. Not quite ten. Trace had been gone for hours on her date. Must be a home run.

Bracing himself, he shifted to begin the arduous task of sitting up, then the hellfire process of washing up, stripping down, and getting comfortable so he could get some decent sleep.

Explosive against the quiet of the house, the front door squealed open. Chunky, rubber-soled boots tapped cautiously over the entry tile, then rounded past the kitchen. A dining chair smacked against the table.

“Fuck,” Trace muttered, then muffled a giggle, her voice echoing up the stairs.

Cole halted his attempt to sit up and leaned back on the couch pillow, his evening entertainment settled. At least he wouldn’t have to stare at the ceiling until sleepiness struck.

Tiptoe, tiptoe, slower on the squeaky step, and a few more. Red hair shielding her face as she reached the top, Trace pushed it back, releasing a grinning sigh.

Cole opened his mouth to fire off his first tease, but no words came out. His pulse tripped over itself. The couch was suddenly stiff underneath him, and he adjusted his shoulders in a failed attempt to get comfortable.

Hand teased in her hair, her cheeks flushed, biting her bottom lip…

Fuck.

Sleep wasn’t coming for him tonight. Bad enough they’d been so close earlier, but that goofy grin, a lightness that hadn’t been there before, and she’d always been so damn adorable when she let loose.

Trace took a few steps toward her bedroom, then turned sharply to cross the room.

As he’d done since the day they met, he squashed the wistful, dreamy look on his face and folded his good arm behind his head, sporting a snarky grin. “Tipsy?” he asked.

Trace stopped fast, released a giggle. “Not as bad as it looks,” she said, shaking her head.

“No? Because you look trashed. Didn’t want to make a night of it?” Keeping it light, he hoped to hell she didn’t see the yearning hiding behind the tease.

Trace snorted a goofy laugh. “I am not trashed,” she said, shifting directions and she dropped to sit on the opposite end of the couch next to his feet.

Gaze wandering down, a glassy-eyed smile countering her claim, she patted his good foot, tracing his ankle as if she’d found a fun toy.

Cole swallowed hard, undecided if he should let her keep doing that, or sneak his foot away. Definitely not a good time to flirt back. “Liar,” he said, hoping his voice was steady.

“Maybe a little bit,” she said, her goofy smile rich with amused curiosity as she traced her fingertips in a circle around his ankle bone. “It was nice to let loose with Haley and sort of, hash it out. A very long, overdue hashing of outs. Or outing of hashes.”

He paused, waiting for her to say what had needed hashing out.

Instead, she pushed her thumb on the middle of his ankle bone, tilted her head, then traced down the top of his bare foot.

“Trace?”

“Yeah?”

“That’s my foot,” he finally said, wondering when she’d realize what she was doing to him.

“I know. It’s a nice foot.” She snorted another giggle, almost a hiccup in there. “Finn’s going to call you tomorrow to hang out.”

“K,” he said, biting down on the edge of his tongue, watching her expressions change as she traced the contours of his ankle again. Fire followed the wake of her path. The best and worst sort of torture he couldn’t seem to break away from. “It will be nice to catch up with him.”

Her brow lowered, her smile faded. “Have you ever done it against the door?”

Voice catching in his throat, he swallowed the frog that threatened to choke him for real this time. “Um, what? Like, sex?”

“Of course sex,” she said, her hand flattening so she grasped his calf. “What else would one do against a door?”

“I have no idea,” he murmured, staring at her hand and terrified this either was, or was not, going the way he wished it would, because of so many reasons.

“How do you not know if you’ve done it against a door?”

Before he could answer, she kept talking.

“Because, I mean, that’s sort of one of those need-you-now, can’t-resist, so aroused you’ll think you’ll explode without the other person moments. I’ve never had one of those.”

“No?” he managed to ask, his voice filled with gravel.

For all the make-outs he’d walked in on in high school, he couldn’t picture Trace’s high school self hadn’t experimented with about everything.

He certainly had experimented with pretty much everything, and hadn’t been with the same person enough times to really get creative.

“Blowjobs. I think I should do more of those.” Trace’s hand slid up his leg.

Risking severe reinjury, Cole sat up fast and slid his feet away. “Whuh… what?” He shook his head and pushed his hair back, gripping his hand in the overly long mess of it. “Wait, no, I don’t want to know.”

Trace’s shoulders slumped, and she sat up straighter. “Sorry. I think I’m tipsier than I realized.”

“No worries,” he said, words flooding the tangled mass of his brain and not forming a single coherent thought.

She folded her hands in her lap and shook her head, staring ahead now.

“This town is a hotbed of gossip. When Finn moved back home, we hooked up again, and, well, it didn’t work out, and then he hooked up with Haley.

She was my best friend when I was a kid, before I met Finn.

Anyway, they met a few months ago and now they’re engaged and adorable and so in love and…

I don’t want him or anything, because, I just, I’m not into him anymore, but…

dinner with Haley was fun and we talked about their wedding and I’m the maid of honor and… ”

Trace didn’t seem to need him here for this entire conversation, but Cole pushed to sit up straighter, translating her rambling as she continued to spew out so much that he’d missed.

“After dinner we walked to Halseth’s and, remember Finn’s the bartender now? Anyway, we sat at the bar and we all three visited and I didn’t feel like a third wheel like I thought I would, I mean they’re the two best friends I’ve ever had, and…”

Her blinks grew longer, and Cole hoped to hell she didn’t pass out on the couch, as he wasn’t in any shape to carry her to bed.

“And I dress like my mother and never have wow-sex and I never make a first move and…” Trace took a long inhale and looked over at him. “I never have to pretend around you either. I like you. We should have sex.”

Long pause. Cole waited for her to laugh or say she was kidding. Nothing. “What, like now?”

“No, I’m trashed,” she said, snorting another laugh. “I mean, I trust you to give me your honest opinion. Do I suck at blowjobs?” She tipped her head back and released a riotous laugh. “Ha. That would be the point.”

“Trace?”

“You think it’s a great idea, don’t you? I mean, I saw your penis the other day and it’s very pretty.”

“Thank you,” he said, swallowing that damn frog even harder and couldn’t think of anything else in the entire realm of vocabulary to utter.

She scanned him up and down. “I was going to say maybe we could try the door thing, but I bet you’re not supposed to do any heavy lifting.”

“Trace,” he tried again, shaking off so many images of…

well, fuck, of what-ifs, like what if he was one of those assholes who was okay with messing around with someone he cared about, drunk or not?

“I’m really glad you trust me enough to…

experiment, but…” He groaned and rubbed his palm against his forehead.

Now would be the worst moment in the entire history of confessions of feelings, to tell her.

But what the hell. She probably wouldn’t remember, anyway.

But what if she did?

Or if she drunkenly, heartbrokenly decided they should fool around, tomorrow if not today?

He looked up and opened his mouth to confess. To everything.

Trace’s eyes fluttered closed, and she smiled as she drifted back to lay on the sofa. Hell. Cole pushed to stand and maneuvered enough to slide her legs on the couch, slip off her boots, and laid a blanket over her.