“Because I’d rather be alone in my room talking to you,” I admitted. “Besides, I have a boyfriend, remember?”
He blushed even deeper pink. “Right. So, um, that reminds me I was getting ready to ask you if you could come to a thing with me Friday night. As… as my date. You know, my boyfriend, or whatever.”
Teo’s dark eyelashes fluttered around while he avoided looking at me.
I grinned at him. “Of course I will. What’s the thing?”
“A Cubs game. The company has a box, and a bunch of Chris’s and my friends are going.”
“Box seats at Wrigley? Twist my arm.”
He smiled back and finally looked at me. “Okay, yeah, it’s pretty cool. Good. Thank you.”
I wanted to hold him, reach out and pull him against my body so I could remind myself what he felt like, tasted like, smelled like. It made me feel strangely unmoored, like I was drifting away from an anchor that was meant to keep me steady, safe, protected.
“Are you getting enough sleep?” I asked, clearing my throat. “Are you eating?”
The look on Teo’s face was affectionate and soft. “Yes, Daddy.”
I couldn’t hold back a laugh. “Don’t ever say that to an actual Daddy Dom or he will squirrel you away, and I’ll never get to see you again.”
“Just you, then,” he teased. “Oh, and maybe my real dad.”
“Ewww. Now I’m never getting hard again. Take it back.”
We continued to talk and joke, flirt and tease, until I realized several hours had passed and it was well past midnight in Chicago. I could tell Teo was getting drowsy, and our conversation had already slipped into that sleepy, slow kind of meander that was more about not wanting to say goodbye than anything else.
“You need to get some sleep, baby,” I said, the endearment slipping out without me realizing it. When I heard myself say the word, I almost choked on my tongue. I’d called him “babe” before, but never like this. Never in the tender kind of way that made me feel exposed and vulnerable, as if my real feelings for him couldn’t stay hidden even though they should have. Teo’s eyes widened. We stared at each other.
“See you Friday?” he asked hesitantly, as if I’d somehow changed my mind while we talked.
“Absolutely. Just let me know where to meet you. I’m looking forward to it.”
And I was. Not only could I not wait to see Teo again, but the idea of claiming him in front of Chris, even if it wasn’t real, was selfishly exciting.
I counted down the hours.
17
Teo
My hands were sweating. Come to think of it, so was my back. And under my arms, and probably… there he was. I stood outside the Wrigley Field gate beside Chris and a couple of other guys from work when I spotted Jack making his way toward us through the crowd.
“I can’t believe you invited the company pilot,” Chris muttered, not for the first time.
“He doesn’t work for Banks,” I reminded him under my breath. “He works for Douglas Aviation.”
“Same difference.”
My heart skittered around the closer Jack got, but when he spotted me and grinned a huge, gorgeous smile… well, let’s just say I was sweating in even more places after that.
“Hi,” I said, stepping forward to greet him. My legs were on a different speed plan than my brain, so I kind of stumbled into his arms by accident. He held me tightly for a beat before pulling back and laying a kiss on me.
Oh god. Ohhhh godddd. His lips… his now-familiar taste… I wanted to melt into him and kiss him for the rest of the night.
“Ahem.”
Chris’s voice startled me out of my mini make-out session. My face and neck heated until my entire body was one giant ball of what my sister referred to as “man stink.”
“Hi,” I said to Jack again. In case he hadn’t heard the first time or felt properly greeted by my tongue in his esophagus. “Hi. Um, I think I said that already. This is Chris Banks, and this is…”
“Jay Acosta,” Jay said with a flirty smirk. “And you are delectable.”
I was torn between pride and jealousy. “Yeah, so that’s Jay, and this is Hannah, Alan, Sam, and Logan and Logan’s sister Tara.”
There was a woman standing between Hannah and Chris I’d never met before, so I added, “I’m sorry, I don’t know your name…”
“This is Chelsea,” Chris said, not giving her a chance to answer herself. “She’s with me.”
I stared at him in numb shock. “Oh. Hi. I’m Teo, and this is Jack. Nice to meet you, Chelsea.”
I turned to look at Jack, and the concern on his face nearly made me want to vomit. I tightened my teeth together and refused to be upset. After all, I’d brought someone too.
As if I needed reminding, Jack put his arm around me and pulled me tightly to his side, pressing a kiss to my temple and murmuring in my ear. “I missed you.”
I turned and buried my face in his neck, wrapping him in another hug because I just needed it for a split second. Then I’d be fine.
He held me against him while he answered a question someone had asked about whether or not he was a Cubs fan. “Was Ron Santo at home on third base? Could Kerry Wood throw a baseball?”
When I pulled away, he didn’t stop bantering with Logan and Tara about the Cubs, but he grabbed my hand and held it tight. We made our way through the gate and toward the private suite. I’d been with the Banks family many times before, but it never got old. I still felt like the luckiest kid alive when I passed through the gate and into the hallways to the private suites.
I remembered the first time Chris and his dad had invited me and my dad to join them at a game. The Cubs had crushed the Atlanta Braves. I’d watched Chipper Jones and Tom Glavine fill out baseball uniforms like the damned things had been made from spray paint. When Glavine hiked up his knee and then stretched his chest out to pitch a ball… well, it had been pure heaven for a ten-year-old boy who didn’t realize at the time why he was so obsessed with baseball players more than the game itself.
When we entered the suite, Chris went straight to the fridge and began to pull out cans of beer to pass around. Catering had set out food in silver chafing dishes, and I knew from experience and scent that there were amazing hot dogs inside at least one of them.
“This is amazing,” Jack said, looking around. “Thanks for bring me, Tee.”
Chris handed him a beer. “You’ve never been in a box at Wrigley before?” he asked.
“Nah, man. I had box seats for Hamilton in New York once though. I went out with one of the dancers, and he hooked me up with them. It was amazing.”
“For real?” Hannah asked. “God, I’m dying to see it. I need to find a dancer to hook up with. Who knew that was the shortcut?”
I watched Jack charm the pants off of my friends. He was confident and relaxed around new people, and I realized that being a commercial airline pilot would have put him in the position of having to make new friends almost every time he showed up for work. It seemed to be easy for him. He quickly turned the conversation around and began asking Hannah what other Broadway shows she’d seen and whether or not she’d ever been to New York. Logan joined in to ask Jack for some restaurant suggestions in Greenwich Village since he had a business trip coming up. The three of them made their way down into the stadium seats and continued talking.