Page 30 of Cheap Shot

You up for something tonight?Luke sent a little later when he slid into his car.

It didn’t take long for him to get a response from Sebastian.Maybe. When?

When do you get back to your place?

Like half an hour. Train’s kinda slow today.

Ugh, fuck. There are going to be a lot more people walking around tonight.They’d had an afternoon game, so it was still early evening.

So wait until foot traffic dies down.

The guys are bugging me to go out with them.

Sounds like a YOU problem,he got back.

Luke chuckled, though he replied with,Don’t pretend like you don’t like this too.

I do, I’m just fucking tired of your paranoia. Walking into a flower shop won’t destroy your masculinity.

I’m not worried about my goddamn masculinity. I’m worried about my private life getting splashed all over the fucking internet,he shot back.

FFS. You make everything way more difficult than it needs to be. Just use the back entrance to my building.

There’s a back entrance?

It’s called fire codes, asshole. Yes, there’s a back entrance you can reach through the alley in back. I’ll leave the back door unlocked and you can walk in.

Why the fuck didn’t you tell me that before now?

Because some guys get freaked out that it’s a setup.

I can fucking handle myself against anyone.

Luke got two eyeroll emojis in response.Okay, Rambo.See you in forty?

I thought it was thirty?

It’s forty now, dickbag.

Luke was still simmering with annoyance as he approached Sebastian’s shop in his car thirty-five minutes later. There was a light on inside the building as he cruised up, and a moment later, a woman stepped out, carrying something wrapped in paper.

Goddamn it, the shop wasopen.

Fuck you, Sebastian, he thought as he kept driving.

It would serve him right if Luke just kept driving. If he headed to O’Neill’s Pub and just never showed. But a small, grudging part of LukeknewSebastian had done it for a good reason. He’d ensured that Luke would be annoyed and frustrated. He’d deliberately goaded him into ensuring Luke didn’t hold back tonight.

Fucking asshole,Luke thought, even though a little sliver of him grudgingly admitted it would make tonight’s hookup as hot as the last.

He warred with himself for a moment as he waited to make a left turn.

But the thought of Sebastian’s throat constricting around his cock was too compelling of an argument and, after he turned, he found a parking spot on the street, glanced around, then ducked into the alley that ran behind the flower shop.

Luke glanced around again before he pulled open the door, and his gut was tight with anxiety as he stepped through it. He could hear noises from the front of the shop, and he jerked in surprise when he saw a woman standing in a room just off the hall, a mess of flowers spread out on a table in front of her.

But she didn’t turn her head and a moment later, when she did a little shimmy, Luke realized she probably had earbuds in and was dancing to the music playing on her phone. Heart in his throat, Luke quietly opened the door leading to the stairs to Sebastian’s apartment and ducked through it.

He wasn’t exactly light on his feet as he squeezed his way up the narrow stairwell, and he winced when the wooden treads creaked beneath his feet. Someone really needed to tighten some screws around here.