the bed.”
“If Emmitt ‘Big O’ Bradley was my roommate, I’d make it a rule that every argument happened in bed,” Beckett said.
Annie shushed her and looked around the break room. Thankfully, it was busy on the floor, so the break room was almost empty. “I don’t want any rumors to start, and Emmitt seems to be patient zero for half the town’s gossip.”
“Also for half the town’s orgasms,” Lynn said sweetly, while Beckett made a lewd gesture.
“Can you not?” Annie stuck her spoon in the applesauce and pushed it away, no longer hungry.
Beckett picked it up, sniffed it, and made a face as if she’d just sucked on a lemon. “Since when do you eat all healthy?”
Annie knew she’d met a kindred soul in Beckett when her friend had announced that a chocolate bar and a jar of peanut butter was a balanced meal.
“Since Emmitt stole my leftovers.”
“He stole your pizza and you didn’t kill him?” Her friends exchanged meaningful glances.
“He also picked off the olives.”
“You sure he’s just a roommate?” This from Lynn, who was setting out a lunch that looked Gordon Ramsay approved. Knowing Lynn, though, she’d likely made it as she dashed out the door. Lynn was awesome that way.
“Yes. Trust me, even that is too much of him.” She tossed her applesauce in the trash. “I can’t believe I’m asking this, but any new deaths this week?”
Lynn sliced her panini à la perfection in half and handed it to Annie—on a cute napkin of course. “Is he really that bad?”
“He’s really that charming,” she said around bits of bacon and avocado. “It was easier when I hated him. Only, the more I learn about him, the more I’m starting to like him.”
“It’s the lure of the unattainable lover syndrome,” Beckett said. “It drives guys like Emmitt nuts.”
“What do you mean?” Annie asked, because it was better than focusing on the way her belly dipped when she thought about being his lover.
“Guys like Emmitt never have to work hard for things, so when they meet a challenge like, say... a woman who expresses her lack of interest, they become invested in proving you wrong.”
“He wants what he can’t have,” Lynn agreed.
Beckett sat back in her chair and propped her feet up on the empty seat between them. “You want to go back to thinking he’s a tool? Go along with the flirting and pretend you’re really into him. He’ll disappear. Trust me, that’s his MO.”
“Are you saying sleep with him?” she asked, annoyed at the way her belly fluttered.
“Flirt, kiss, sleep.” Beckett shrugged. “What’s the worst that can happen?”
“I sleep with my roommate!”
“Who never stays in town for very long,” Beckett pointed out. “If he doesn’t follow his usual MO, then it’s no biggie because your contract is up in a few months. And while I’d love for you to stay here forever and ever”—Beckett took her hand—“you have the world to see. Remember?”
She remembered. “What happened to ‘Guys aren’t worth the heartache? Man-Free Living’?”
“Who said anything about involving your heart? Man-Free Living doesn’t mean orgasm-free, or I would have turned in my chip last night. It’s about living your life on your terms,” Beckett said, and it was as if she were speaking Swahili. Everything Annie did, she did wholeheartedly. Halfway wasn’t in her genetic makeup.
Annie had learned firsthand that halfway led to regrets, and regrets wound up hurting the people you loved. Then again, maybe that was her problem. “You mean a fling?”
“He’s been called the Male Wonder of the World. Supposedly one night with him and it’s like you’ve been reborn. I’ve even heard his dic—”
“Beckett!” Annie stopped her friend before she did the whole I once caught a fish this big routine.
“What? See if it’s legend or legit. Either way, you have one hell of an awesome rebound sex story, and you close the door on Clark forever.”
“He’s marrying someone else. That pretty much closed, locked, and deadbolted the door.”
“But this would be on your terms,” Lynn said, and Annie’s belly fluttered for a whole different reason.
Everything in Annie’s life had always been on someone else’s terms. From birth, all the way up until Clark, she’d never acted out or taken a risk for fear of disappointing someone.
“I’ve never had a fling,” she admitted. “I’ve never had a one-night stand.”
Even saying it made her feel as if she’d engineered her entire existence around exceeding external expectations. And maybe she had. Annie was so desperate to fit in, her life had been short on