Page 24 of Goal Line (Boston Rebels #4)

Chapter Nineteen

LUKE

“ U hhh,” I say as I stand in Eva’s living room, looking down at the loveseat that’s apparently replaced the significantly larger couch that took up the middle of this room the last time I stayed here. “Did your couch shrink?”

“I—” Eva sighs. “I didn’t even think about that. Yeah, the old one really was just too big for the space, so I got the loveseat and chairs last month. There’s actually more seating this way, but it’s not ideal for overnight guests. You take the bed, and I’ll sleep here.”

Eying the loveseat, I try to picture Eva being able to lie on it without being curled up on her side.

“Don’t be ridiculous. I’m not sleeping in your bed while you’re scrunched up on this tiny thing.

” I glance at the two seat cushions on the loveseat and then each chair.

“I could probably take all the seat cushions and make myself a mattress on the floor.”

“Yeah,” she scoffs. “ That would be comfortable. ”

“At least I could stretch out that way.”

“Luke,” she says, and then covers her mouth as she yawns. “Just take the bed for tonight, and I’ll take the couch. It’s fine.”

“Like hell is my pregnant wife sleeping on a loveseat while I take the bed.” I grind out the words and cross my arms over my chest.

Eva lets out a deep sigh that has her shoulders drooping. “It’s too late to be having an argument about who’s sleeping where.” She glances at the alarm clock on her nightstand, and I follow her gaze to see that it’s after two in the morning.

“Then stop arguing,” I say, reaching down for the loveseat cushions, but before I can pull them off, she flops down on it. She’s curled up on her side, with her head on the throw pillows that lean up against the edge.

“I’ve taken plenty of naps on this thing. I’ll be fine.”

“You’re being utterly ridiculous. That doesn’t even look comfortable, and you’re going to wake up with a kink in your neck.”

“Well, if you try to sleep on the cushions on the floor, you’re going to wake up with a sore back.”

She’s not wrong. Whichever one of us doesn’t sleep in the bed is going to get a crappy night of sleep.

Still, neither one of us mentions the possibility of sharing the queen-size bed wedged into the small alcove of her studio apartment.

Previously, we probably could’ve handled it just fine. Now, I want so much more than the friendship we’ve had. But sleeping next to her, unable to think of anything but how close we are and how easy it would be to reach out and pull her against me...

Don’t be that guy , I tell myself. I’ve spent so much of my life suppressing my feelings and pretending that I didn’t want that kind of relationship with her, determined to be the friend she needed, not the guy waiting around for her to change her mind.

It didn’t occur to me how much harder it would be to maintain that distance once I kissed her. ..twice.

I should have just given her a chaste kiss and called it a day...but the way she wrapped her arms around me, pressed her body into mine, and parted her lips when I kissed her, I couldn’t help myself. And I couldn’t stop myself from doing it again.

Which makes me an absolute dick, because if there’s one thing in this world I’m not, it’s someone who preys on vulnerable women. And in that moment, with her heightened emotions, it’s possible her guard was down and I’m an asshole for taking advantage of that. Fuck.

“I’m too tired to argue with you,” she says, closing her eyes. “For real, just go to bed, Luke. Tomorrow, we can figure out a different solution for the next few nights.”

I look down at her where she’s cozied up in a ball on her side and sigh. “The only reason I’m agreeing to this is because I don’t want to fight with you right now.”

She cracks her eyes open and turns her head slightly to look up at me. “But tomorrow you’ll want to fight with me?”

“Tomorrow I’m going to find a two-bedroom place to rent for the next few days so we don’t have to fight about this at all.”

She shoots up to a sitting position. “What? No. I have plenty of room for both of us here,” she says, and my gaze roams the studio apartment—all of which could fit in my kitchen back in Boston. “Don’t waste your money on that. We’ll just...get an air mattress or something.”

“The only way I’m agreeing to that is if you take the bed tonight,” I tell her.

I know she always starts on her side when she falls asleep, but I’ve slept in her apartment before and found her lying crossways on her bed in the morning, so she moves around in her sleep.

There’s no way I want her falling off this loveseat in the middle of the night, or waking up in pain if she’s scrunched in here.

“I can sleep anywhere, Evie, you know that. You can’t. ”

She sighs. “I’m agreeing to this for one night only. Tomorrow we’ll get an air mattress and I’ll sleep on it.”

“Fine,” I say, even though I have zero intention of letting her sleep anywhere except the most comfortable option, which is her own bed.

With a sigh, she gets up from the loveseat, grabs something out of a drawer in the dresser near her bed, and heads into the bathroom.

While she’s in there, I take the seat cushions off the loveseat and two chairs and lay them down in a line.

I can tell just by looking at them that they’re about a foot too short, so I grab the back cushions off the chairs and stick one at each end, for my head and feet. Good enough.

Eva comes out of the bathroom a few minutes later, face washed and in shorts and a tank top.

I glance back down at the makeshift bed so I can pretend like I didn’t just notice the way she’s not wearing a bra.

“I’m going to brush my teeth,” I say, leaning down and grabbing my toiletry bag out of the top of my suitcase.

“All right,” she says. “Goodnight.”

“Night.”

I take my time brushing my teeth and splashing water on my face, giving her time to get settled and myself the space to get my racing mind under control.

Seeing her in those tiny shorts and a tank top, combined with the memory of how soft she felt as I kissed her—I need to lock that shit down or I’m going to find myself jerking off on her living room floor while she sleeps.

I head back through the dark living room, thankful for the beam of light streaming through the crack in the curtains over the French doors leading to the small courtyard outside.

I make it back to my makeshift bed and drop my pants and shirt over the back of the couch, then grab the blanket Eva must have left for me.

I toss that over the lower half of my body as I situate myself on the cushions, and then realize I need another pillow to go under my head, so I reach over to the couch and grab a throw pillow.

I’m still uncomfortable as hell, but at least I can hear Eva breathing steadily in her bed on the other side of the loveseat.

I’m not sure how long I lie there, but it feels like at least half an hour, before my upper back starts hurting. So, I sit up enough to reposition myself on my side, and as I lie back down, that’s when I think I hear her whisper, “Luke.”

I consider not responding. Maybe she’ll think I’m comfortably asleep? But what if she’s whispering my name because something’s wrong?

“Luke,” she says, a little louder this time.

“Yeah?”

“Can you come here for a sec?”

“This better not be a ploy to switch places,” I say with a groan as I stand. There’s no world in which I’m letting her sleep on the floor while I’m comfortable on a bed .

“Promise,” she says as I walk around the chair and loveseat and head toward her bed.

“What’s up?”

I can barely make her out in the dark alcove where her bed sits, but I think she pushes up onto her elbow and pats the opposite side of the bed. “Lay down.”

“You want me...to sleep in your bed?” Why does my voice sound so damn high-pitched?

“I’m not going to be able to fall asleep if you’re uncomfortable on the floor. And you’re not going to switch places with me. So just lay the hell down so we can both get some sleep, okay?”

She sounds so annoyed that I chuckle.

“Fine,” I say. The bed dips as I kneel at the end and crawl up to lie down, facing her. “Happy?”

I can barely make out the small smile that curves her lips. “Less annoyed. Now go to sleep.”

The whole bed shakes with my laughter, and she lets out a little groan in response, but we both must fall asleep quickly because I have no memories after that.

T he ray of light shining through the window and directly into my eyes isn’t what wakes me up in the morning.

No, it’s the way Eva’s wrapped around me like a starfish.

I crack open one eye to find her lying on her side with one of her legs draped over mine, her arm across my torso, and her head resting in the crevice between my shoulder and chest, while my arm is wrapped around her back, my hand resting possessively on her hip .

Did I pull her to me in the middle of the night? Or did she roll onto me? Shit. This is why you don’t sleep in the same bed as your best friend.

She’s your wife now, a little voice in my head reminds me. It’s the same voice that would tell me jumping into a pool from the second story of a house when I’ve had six too many beers is a good idea. I know better than to follow his advice.

But at the same time, as I lie here, listening to the birds outside and the faint sounds of LA traffic in the distance, I can’t help but imagine what it would be like if we could wake up together every day.

I know Eva’s intention when we get back to Boston is to move into my guest bedroom—she has made that very clear—but I would love for things to work out differently.

With her, I wish lots of things were different, but this marriage based on friendship is still better in every way than being with anyone else.