AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Sophie winks. “Darn. I’ve been really into Ivy Nelson’s new series.” She points a hard finger at Emma. “Not yet. Those are definitely eighteen plus, missy. You know the rules.”
“Check in before reading, I know.” After rolling her eyes again, Emma complies, flattening her hands over her ears and humming quietly. Sometimes I worry for her eye muscles.
“We had coffee at my place.” I say it as quickly as I can, hoping they’ll be satisfied and let it go. As much as I want to be as cool and comfortable talking about this kind of shit as they are, I’m not.
Lauren snorts. “That’s it? That’s the big secret?” She waves at Emma to indicate she can take down her hands. “What did you and Julian do last night, then? If he spent the night, I assume you guys went out?”
Emma taps my shin under the table and mouths “lame” when I look up. “No. He came over early this morning, actually.”
Lauren groans. “Frankie! I thought this was going to be juicy. I’m so disappointed now. You’re the worst friend ever.”
Sophie reaches across the table to pat my hand. “Ignore her, Frankie. She’s just having a dry spell.”
“Lies! I had a very satisfactory time last night with a gentleman by the name of Chris.”
Before Sophie or I can say anything, Emma pipes up. “You named your vibrator Chris Hemsworth, Lauren.”
We’re still laughing when the server comes back to bring us our drinks and take our order. I reach across the table to give Emma a fist bump, then she fishes a piece of ice out of her water and hands it to Lauren, who promptly throws it back at her face.
If only Eleanor and Bianca were here. Megan, too, I suppose.
Thankfully, the conversation shifts to other topics, like the unfair dress code at Emma’s school, and I relax. I relax even more once the food arrives and I’m presented with a cheeseburger so beautiful I want to cry. The goat cheese on it oozes out the side, ribboned with streaks of spicy blueberry jam—there’s an extra ramekin of it for my fries—and the beer-brined pickles on the side already have my mouth watering.
It’s hard enough to remember that what Julian and I have is fake, especially after this morning, but being teased about it by the girls has me second-guessing everything I say and feel. But for now, this burger and I are about to have an intimate moment.
“Frankie, if you don’t stop moaning while you eat, I’m going to call Julian and tell him to pick you up and remind you what’s worth moaning about.” Lauren eyes me over the fish on the end of her fork. “It can’t be that good.”
“Not my fault you ordered boring salmon instead of this cheesy, meaty goodness.” I pop a jam-covered fry in my mouth, determined not to think about how Julian had me moaning this morning.
“If Julian is half as good a kisser as his son, you should—” Emma turns beet-red at the realization of what she confessed. “I mean. Uh. I saw you kissing Julian at the movies, remember? He looked like he knew what he was doing.” She shoves a bite of her own burger in her mouth, chewing furiously.
Sophie lowers her fork back to her plate, her linguini flopping off the side with the motion. “First off, we’re going to come back to that thing you said. Later. But how and when did you see Julian and Frankie together?”
Emma swallows before carefully placing her burger on the plate and wiping her fingers on her napkin. “When you and Teddy went out to that speakeasy, and Frankie and I went to the movie? Julian and Liam were there too.”
“What are you leaving out?”
Holy shit, Sophie is good at the quiet-but-scary-mom voice. I think she’s even scarier than my mom, and Mom orders around Air Force boys like they’re recalcitrant toddlers. I’m ready to spill the beans, but Emma kicks under the table again, brushing past my shin.
“Ow!”
“Fuck! I’m sorry, Lauren. I was trying to kick Frankie, not you.”
Sophie rubs a hand over her eyes. “Jesus Christ, child. I thought you were sixteen, not six. You’re lucky you were a really cute kid.”
“It wasn’t really on purpose, okay? I posted a snap that Frankie and I were going, and then a bunch of other people from school said they wanted to come, too, and it just happened to include Liam. And really”—she smirks at me—“It worked out for Frankie since she got to snuggle with Liam’s dad the whole movie. Probably better than snuggling with me.”
“Not really, since Julian is not a horror movie fan. Pretty sure he almost broke my hand, he was squeezing it so hard.” I laugh, but then clap my hand over my mouth. “Shit, he would kill me for telling you guys. Please don’t say anything.”
Lauren is too busy giggling and swirling her cocktail to tease me, but Sophie turns her mom eyes on me. Fuckity fuck, I’m in trouble now.
“So you and Julian just happened to meet up at the movies, but that doesn’t explain the kissing.”
Emma jumps in to answer, gracing all of us with the sight of her half-chewed food. “Oh, this super hot guy from your work showed up. What was his name? Daniel or Damon or something. Anyway, he was being all douchey and basically dared them to.”
Lauren stops laughing and turns to me. “Derek?”
“Unfortunately.” My french fry loses some of its orgasmic quality when I confirm.
