My Favorite Hal-Night Stand - Christina Lauren Page 0,14

leans back in his chair, eyes on the ceiling while he thinks. “Let’s see . . . ‘Ghosting’ is when someone you’re chatting with online just disappears. No reason or anything, just goes ghost. As opposed to a ‘slow fade,’ where they start to respond less and less over time.”

Chris is diligently jotting all this down.

“ ‘Benching’ is pretty self-explanatory,” Ed says. “They like you but keep you on the bench so they can continue playing the field. ‘DTR’ means to define the relationship, so ‘The Talk.’ ‘F2F’ means they want to meet. Oh, and if you do meet, a ‘half-night stand’ is when you hook up, and leave when the sex is over.”

Something inside me comes to a stop, and I work very, very hard to not look up at Reid. When I glance up, his eyes immediately dart away from my face.

None of us says anything. Chris is finishing his note taking. Reid and I are studiously not looking at each other. Ed is leaning in, excited now.

“Seriously, you guys want to do this?” he asks. “Like, Team Dating App?”

“Um,” I say. “No? But . . . maybe.” I glance at Reid. “If we must.”

“Okay. Well, if you’re all down, Tinder is pretty awesome,” Ed says.

Tinder? When would he have time? Ed is either in the lab or playing one of the half-dozen arcade games he owns. I try to imagine a scenario in which someone is expecting a hot hookup, and they open the door to find Ed standing there instead. Like I said, Ed is good-looking in his own way, he’s just . . . so Ed.

I guess he’s getting more action than I thought. The reality of this slaps me into awareness. Ed has game because he expects to.

“You use Tinder?” I ask.

Reaching across the table, he pulls a discarded tomato from my salad and pops it into his mouth. “Sometimes.”

“And?” I am suddenly dying to get the rundown on Ed’s Tinder booty calls.

“No,” Chris interjects, “No Tinders or Grindrs or any other hookup apps. We need dates, not sex.”

I don’t miss the way Reid’s eyes flicker my way.

Ed pulls out his phone, swiping through his apps before turning the screen to face us. “We use it to find matches. We meet them, hook up, have fun—whatever, and then we ask if they want to go to the banquet.”

“I love that the sex comes before the date,” Reid says dryly.

Ed nods sagely. “Sex is just the bonus.”

Chris’s chin comes to an amused landing in his cupped hand. “Boy, in what universe is sex with you a bonus?”

“I have an IQ of one hundred and forty-eight,” Ed says. “I’ll let you connect the dots.”

“Actually, being smart means you’re probably having less sex,” Reid tells him. “A 2007 study showed intelligence is negatively associated with sex frequency. In fact, only sixty-five percent of MIT graduates have even had sex.”

“Pull up the plane, Reid,” I say.

He laughs. “Okay, I guess what I’m saying is maybe Chris and Ed are right. Chris’s sister is happy. I know a few people who’ve met their significant other online. Hell, I know lots of people who’ve met some of their best friends online. Maybe a dating site isn’t the worst idea.”

I slide my notebook back and point him to my neatly arranged columns. “I have a whole list of maybes. I don’t need someone else to find me a date.”

Reid gently takes it from me. “I think ‘maybes’ might be a tad optimistic.”

“What if we don’t all find matches?” Chris asks. “Then what?”

“Whoever doesn’t have a date takes Millie,” Ed suggests.

My voice tears out in a playful screech: “Why are we assuming I’m also not finding a date?”

Just over Reid’s shoulder, I spot Avery Henderson waiting at the counter for her coffee and I stifle a whimper. Now a professor in the English department at UCSB, Avery was my little sister’s college roommate at the University of Washington and, quite frankly, has always been in better touch with Elly than I have. Avery picked up on this about nine months ago, too, when she realized I hadn’t heard that my sister was expecting twins, and since then, she loves to lord it over me when we run into each other at Saturday Pilates. But here, at lunch with my guys, I am unprepared for the ambush and try to duck into Reid’s shoulder, hoping she won’t see me.

Unfortunately, when the barista hands over her coffee, Avery catches my eye. I smell Reid’s