you doin’ here?” he asked with a big smile on his beaming face.
“I work here.”
Those light brown eyebrows went up, his pleased and surprised expression getting even brighter as his gaze strayed to the counter in front of me, lingering over the logo painted onto the front of it. He had to be reading the MAIO HOUSE spelled out across it. “You sure do work here, huh? I forgot all about the name ’til now.”
What was he still doing here in Houston? Had he had his workout in Miami already?
Before I could wonder over it too much, my old friend dipped his chin and extended his arms out at his sides in a universal gesture. “You don’t wanna be seen with me in public?”
Umm… not really?
But how mean would it be for me to not welcome a hug from him?
I thought about Gunner for a second. But… fuck it.
Heading around the counter, I walked right up to the man with the familiar face and wrapped my arms around his neck while he hugged me over my shoulders, all warm and freshly showered from the smell of him. He hugged me tight right back, basically shoving me into the expanse of a chest that felt as hard as I’d imagined it would.
He smelled pretty nice too.
But I still stepped away quickly and asked again, “What are you doing here?”
“We’re doin’ a video for a charity.” That gave me no news on what had happened with the Miami Sharks, and that was fine.
“Zac,” the older man who had walked in with him sighed in exasperation. I peeked at him in his tailored gray suit, white shirt, and light pink tie. He wasn’t even looking at Zac, but instead at the phone he was busy tapping away on.
Zac made a face at me that I couldn’t decipher before turning us both around to face the other men. He winked at me. “Bianca, this is Dwight and this is Kevin,” he said, referring to the two bigger guys. “And this is Trevor, my manager. You can call him Trev. Y’all, this is Bianca.” His attention came back to me at the same time as his hand landed on the top of my head in a way that reminded me of how he’d done it a ton while I’d been growing up. “We’ve known each other twenty somethin’ years.”
Twenty-four, but okay, no need to be technical.
I was pretty sure Deepa made a little gasp, but I didn’t look at her. I was going to have some explaining to do after this. I’d get there.
I held my hand out to the biggest guy because he was the only one smiling at me. “Nice to meet you.”
“How’s it goin’?” the man replied, taking my hand in one that was three times the size of my own. And that was saying something, because I wasn’t a huge person, but I had pretty big hands.
“Good, thank you.” I turned to the other guy and shook his too. It was big but not as large as the other one’s had been. “Hi.”
“Hey.”
Then I turned to the older man, Trevor, and held out my hand to him as well because I highly doubted he’d remember meeting me years ago.
He glanced down at my outstretched palm, and then so did I. Was there something wrong with it?
And that was when Zac reached over, grabbed his manager’s hand from where it had been hanging loosely at his side, and held it out toward me.
It took everything inside of my soul to keep a straight face when I slipped my hand into his mostly limp one, only held up because of Zac who was still supporting it and who moved it up and down jerkily as he shook mine back. I looked at him and could see how thin his mouth was… because he was trying to keep from laughing too. I’d seen him make the same expression a million times back in the day.
We shook some more, way longer than what was necessary or normal, until the other man finally gave my hand a gentle squeeze, and I tore mine away from his with a glance at a Zac with laughing eyes.
And he thought I was a pest.
I guess I’d been right about Trevor not being pleasant from the memories I had.
“Hi,” I told him, fighting for my damn life to not smile. “So nice to meet you.” Except not really.
“Do you need me to move your mouth too or…?” My friend trailed