Page 9 of Prime Time Romance

“This is more my style.”

“What the—” she screams.

My arms tighten around her legs. Her body stills as she realizes she’s not about to fly face-first into the pavement.

“You okay up there?”

Her arms dangle for a moment. “More of a warning would have been nice, but otherwise I’m good.” She taps my back. “Giddy up, buttercup.”

I carry her a few more blocks to the streetcar stop. When I finally set her down, she lingers momentarily with her hands on my chest, then leans in and sniffs the spot where my neck meets my collarbone.

“Why do you smell like a forest?” She tilts her head back and looks up at me. “It’s like a mix of mint and pinecones and something else. I’ve been trying to figure it out for the last block and a half and it’s driving me crazy.”

I’m not entirely sure how I’m supposed to answer this question. “I’d like to claim that it’s my natural man smell, but I think you might be referring to my deodorant. It’s called Cedar Wood Lumberjack.”

Her jaw drops. “Actually?”

“Swear to god. I saw it and bought it based on the name alone. Clearly, it did not disappoint.”

She opens her mouth as if she’s about to say something else but is interrupted by the arrival of the red-and-white streetcar, which opens its doors, flooding us with a wave of warm, body-scented air.

She holds up her hands as if she’s proving a point. “I can say one thing. It’s a definite upgrade from Doritos.”

3

Brynn

I’m in a significantly better headspace as soon as I’m showered and dressed in my comfy cozies, with a bag of popcorn in the microwave and cold Pinot Grigio in my tumbler. When the popcorn is poured, I grab my fuzzy blue Snuggly from the end of my bed and head to my couch and the obscenely large big-screen TV purchased by my ex right before our relationship imploded.

My Netflix account has Carson’s Cove ready and waiting in my favorites as if it too expected that I’d need a little comfort-binging tonight. But before I can pick up the remote and press play, the door to Josh’s bedroom swings open and he wanders out wearing nothing but a pair of light-gray low-slung sweatpants.

This is not the first time he’s wandered around my townhouse half-naked.

It started happening shortly after he moved in.

He emerged late one morning from his room in nothing but his gym shorts. To be fair, I was home sick from work. He likely didn’t expect me to be there. But even when he spotted me lying on the couch, he didn’t seem to care. I rationalized that I was just being a grouch. He was a new face moving into my personal space, and there was bound to be an adjustment period. Then one night, after a long cry caused by a SiriusXM bill that showed up at my house with Matt’s name on it, I walked into the kitchen to find Josh making eggs in his boxers and this threadbare Anaheim T-shirt that he loves. It clings to all the right places and you can easily make out his nipples. It’s almost as bad as being top-naked. He was talking to someone on the phone. His mom, I think. I could only make out bits of the conversation as he made his eggs, his forearms flexing as he flicked his wrist and flipped them from sunny-side up to over easy. I don’t know if it was the arms, or maybe some culinary competency kink I never knew I had, but I felt the stirrings of attraction. I immediately knew it was a bad idea. He was my roommate. I had just reached the milestone of saying I was over Matt and actually being over Matt. The last thing I needed was Temptation Island in my kitchen making breakfast for dinner. I almost terminated our roommate agreement right there.

But I let him stay.

In this economy, beggars with variable-term mortgages cannot be choosers.

But in that moment, I made a choice to draw a firm boundary for our relationship, with Josh Bishop and his annoyingly sexy body on one side and me on the other. Up until now, it’s been a hard line. That is, until my brief lapse in judgment when I borrowed money earlier tonight.

“So.” He drops onto the couch beside me and heaves a single leg onto the coffee table. “What are we watching?”

I stare at him for a moment, just to make sure what I think is happening is happening.

“Well, I was about to watch Carson’s Cove.”

He adds his second leg, stretching both of them out as he leans back into the cushions.

“And I guess you are watching it with me?” I ask.

He glances over, not looking the least bit fussed. “Is that all right?”

Is it?

“It’s fine.” My eyes dip for a moment to the golden bronzeness of his chest. “But you are going to need to put a shirt on first.”