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Jack looked down at his ass jeans and groaned. Could he have been more obvious?
Following Ed’s lead, he climbed out of his Jeep.
Ed greeted him with a slow smile, eyes sweeping over him. He seemed to pause for an eternity on every change Jack had made.
Yeah, totally busted.
Finally Ed cleared his throat and spoke. “Hey, Jack.”
“Hey.” He reached out a hand, and Ed took it. His cool fingers wrapped tightly around his palm, shooting tingles up his arm. Jack’s breath hitched. “I’m really sorry for the screwup.”
“Seriously,” Ed said. Was that an extra squeeze of his hand? Or was Jack imagining it? “Don’t worry. My mom and I laughed about it.”
“Here, by the way.” Jack passed over Ed’s phone and took his back. He slipped it into his pocket as he leaned back against his spare. What should he say next?
Ed’s eyes darted to a spot just right of where Jack stood. Following the line of sight, Jack took in the HRC sticker on the back of his Jeep.
He tensed, waiting for the ball to drop.
Again, Ed cleared his throat. This time he followed it up with a hand through his hair. Shit, he was getting ready to hightail out of there.
Ed shifted his weight but stayed in place.
Jack stifled a nervous laugh and went for broke. “You want to get something to eat?”
Ed’s chest puffed out with a breath, and he let it out slowly, rubbing the back of his neck. “I’m not….”
Not gay! Jack missed the end of the sentence.
Fuck.
“I mean, I am a bit, but not totally starving, though.”
Heat seared Jack’s cheeks. He wanted nothing more than to blurt out an excuse and get back to the frat. Fast.
“I know a good place,” Ed suggested with another glance at the HRC sticker. “We could take my truck.”
Make up an excuse! End this now. “So long as you promise to bring me back.”
Ed raised an eyebrow. His lips parted as if to quip back, but he firmly shut his mouth and gestured to his truck.
“Um… hang on a second.” He turned on his phone. “Marcus asked me to text if we ended up doing more than exchange phones.”
Ed made a funny sound and cleared his throat. “Marcus sounds like… like he really cares.”
Jack paused. Ed was sending some massively mixed signals. Or Jack really was that bad at reading guys. Could Ed just be the real friendly local type? Just looking for another dude to hang with? “Marcus is a bit over the top at times, but great.”
He sent off a quick message to Marcus telling him not to wait up. He wasn’t sure, but when he looked up, Ed’s eyes were narrowed on Jack’s phone.
Huh.
* * *
The diner Ed knew was farther than Jack would’ve thought.
Ed tapped his thumbs on the wheel. “What year are you at Harrison?”
Ed peeked at him out the corner of his eye, and Jack shifted in his seat as his skin prickled. Friends. He just wants to be friends. He rubbed his clammy palms over his jeans.
“Junior. I’m almost twenty-one.” Jack’s phone vibrated.
“Is that Marcus?”
Jack tilted his head at the slight strain in Ed’s voice. “You heard that?”
Ed smirked, cheeks lifting, voice teasing. “I might have got used to that buzzing today.”
Jack pulled out his phone, turned it over, and laughed. “Yep, Marcus. Apparently I can have fun, but not too much fun. It’s a school night. Dork.”
Ed focused on the car ahead of him at the light. “Is Marcus… does he, like, often mother you?”
Mother you. Breathlessness seized his chest, tight and painful. Suddenly he was eleven again, on the football field. He’d just run a bootleg left for a thirty-yard touchdown. He’d looked up and his parents sat in the bleachers, waving their arms, his mother cheering him on.
They had always been there.
Even the first time he’d run away from home, they’d been a half a street behind him the whole time. Following. Making sure he was all right—
“Jack?” Ed’s voice brought him back to the present. The truck had come to a stop. “You disappeared there for a second. You all good?”
Jack blinked. Struggled to calm his breathing and focused on Ed’s soft, moving lips, then looked up into concerned eyes.
Pull it together. “Um, yeah. I’m good.”
He glanced out the window toward a diner. A flat roof and curved edges rimmed with green fluorescent light beckoned them over.
Jack’s seat belt clicked. The belt sliding over his chest brought him back to the moment. He looked over, and Ed smiled at him.
“Yeah, let’s go in then,” Ed said.
A burst from the chorus of “Rawhide” greeted them as they entered the diner.
“Rawhide?” Jack breathed in the comforting scent of grease and coffee.
“You know this song?”
“Yeah,” Jack said. “Who doesn’t?”
“Nice, wasn’t sure you’d like it here.” Ed made his way to the host. “Can we have the booth over there?”
