Page 12 of Necessary Space

I shrugged, thinking back on the accusation in Hendrix’s voice when he’d asked about my date. Maybe a little bit of jealousy in his words, but I hadn’t been certain so I decided to let him ruminate on his own feelings for a bit.

“I left him there to think about it.”

“You’re an asshole.”

Both our phones buzzed, a familiar triple pulse that indicated an alert from our doorbell camera. I swiped my screen awake and tapped into the app, warmth flooding my chest…and lower, when I recognized the broad frame of the man on my porch.

“Some people like that about me,” I said, pouring the rest of my wine into Gray’s mug. “Can you make yourself scarce?”

“Only because I love you.” He stood up, taking his phone and the wine down the hall and into his bedroom, leaving me alone to find out why Hendrix was on my porch at 10:15 on a Tuesday night.

CHAPTERFIVE

Hendrix

Foreplay.

If I’d made the mistake of thinking Miles was moderately arrogant, I’d severely misjudged him. He had enough arrogance for both of us and more.

Foreplay, he’d said, then brushed past me like it was nothing. After I’d gotten my breathing under control, I went back inside. It had taken a lot of work, but I didn’t think about why Miles made me lose my breath in the first place until I’d already said goodnight to Freddy and seen him on his way. I walked back to the office with Miles’s sparkling blue eyes in the forefront of my mind, and the whole drive home I’d done my best to ignore the fact I could feel my heartbeat in my neck.

The problem wasn’t any of those things on their own, though. It was all of them put together were far too close to the way I’d felt the first night I met Rome, and that wasn’t good for any of us. While Miles might have been what I wanted—or, rather, what my cock wanted—he wasn’t who I needed. I was old enough to know better.

And yet.

That was how I found myself on his porch, finger inches away from the doorbell, cursing his name.

“Go home,” I muttered to myself, pulling my fingers into a fist and tucking my hands behind my back.

Before I could talk myself into it—or out of it—the door swung open, revealing none other than Miles and all of that ego. Our houses were close to the same floor plan, and I had no idea how he fit all of it inside without suffocating himself.

“Hendrix.”

The sound of my name on Miles’s tongue caught me off guard, signals in my brain crashing into each other without warning. I’d expected him to patronize me. To call me buddy or something else to piss me off. I hadn’t planned on my name dripping off his tongue like honey.

“What?” I blinked, looking up from my feet and choking on my own spit.

A threadbare white undershirt stretched across his front, sinking into the dips of his muscles and pulling taut around the arms. He wasn’t a huge guy, definitely not broader than me, but the shirt fit him better than it had any right to. Black joggers wrapped his slender legs, sitting low enough on his hips to reveal a sliver of tanned skin between the waistband and the hem of his shirt. He was barefoot, a mug in his hand, finger looped casually through the handle.

“You’re the one on my porch, Hendrix. You tell me.”

I bit my cheek. “Can you stop using my name?”

Miles smirked, giving the mug a spin around his finger like it was a six-shooter.

“Thought you didn’t like when I called you buddy, though.”

“I don’t.”

“And you don’t like when I call you Hendrix either?” he asked.

That wasn’t the problem at all. In fact, quite the opposite in that I liked it very, very much.

“Can you just not?”

The raised corner of his smirk twitched, then fell into an amused-looking smile.

“What brings you to my side of the fence this evening?”