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Absolutely it.
Chapter Six
Luke
Kent: What’s the room # we’re meeting at tomorrow?
Luke: Seriously?
Kent: Yeah, I can’t find the email.
Luke: 27th floor, room 42. 9 am.
Kent: Thanks! Knew you’d know it. You’re always so organized.
That was him, always with the information handy.
Luke set the phone on the table and closed his laptop. No wonder Kent thought he was boring.
He should have ignored Kent’s message. Or at least made him sweat an hour.
He stretched his neck, sore from sleeping so stiffly.
“Seriously, E? It’s Sunday!” Nico’s voice carried into the kitchen from the bedroom. “Fine. Send it, and I’ll look at it. Later. Luke and I are going shopping today.”
Luke gulped the fresh batch of coffee he’d brewed. Nico had suggested they go to the Italian market, but should he? His stomach was a knotted mess. Tomorrow, the rest of his life began.
Only 10 percent of interns got offers, according to the career development office at Harrison, and Luke was determined to be one of them.
“Why would I have talked to the asshole? He dumped me.” Nico’s voice grew distant. The bathroom door snicked shut, muffling the rest of his words.
The easy way Nico bantered with his sister had Luke yearning for the same, for home. Maybe he could squeeze in a trip home before school started? Finances permitting.
“Okay. I’ll call tonight if I have any questions,” Nico said as he emerged into the kitchen a few moments later. His fiery, bemused gaze hit Luke’s with warmth and frustration. “Ugh. My sister is crazy.”
“I heard.” Luke suppressed a smile. “What’s wrong?”
Nico tugged the rim of his light blue polo shirt that sat upon brown khakis. The sleeves stretched around his biceps, showing off considerable definition. But that wasn’t what sparked Luke’s curiosity.
This made two days in a row Nico had worn obviously newly bought clothes. New, yet plainer than he’d first seen on the guy. Something about it didn’t sit right with Luke—maybe the way the clothes didn’t sit right on Nico.
Not that he looked bad—that would make summer easier—no, the clothes looked comfortable. Just that Nico looked uncomfortable in them.
Nico stopped fiddling with his shirt and poured coffee into a mug. “Wrong? Nothing and everything. She’s at home. Elliott’s here in Philly studying for the bar exam, and she has nothing else to do except nitpick about wedding details.”
The chair skidded as Luke got up with his empty cup. “It is her wedding, and she did hire you to be the planner.”
Nico snorted. “If I were a real wedding planner, there’s no way she’d call me on a Sunday. She’s taking full advantage of the fact I love her to death.”
Luke raised an eyebrow. “Could’ve fooled me.”
“Pfft. That’s just how we talk.” Nico took a long sip and eyed Luke. “I poked my head in and you were scowling at your phone. Everything alright?”
Luke grimaced. “Fine. Kent lost the orientation email with tomorrow’s details.”
“I hope you gave him the wrong room and told him to report two hours late.”
He should have, but that wasn’t him. “Nope?”
Nico gaped at him. “You gave him the details?”
“Seemed the right thing to do.” At the time. Now he wished he hadn’t jumped to help Kent like that. Luke stared hard at the coffee swishing in his mug.
Nico leaned against the counter next to him and bumped Luke’s shoulder. “Hey, you were the bigger person. Something I might need to work on.”
Luke peeked at him out the corner of his eye. “Oh?”
“I might have written ‘fucker’ on my ex’s pillow before I left campus.”
“Might?” Luke lifted his mug, his arm brushing Nico’s again. “You don’t know?”
Nico downed the last of his coffee and lurched toward the sink. “I think I’ve said enough.”
A laugh shot from deep inside. “You can’t refuse to answer. A roommate needs to know.”
“I have a constitutional right to remain silent and I’m exercising that right. And”—he pointed to Luke—“you’re not allowed to draw any adverse inference from my silence.”
Luke stared at Nico in disbelief and snorted. “Professor Meadows, constitutional law?”
“Last semester. You?”
“Last spring.” Luke rolled his eyes. “Man, he was so . . .”
“Boring?”
“Yeah.” Just like me. He dropped his mug into the sink next to Nico’s and washed them both. “So I hear we’re shopping?”
Nico whistled playfully, avoiding eye contact.
Luke chuckled, and Nico folded, sagging against the counter beside him. “It’s easier to get off the phone when someone’s waiting on you.”
“True.” Luke dried their mugs and opened the cupboard above Nico. Startled breath fizzled over his neck, and Luke froze at their proximity. Their eyes clashed, and Luke tried not to read into the way Nico looked at him, that cautious spark in his eye. Heat from Nico blazed into him, frying his nerve endings, and Luke dropped the mugs onto the shelf and jerked back. “So. Where are we going?”
Nico raced a hand through his hair. “We?”
