Page 76 of Puck You Both

The back of him is naked too, so I follow him down the hall at a respectful distance. For about half a second, before I lose my conviction and walk so close I can feel his body heat. Or maybe it’s my body that’s heating up.

The kitchen is clearly Patrick's, everything lined up in neat rows like he uses a spirit level daily, but if I look closely, there’s evidence of Theo everywhere anyway. A game controller by the fruit bowl, a hoodie over a barstool. One sneaker lying abandoned under the table, its partner nowhere in sight.

Patrick takes the binder out of my hands. He looks at it, then looks at me. I brace for the comment, but he just sets it on the counter by the fruit bowl and says nothing.

I'll take mercy where I can get it.

He hands me a glass of water before I can ask for one and I drink half of it in one gulp. Patrick watches me do it, but lets that go too.

Idle time is my mortal enemy for the night, and as soon as a few wordless seconds come to pass, the surreality of the situation hits me. I know why I'm here, they know why I'm here, yet nobody's saying it, so it just hums under everything—under the onions, under the audible breaths. Meanwhile, a naked man is cooking inches away from an open flame, and I'm supposed to stand here and be normal about it?

"Gentlemen," Theo announces, bumping the oven closed with his hip. "Chef says forty-five minutes."

"Chef said twenty-five ten minutes ago," Patrick says.

Theo grins. "Chef is building suspense."

My mind drifts off to several indecent things that can happen in forty-five minutes and finish my water, while I watch them be. They move around each other without looking. A hand on a hip to pass behind, a spice jar handed over before it's asked for. Weeks of practiced choreography I wasn't here for, running all on its own. Then, there’s me, standing at the island, feeling enormous and extra.

Patrick asks how the drive was. I tell him how it was, without thinking, and I couldn’t repeat what I said if I tried.

Then the timer gets set, and Patrick takes the towel off his shoulder, folds it once, and puts it down, and jerks his chin toward the living room.

The three of us walk like a unit.

"Sit," Patrick says.

There's an armchair by the corner of the table. My pulse spikes as I give it a passing glance and take the couch instead. Behind me, Theo makes a small noise that tells me he noticed, and that I'll be hearing about it. He drops onto the far cushion, the mittens still on his hands, folds his legs under himself, and gives me the widest grin I’ve ever seen him produce.

Patrick sits on the edge of the coffee table across from me, elbows on his knees, and takes his time.

"Tonight is an exploration," he says. "That's the whole map. Nobody does anything that isn't asked for. Anything's a no until it's a yes."

None of those words are sexy on paper, yet all of them are working on me anyway. Halfway through, I figure out why. He's thought about this. About me. In advance, carefully.

Being planned for, it turns out, feels a whole lot like being wanted. And it feels fucking magnificent.

"And a stop is a stop," he says. "One word, no questions."

I nod and push my hands under my thighs so they don't do anything stupid.

Theo clears his throat theatrically and waits until both Patrick and I look at him. "Motion to note that he's been staring at your hands for ten minutes."

I have been. They're clasped between his knees, and they're a problem.

"Denied," Patrick says, then looks back at me.

"Excuse-moi? This court is corrupt!"

"We go slow," Patrick continues. "Nothing has to happen at all tonight. We can eat frittata and watch—"

I’m on my feet so fast my vision goes momentarily black. "I've watched enough movies."

Theo presses one mitt to his mouth. Patrick holds my eyes for a moment, and something behind all that calm catches fire and stays lit.

He stands, crosses to me, stops just inside my personal space, and gives me a full second to watch it coming. That's him all over, no ambush, no rush. He shows me exactly what he’s going to do before he does it.

His hand comes up to my jaw, and we engage in a wordless exchange, his left brow arching, me giving him a tiny nod, words obsolete.