Look at You

Chapter 6

6

I manage to last the rest of the week at TechNet. Callie is nice. She's chatty, like she's here for fun, not her 6-figure salary. I can't yet tell whether I hate it or absolutely adore it.

I wake up on Saturday to the incessantly ear-deafening buzzing of my phone on my nightstand. I somehow manage to grab it after slapping around on the wooden surface for a few seconds longer than it really should have taken me. I rip out my phone charger and answer the call.

I don't even have time to growl out a perturbed greeting. "Love. Get up."

I groan. It's Trey, my "one friend still left in Baker," according to Jay. Trey and I played lacrosse together in high school. We went to Highland Academy, but now he teaches history and coaches at the public high school in Middletown.

He takes my groan as a greeting. "Be there in 20. Get your sneaks on." He hangs up before I can tell him I've broken my leg or have taken ill with hay fever.

I mutter curses under my breath the entire time I'm inching on my running sweats and a long sleeve. It's February in Ohio, so the only thing checking the weather is going to do is make me gag. I pull on a beanie and grab some gloves (which I know Trey is going to make fun of me for.)

He shows up to the front door exactly when he says he will. He talks to Alice for a full three minutes while jogging in place. He's a hunk of lean muscle that takes up the entire doorway and absolutely blows my soft body out of the water. I squeeze past Alice and meet Trey on the front walkway. He hits a run before I even close the door.

"Shit Trey!" I have to haul ass to catch him. "Couldn't have given me like a day's notice?"

He picks up the pace now that I've reached him. I make sure he doesn't miss my string of shit fuck god damnits.

"Better training this way." He makes it sound like we're sitting across from each other in a board meeting. His even-keeled voice only adds to the visual.

"Training for what!"

"How's TechNet?" He asks. I want to knock him in his bald little head for doing this to me at 8 am. ­I can hear his voice in my head—it's shaved, not bald, brother. Style.

"Ugh," I'm already wiping my nose. "It's fine. Done with training next week."

"Yeah?" I swear he picks up the pace. I know he has when I see him smile at the face I make. "So, what next?"

"What next?" I'm flabbergasted. And very, very out of breath. I check my watch. We're barely at a half mile. "What do you mean, what next?"

"You're always moving, Love! You always have a goal. First it was getting into Harvard, then it was building your coding business, and now that you've done all of that, and you've got a side hustle at TechNet, I just wonder. What next?"

I blow air out of my lips. "That is not true. Plus, I worked on those things for like 4 years each, so I wouldn't really call that always moving. More like moving but very, very slowly."

He turns his head to eye me with one raised eyebrow. I meet his gaze briefly, then pound the pavement harder. I hear him breathe out a sigh next to me, but he matches my pace.

"Maybe more time for going out? Meeting people? Dating?"

He knows he's hit a nerve. I lick my lips. "Yeah well. Not like there's much of that in this town anyway."

"I may know some people!" Trey hits my bicep lightly. "If you're actually serious this time."

Trey has tried to set me up a handful of times. In high school, sure, but a couple of times more recently as well. I've always been a dud at dating. I'm an engineer—it's my duty to find bugs. And unfortunately, I have a habit of doing the same thing to people.