Chapter 12
CHAPTER TWELVE
EMILY
Finn hadn’t moved. But the mask he’d been wearing for Elliott with the easy grin, the nods, the yeah, man, when I’m cleared confidence—all of that was gone.
“Finn.”
He didn’t look up.
“How bad is it, really?” I asked.
He didn’t move.
“I don’t know. I knew when I started playing that there would be an end. But I thought it was a ways off. Now I’m staring at the possibility and I don’t know what to do.”
I didn’t have a closing argument for this one.
“I just need to sit with it and let it be terrible, so I can get on with my life.”
“Can I sit with you while it’s terrible?”
“Do I have a choice?”
“Not really.”
“Good, because I’d say yes, anyway.” He paused, then said, “Em.”
“Uh-huh?” I asked.
“I don’t want to disappoint you.”
“You’re not going to disappoint me.”
“You don’t know that.”
“Yeah, I do. I’ve known you since you were the kid who ate an entire sleeve of Oreos before Elliott’s seventh grade birthday party and threw up behind the bounce house. The bar for disappointing me was set pretty low, and you still cleared it.”
That got a flicker. Not a smile. But close enough that I’d take it.
He turned to the window, his back to me. “Em, I’m not exactly operating at full capacity here. In any department.”
“Finn… be real right now. You are a good guy.”
“But I don’t know that I can…” He tilted his head and—
“Oh.”
“Yeah.”
“You don’t know if everything…” I cleared my throat. “…is in working order down there?”
He turned to me and pursed his lips. “I’m cleared to try. But up until now it hurt too bad to even think about… you know.”
“You’ve had a…” I cleared my throat again. “…handle on things, though? Right?”
“You mean, have I used my hand?” he asked.
“Yeah. I mean, are you worried there’s an issue of getting your big guy to stand up tall, or is it more of a concern that once you slip the popsicle in, it’ll melt before you give all the goods?”
He stared totally blank at me. “We’re not having this conversation.”
“Finn, I’m your friend. I want to help. What are you really worried about?”
He breathed deep. “I’m worried that the customers won’t get what they pay for.”
“Oh my God, they pay you?” I asked with mock outrage.
That got a lip twitch. “You know what I mean, Em.”
“But do I? Do I really?”
He grimaced. “I don’t know if the flag can fly on the flagpole. I don’t know if I can make it rain. The doc says I’m fine, but I’m…”
He was scared.
And there it was. The thing under all the other things.
Twenty minutes ago, he’d been nodding along to Elliott’s game plan like a man with a future, and now he was standing at a window admitting he was terrified his body had quit on him in a way that had nothing to do with football and everything to do with being a man.
And then a thought surfaced. And I was already building the case before I’d decided to take it.
I crossed the room and stopped right behind him. “Finn.”
He didn’t turn around.
“Look at me.”
Slowly, he did. The exhaustion in his eyes hadn’t been there when he was riffing on kickers.
Here we go. Leaping off a cliff with a very questionable plan.
“Let’s test it,” I said, keeping my voice calm.
His brow furrowed. “Test it?”
“Test things together to make sure you’re performance ready,” I said, keeping my focus on him alone. “As a clinical trial. A controlled experiment. I mean, lots of friends have benefits, and we obviously have chemistry. I’m not going to judge you. We might as well give it a try.”
His eyes went wide. “Em, are you serious right now?”
“I’m talking about taking the fear out of it,” I said, the words tumbling out, forming a safety net of logic around a completely illogical proposal.
“Removing all the pressure. All the expectation.” I took another step closer.
“You trust me. I trust you. No judgment. And I am definitely not paying you, so you don’t need to worry about that factoring into the performance. ”
He stared at me.
I stared right back.
I braced for him to tell me I was insane.
Instead, he licked at his bottom lip.
“A clinical trial,” he repeated.
“Exactly.” Lawyer brain, fully online. “We establish parameters. We set goals. We gather data.” I gestured between us. “The goal is to prove the hypothesis that you are, in fact, fully functional and any issues are purely a psychological impediment, not a physiological one.”
Oh God, I sound like I’m drafting a contract.
He scrubbed a hand over his jaw, and when he looked at me again, a little of the old Finn was in there. Buried, but breathing. “Gather data?”
“Data,” I confirmed. “We need rules of engagement. A framework.” I crossed to his kitchen and he followed.
I got us both a glass of water and then turned so my palms were on the polished granite countertop. It felt like a witness stand. “Let’s start with the basics. What’s on the table?”
He followed me, leaning his hips against the opposite counter. “On the table?”
“And off,” I said. “Hard boundaries. Absolute nos.”
“No weird feelings.” His words came out rough.
“Agreed. This is a scientific endeavor. That’s Rule Number One. We’re just two friends and I’m a friend helping you with your research.”
“Agreed. No feelings. It’s strictly… procedural.”
“For the procedure… is kissing on the table?” I asked.
“Kissing is on the table,” he confirmed.
My throat went dry. “Is… all the way on the table?”
“Yeah, Em. It is.” He paused. “For you, too?”
I didn’t flinch, even though my insides were doing things that would’ve been embarrassing on a polygraph. “Definitely.”
“What about… if I’m not good at it anymore?” he asked, his voice dropping. “What if I suck at it?”
“Then the data will reflect that we need more trials,” I said softly. “No judgment, remember? We just… try something else.” I leaned forward, my hands gripping the edge of the counter. “Any hard nos?”
I expected a joke. Instead, he said, “I don’t want you to pretend. If you don’t like something, you say it. Instantly. Yeah?”
“Okay,” I whispered. “I can do that.”
What if I like all of it? What if I like it too much?
Dangerous question. Filing that one under problems for future Emily. “My hard no is that there’s no stopping midway through a data-gathering session to discuss football stats.”
That got a real laugh. Rusty. Broken. But real.
“Deal,” he said. “So the checklist is… kissing, all the way, no faking it, and no sports commentary.”
“A solid preliminary framework.” I was using my closing-argument voice on a proposition to sleep with my best friend. My law school professors would be so proud. “I think we’re ready to proceed to the experimental phase.”
He pushed off the counter and the distance between us went from comfortable to not. “The lab is open, then?”
I nodded. Because for one of the few times in my life, I couldn’t find any words.
He moved slowly, giving me every chance to back out.
I didn’t. I stood my ground.
He lifted a hand and brushed a strand of hair from my face. His fingertips were rough—calloused from grip tape and years of catching things that were thrown at him. The drag of them against my cheek had me shivering.
I rose onto my toes and closed the last inch of space between our lips myself.
The first touch of his lips was careful. A question.
I answered by pressing back, my hand sliding up to the side of his neck, my fingers curling into the short hair at his nape.
He groaned, low and rough, and the careful part ended.
His hands found my waist and pulled me flush against him. His fingers dug into the curve above my hip, and I could feel every single unfair inch of the man through his T-shirt.
Finn Taylor’s hands were on my body and I’d wasted years pretending I didn’t want them there.
I opened my mouth and he took the invitation. His tongue slid against mine and I made a sound I would deny later.
My hands went from his neck to his chest, bunching the cotton of his shirt, pulling him closer, and his grip on my waist tightened until his thumbs pressed into the bare skin just above my waistband.
He walked me backward until the edge of the counter hit my lower back. His hands slid down over my hips, fingers spreading, and when they curved around to the back pockets of my jeans and squeezed, I arched into him on pure instinct and zero thought.
“Data point,” I managed against his mouth.
“Shut up,” he said, and kissed me harder.
I shut up. I also slid my hands under the hem of his shirt because I’d been staring at the strip of skin above his waistband for weeks and I was done lying to myself about it.
His stomach tensed under my fingers—warm, ridged, very much alive—and the sound he made when my nails scraped across his abs was something I planned to replay on a loop until I was dead or he got a restraining order.
His mouth moved from my lips to my jaw, then down the side of my neck, and my head fell back against the cabinet. His teeth grazed the spot just below my ear and I stopped forming thoughts with vowels in them.
My hands were halfway up his back, his shirt rucked up to his ribs, and his thigh had ended up between my legs. I was approximately four seconds from making a decision that could not be framed as “clinical” under any interpretation of the word when he—
Stopped.
“It works,” he said, and his voice was low enough that I felt it more than heard it.
Then he pressed his hips against mine and, oh… okay.
“Yes, it does.” I blinked. Hard.
He smiled.
“Stage one is a success,” I said, cupping him carefully with my palm.
He pressed his forehead against mine. Both of us breathing like we’d run stairs.
Oh.
Oh, Finn.
There was the ghost smile again. “I just need a minute. It’s…uh…I…don’t want to screw this up and it’s uh… I just…”
“Then take a minute,” I said, kissing him, lightly. “The framework’s not going anywhere. The lab’s still going to be open.”
He let out a slow breath and his ghost smile went a little more solid.
I grabbed my water glass and pretended my hands were steady. He moved to the other side of the kitchen island and did the same.
We stood there, sipping water in total silence like two people who had not, thirty seconds ago, confirmed a major medical finding with our hands all over each other.
Friends. Doing research.
Sure.