Page 83 of The Wild Card

Sadie and Foster are up front, arguing about something—I’m not even sure what, their voices just background noise to the roaring in my ears. Crew and I are in the back seat, not touching.

Well. Almost not touching.

His hand rests on the seat between us. Mine rests next to it. Our pinkies are barely brushing—the smallest point of contact—and somehow it’s the most erotic thing I’ve ever experienced.

I keep replaying the kiss. The way he’d looked at me after, like I’d cracked something open in him he didn’t know how to close.

What happens when we get home?

Do we talk about it? Do we pretend it didn’t happen? Do we…

His pinky hooks around mine. Just barely. A question.

I hook back. An answer.

I feel him exhale beside me.

The city slides past the windows—neon signs and headlights blurring together—and all I can think about is the apartment waiting for us. The door closing behind us. The privacy of walls and no audience and a conversation we’ve been avoiding for weeks.

“You’re quiet,” Sadie says, twisting around in her seat. “Both of you. You okay?”

“Just tired,” I manage.

“Mm-hmm.” She doesn’t sound convinced. “Foster, don’t they seem quiet to you?”

“Leave them alone, Sadie.”

“I’m just saying—”

“And I’m just saying maybe don’t interrogate them in a moving vehicle.”

Crew’s thumb traces a slow circle on the back of my hand. My whole body feels like a live wire.

Ten more minutes. Ten more minutes and we’ll be home, and I’ll have to figure out what to say, how to act, whether this was a one-time slip or the beginning of something neither of us planned for.

Ten more minutes and everything changes.

Or nothing does.

I honestly don’t know which scares me more.

* * *

The elevator ride up to the tenth floor takes approximately seven hundred years.

Foster and Sadie said their goodbyes in the lobby—Foster with a knowing look at Crew, Sadie with a crushing hug and a whispered “call me tomorrow with details”—and now it’s just the two of us. Standing on opposite sides of the elevator. Not looking at each other.

The tension is so thick I could cut it with a knife and serve it with the leftover guacamole.

The doors slide open. Crew steps out first, keys already in hand. I follow him down the hall, watching the set of his shoulders, trying to read his body language.

He unlocks the door. Holds it open for me.

I step inside.

Murphy meows from the couch, annoyed at being left alone, but neither of us moves toward him.

The door clicks shut behind us.