Page 45 of The Friends and Rivals Collection

TEN POINTS

Axel

A week later

I down the last of my coffee then set the mug in the sink amidst an embarrassingly large pile of empty mugs.

But, whatever.

Who’s going to see them? I leave the kitchen, grab my messenger bag, and head for the door.

You dumbass . Hazel will see them .

Don’t want her thinking I live like a pig. Setting down my bag, I double back to the scene of the messy crime and wash the mugs, putting them in the dish rack to dry.

Then I head to the door again, surveying my pad one more time before I take off. Yup. It’s officially acceptable for a lady to see tonight.

Lady?

Fuck that.

She’s not simply a lady. She’s my woman. My girlfriend. My big love.

On that thought, I smile.

The goddamn grin doesn’t leave my face as I head down the hall of my building and step into the elevator. My buddy Bridger’s in the lift, sporting a ruby-red shirt, checking out his phone. He looks up when he must hear me. Then he arches one brow. “What’s wrong with your face?”

“What is wrong with my face?” I ask, lifting a hand, hunting for…coffee residue?

He points at me, his eyes narrowed. “Your mouth is doing something funny. I think…” He peers quizzically. “Is that a smile?”

Asshole. “Yes. They are common in the species of men when they fall ass-over-elbow in love.” Then I grin wider. “Like yours, dickhead.”

He laughs, but now he’s smiling too. He was the first of the two of us to fall, and he and his girlfriend, Harlow, are disgustingly happy together. “Fine, you got me there,” he says, then shoots me a wide-eyed look. “So, who did you hoodwink?”

The elevator slows at the lobby, and as we leave the building together I tell him. “The one and only Hazel Valentine.”

“No kidding? Harlow loves her books.”

“Harlow has good taste.”

“I love her books too. I’ve been trying to acquire them for my company,” he says. Bridger runs a TV production shop.

“Want me to put in a good word? I imagine you’ll need it. Everyone wants Hazel’s stories,” I say, feeling all the pride in the world.

“Sure, but the four of us should have dinner soon too. As friends. Go to a show.”

“I like musicals,” I say as we hit the street.

“You do?”

“I am a man of many mysteries,” I say.

“You are, Huxley. You are,” he says, then claps me on the shoulder. “You wear happiness well.”

“Thanks, man,” I say, then we head in opposite directions, and I make my way to Chelsea to a familiar haunt.

A coffee shop where I once paid rent. Hazel and I spent so much time at Big Cup that we left rent tips. A few twenties a week in the tip jar. Wi-Fi, caffeine, and a place to park your ass is all a writer needs, and I’m eager to pay it again, since I’ll be working with her.

When I near the familiar shop, my pulse kicks up.

I walk a little faster, and once I spot that mane of red hair, I feel both longing and peace.

That’s a welcome change—the peace part—from when I’d walk into the shop, twisted and torn over the unrequited feelings that had squatter’s rights in my chest.

Back then, the pain of wanting someone I couldn’t have, of loving someone in secret, ate me alive. Pushed to the emotional brink, I made terrible decisions I regretted.

I’d probably have let that regret eat me alive some more too if she hadn’t come back into my life on that trip and insisted—absolutely, relentlessly insisted—on uncovering what went wrong.

God, I fucking love her for never giving up on us, and on me.

I grab the handle of the door and head inside, marching straight over to my fiery redhead. She’s biting the corner of her lip, tapping away like a madwoman. She’s lost in words, and it’s a beautiful sight.

This is how I started to fall in love with her. Fierce and focused, she’s the breathing manifestation of creativity.

My heart rockets as I close the distance between us, grab the chair, and sit across from her.

Seconds later, she looks up, then blinks. “Oh, I was?—”

“Writing a scene where the hero answers the door wearing only a towel.”

She shoots me a don’t you wish you were right look. “As a matter of fact, no.”

“I don’t believe you.”

“Don’t make me prove you wrong.”

“Prove it,” I counter.

She spins her laptop around, and slides it toward me. I peer at the screen, reading the first line.

“Oh, no you don’t. Read that shit out loud,” she says, flapping her hand at the silver machine.

I stifle a laugh, then I clear my throat and read.

“After an ungodly long shower, where I stood under the scalding-hot stream for a few days—it feels that way at least—I step out and wrap a fluffy white towel around my breasts. As I cinch it closed, the doorbell rings. Seriously? Like I’m going to open the door now anyway.

But maybe it’s my friend Penelope, since she just returned to town. It’d be rude to leave her hanging.

“I pad quietly to the door as a droplet of water slides from my hair down my shoulder. I peer in the peephole, and my breath catches. It’s Noah, and he’s dragging a hand through his thick, dark hair.

He heaves a sigh, one of obvious frustration, perhaps from our fight outside the hospital last night.

Admittedly, it had been a long night. But I said things, and he said things.

“I don’t move, still unsure if I’m going to answer it when he mutters something under his breath, and it sounds like my name.

Like a c’mon Lacey . And it’s chased by a please.

That last word undoes me, and I swing open the door, curious but still annoyed.

Before I can even ask why he’s here, his eyes roam up and down my frame and he mutters, ‘ Wow .’”

I look up, then blow out a long stream of air. “You made the heroine answer the door in only a towel?”

She shrugs a playful shoulder. “I’m an equal opportunity towel-after-the-shower-scene writer.”

I lean closer, park my chin in my hand. “Please tell me they’re going to have hot hate sex next.”

She leans across the table, her lush mouth inches from mine. “You tell me. You’re up, Huxley.”

I crack my knuckles and get to work.

It feels good to be back here with her.

It feels even better to leave with her.

And it feels great when she spends the night. Well, first we play a game. I fuck her in the stairwell.

Then call out ten points.

But she called out my name.

So we both won.

I can’t believe my brother roped me into this. “Of all the escape rooms in New York, why did he have to pick a museum-themed one?” I ask Hazel as we leave the Christopher Street station, the chilly air slapping my face.

It’s a few months later and we’re nearly done with our book. But right now, it’s time for friends and family.

“You’re going to do great,” she says, grabbing my hand with her mittened paw.

“This is like, half my books. This is what Brooks does every day. He’s an expert,” I say, dreading it a little more with every step.

“Then you’ll do great. Since you write these escapes all the time.”

I shoot her a withering look. “I’d do great if I had all day to plan and research it.

Then to draft it, then beat myself up over how awful the first draft is, then throw the draft in the trash, drink ten coffees, chase them with whiskey, and finally find the answer in the shower the next morning,” I say as we turn onto the next block, heading toward Conundrum on Jane Street, home of the place where my brain is about to be put to a horribly public test.

“I solve plot problems in the shower too,” she says, all cheery and completely oblivious to my struggles. “Like this morning when the vineyard owner decided to buy a brand-new vineyard as a big gesture for his heroine. I came up with that under the hot water.”

“Show-off,” I mutter. “Also, is that your way of telling me to buy you a vineyard and name it Sweet Raccoon Vines? Because I do well, but I don’t do that well, sweetheart.”

She stops in front of a red-brick building, shaking her head, laughing. “No, and also, did you just see me not placating you about the escape room?”

“I saw it and felt it deep in my bones,” I say with a scowl.

“Remember what I told you in Barcelona? Just have fun,” she says, then presses a kiss to my lips. “And if you have fun, I’ll reward you.”

That lifts me from my escape room funk. “You mean if we’re the last to solve it, I can go down on you in the escape room? Twenty points. I’m so there,” I say, then I grab her hand and walk faster.