“Zeno.”
“Zeno?” he asked, brows pinching. “I guess he always was on his computer when we were coming up.”
“Is it disorienting not to know everyone anymore?” I asked.
“Sometimes, I think, to an extent, the guys who have settled down and started families aren’t as hard to wrap my head around. We’re all in a sort of similar space. It’s the guys who are still single and the new faces that trip me up still. So, what do you know about Zeno?”
“I’ve actually only met him once, when Ezzy and I passed him on the street. He was wearing pajama pants with sharks on them, a flannel, and unicorn slippers. He looked like he hadn’t slept in a week and had a tray of coffee that was all for him.”
“He was always a little… absentminded.”
“From what Ezzy says, it sounds like he might have some executive dysfunction. Apparently, he gets so wrapped up in work that his apartment becomes a biohazard zone. Leo complains about it all the time.”
“What about Gavino?”
“Gav might be the one Costa I know the least about. He’s such a shut-in. I’m not sure how he even gets money because he never seems to be working jobs with anyone else. But I don’t think he has, like, agoraphobia or anything. He just… hates everyone.
“I’ve only seen him twice, and once he was telling Leo that he’d rather roll himself in honey and waltz into the bear pit at the zoo than come with him to dinner at Lorenzo’s place.
“I know his family is worried that he’s never going to find someone in his apartment.”
“Eh, you never know. Maybe she’ll be the cop who comes to do a wellness check on him,” Christopher said with a smile. “How are you feeling?”
“I’m alright. I think it’s swelling up now. That seems to be when it starts hurting again.”
“You should go put it up. Remember what Sal said about doing too much too soon.”
“Ugh. Don’t remind me,” I said, wrapping up the rest of my sub. “I don’t want to be in this stupid thing any longer than I have to be.”
“Mind if I head out for a bit?”
More than I had any right to.
“No. You’re not my babysitter.”
“I just want to get a quick workout in. Don’t get a lot of chances these days.”
It was a public service to let this man work on his body.
“I’ll be here. Icing and elevating like I’m an old lady,” I told him as I hobbled over to the bedroom to curl up with one of the books Charlotte had picked out for me.
I heard Christopher head out, then come back about an hour later, going right into the bathroom. The shower turned on, and I lay there, trying not to think about him in there, water cascading down all those grooves in his muscles I’d thought about tracing.
There was no use, though.
I tossed my book to the side and sighed as desire sparked and caught, spreading through me at an impressive speed.
I was so distracted by it that I didn’t even notice the water had cut off. Or that Christopher had emerged from the bathroom.
Until he was in the doorway.
In nothing but a towel.
Beads of water dripping down from his hair and disappearing into the waistband of his pants.
“My clothes are still in here,” he said, his tone apologetic.
Right.
