Page 89 of Offside Angle

“You should see your fucking face.”

“My face is appropriate!” he protests, although he’s laughing now too. “I’m processing!”

“Poorly.”

“Extremely poorly.”

By the time we finally calm down, my stomach hurts and Cole has tears in his eyes again for a completely different reason.

He takes another drink, still shaking his head, then glances at me with a little more seriousness.

“But are you okay with that?”

I raise an eyebrow.

“With him being a top,” he clarifies.

The laughter fades, although the warmth from it stays.

I look back out over the city.

“It’s weird,” I admit. “Not bad. Just… weird.”

Cole stays quiet, giving me room to find the words.

“I’m not used to being on that side of anything. I was raised with this whole idea that I’m supposed to be the man. I chase. I take care of her. I make her feel wanted. I’m the one who knows what I’m doing.” I shake my head. “With Santi, sometimes he just takes over, and apparently some part of me really fucking likes that.”

I let out a breath and stare down at the bottle in my hands. “I’m still trying to wrap my head around what that means.”

Cole waits, surprisingly patient for a man who has spent most of the evening yelling at me.

“This morning he cleaned my feet because I ran barefoot through the hotel, then put socks on me and dressed me.”

Cole turns his head slowly. “He did what?”

“Yeah. I showed up without shoes.”

“That does not explain why Vega was dressing you.”

“It made sense at the time.”

“It really fucking doesn’t.”

I take another drink, already smiling because there’s no version of the rest of this story that’s going to improve his opinion of my judgment.

“I’d gone there after kissing Shane.”

Cole is reaching for the bottle when the words register. His hand stops halfway between us.

“What?”

“I kissed Shane.”

For a second, he just stares at me. Then his entire face rearranges itself into such spectacular horror that I start laughing before he even gets the words out.

“YOU WHAT?”

His voice cracks loudly enough that I’m pretty sure somebody three floors down just heard him.