Chapter 4
CHAPTER FOUR
Evan
I told myself I wasn’t watching the clock.
I was working, reviewing a client’s brand positioning document that needed feedback by Friday. But my eyes kept drifting to the time in the corner of my MacBook screen.
Nico would be here in thirteen minutes.
My phone buzzed on the desk.
Nico
Running 5 min late. That okay?
Evan
No problem. See you soon.
He’d texted to let me know he was running late. Considerate. Respectful of my time. Ryan never would have bothered.
Stop comparing them.
I closed my laptop, grabbed two beers from the fridge, and straightened the throw pillows on the couch, even though they were already straight. I was nervous, which was ridiculous, but tonight felt different. Like we were crossing some invisible line from “random hookup” to something else.
I was still thinking about that when he called from the garage.
When I opened the door at his knock, Nico was standing there with that smile that did stupid things to my pulse. A dark blue Henley stretched across broad shoulders, jeans that made my mouth go dry.
“Hey,” he said.
“Hi.”
“I missed you,” he said, stepping inside.
“It’s only been three days,” I teased.
“I know.” His gaze dropped to my lips. “Still missed you.”
He kissed me slowly, hands framing my face, thumbs tracing my cheekbones. I let myself get lost in it.
We made it to the bedroom. Barely. Clothes shed in a trail across my organized living space, and what followed was different from the first two times—less urgent, more deliberate.
He took us both in hand and kept his eyes on my face the entire time, like he was more interested in what I looked like than in anything else.
That was the part that undid me. Not the friction of skin against skin, which was considerable, but the specific attention of someone who wanted to see exactly what he was doing to me.
After he cleaned me up, we lay facing each other, catching our breath, Nico tracing lazy patterns on my shoulder.
“I should probably feed you,” I said eventually. “I was planning to make stir-fry.”
“You cook?” He propped himself up on one elbow to look at me.
“Simple meals.” I sat up and reached for my clothes. “Give me thirty minutes?”
“I’ll help.”
The evening dissolved into something easy and domestic with stir-fry, a small dining table, surface conversation about our weeks that felt important anyway, and Nico asking for Friday and Monday before he left.
Five times in just over a week. Not casual.
Something else. I said yes before I’d fully decided to, and afterward I sat alone on my couch and tried to figure out what that meant.
Friday night, Nico showed up at my door with Thai takeout and that smile that made my knees weak.
“I thought we could skip the cooking,” he said, holding up the bag.
“Works for me.”
We ate on the couch, plates balanced on our knees, some baking show playing on TV that neither of us was really watching. Nico sat close enough that our thighs touched, and every point of contact felt electric.
“How was your week?” I asked.
“Good. Busy.” He stabbed a shrimp in his Pad Thai. “Had a couple of intense events. Wednesday’s was rough.”
Events. I filed that away. Another placeholder where a real answer should have been. Events of what? Training implied a gym, something physical. But he traveled for it, worked Saturday nights, kept hours that didn’t fit any kind of training schedule I could map. I didn’t push. But I stored it.
He set his takeout container on the coffee table and pulled me to him. The kiss was deep and slow, tasting tangy-sweet from the Pad Thai. When we broke apart, we were both breathing hard.
“Come here,” he said. Not a question.
He walked me backward through the bedroom door, peeling off my clothes as we went. By the time we reached the bed, I was naked and his mouth was on my neck.
“Let me take care of you tonight,” he murmured, catching my wrists gently when I reached for his shirt.
Something in his voice, commanding but warm, made my breath catch. I nodded.
He pushed me back onto the bed and stripped off his own clothes before joining me. Started kissing his way down my body with unhurried focus, like he had a destination in mind and intended to take his time getting there. When I tried to muffle a sound against my forearm, he lifted his head.
“Don’t hold back,” he said. “I want to hear everything.”
I let go of the breath I’d been holding. And the next sound he drew out of me, I let it come.
By the time he took me into his mouth, I was already trembling.
He worked me slowly, deliberately, and every time I made a sound, he paused just long enough to say something quiet and ruinous—“That’s it, you’re so perfect like this”—before continuing.
The praise did something to me I hadn’t expected.
Made heat pool low in my gut, made me want to be good for him, made me want to hear it again.
He seemed to notice. He always noticed. “You like that.” Not a question, but an observation, warm with satisfaction. “Hearing how good you are.”
“Yes,” I admitted, and stopped being embarrassed about it almost immediately, because the sound he made in response, low and pleased, was worth any vulnerability.
He took me apart slowly and completely, and when I finally came with a shout, it was with my hand fisted in his hair, and I couldn’t have said whether I was pulling him closer or just holding on.
Afterward, he kissed his way back up my body, then shifted to straddle my hips.
I watched him through heavy-lidded eyes—the lines of him in the low light, the unhurried confidence of his movements, the way he kept his gaze on my face even now.
He stroked himself slowly at first, then faster, and when he came his whole body went taut, a broken sound catching in his throat, heat landing across my chest in pulses.
He stilled. Then he leaned forward and rested his forehead against mine, both of us breathing hard, not speaking. Just foreheads touching, the space between us close and quiet.
After a moment, he reached for the tissue box on my nightstand, cleaned me up with careful hands, and dropped the tissues in the trash. Then he collapsed onto his side next to me and pulled me against his chest.
I laid my head on his shoulder and traced the lines of his tattoo.
“One life to live. One life to love,” I read out loud. “What made you get it?”
He was quiet for a moment. “I got it when I signed my first big contract… at work. It was a reminder that I’d worked my whole life for this, and I should make the most of it.”
“Are you?” I asked. “Making the most of it?”
He looked down at me, something soft in his expression. “I’m trying to. I’m getting better at it.”
I wanted to ask what he meant, but I could see he was done with it, so I let it go. Another deflection. I was getting good at cataloging them.
Before he could redirect, I asked, “What did you mean, your first big contract? What do you actually do?”
Something shifted in his expression. Not quite a flinch. More like a door being quietly closed. “It’s a team thing. Complicated to break down quickly.” He said it easily, like it was enough, like he expected me to accept it and move on.
I held his gaze for a moment. He didn’t look away, but he didn’t offer anything more either.
I knew that kind of silence. Ryan had used it differently—impatient, slightly contemptuous, like my questions were an inconvenience he hadn’t agreed to.
Nico’s version was warmer, almost apologetic, but the effect was the same: the answer I’d asked for hadn’t arrived, and pushing further would make me the problem.
So I didn’t push. “A team thing,” I repeated.
“Yeah.” His expression relaxed.
There was a version of this where I pushed.
Asked directly, wouldn’t let the subject change.
I knew how to do that. I also knew where it led.
With Ryan, answers had been the beginning of the end, with each one a new thing to weigh, to worry about, to watch for signs of.
Knowing too much had never protected me.
It had just given me more specific reasons to brace.
So I let Nico redirect and told myself it wasn’t avoidance.
It was patience. I didn’t entirely believe that, but I let it stand.
The silence sat between us for a moment, not uncomfortable but aware. Then Nico shifted, pulling me closer, and I felt him consciously change the register.
“Last night’s stir-fry was good,” he said. “Do you cook much, or was that a special occasion?”
“I cook most nights, actually. It’s easier than going out.”
He grinned. “Control freak.”
“Maybe.” I couldn’t help the smile twitching my lips. “You?”
“Takeout. Definitely.” He shifted to look at me. “I can make eggs and toast. That’s about where my skills end.”
“Your mom didn’t teach you?”
“Oh, she tried.” Nico laughed. “She has this rule—if you can’t feed yourself, you can’t take care of yourself. Taught Miguel and me the basics before we moved out.”
“And you forgot it all?”
“Pretty much immediately.” He didn’t look apologetic about it. “Miguel actually remembers, though. He cooks all the time. Makes these elaborate meals, tries new recipes. Sends me pictures and everything.”
“And you live on what? Protein shakes and takeout?”
“Don’t forget meal prep services.” He grinned. “Someone else cooks, I just heat it up. Best of both worlds.”
I shook my head, fighting a smile. “That’s terrible.”
“That’s efficient,” he corrected. “I work late, travel a lot. Cooking’s just not realistic.”
“You could relearn.”
“I could.” He met my eyes with that simple confidence. “Or I could keep coming here and letting you cook for me.”
The casual assumption that he’d keep coming back settled in my gut before I could examine it.
He said it the way someone states a plan they’ve already made.
Not a question. Not even an offer. Just a fact about how things were going to be, stated easily, like the arrangement had already been decided—including, apparently, what role I’d be playing in it.