“I mean, since you’re going home anyway, can you give me a ride?”

He shakes his head. “Get in.”

At the apartment, I walk back toward Heath’s room. He’s sitting at his desk in front of his laptop.

“Hey,” I say cheerily as I enter.

One side of his mouth pulls up. “Hey. Did I forget we were hanging out?”

“Nope, thought I’d surprise you. I didn’t hear back from you last night after your hockey stuff.”

“Yeah, sorry, I crashed.”

I go to him and he swivels to make room for me on his lap. “Let’s go out tonight.”

“It’s Monday.”

“Why does everyone keep using that as an excuse?”

He chuckles softly.

I take a deep breath. The girls are right. I need to make sure we’re on the same page. “Also, I have something I want to talk to you about later.”

He stiffens under me. Okay, that was probably not the smoothest. “Don’t worry, it’s nothing too crazy. A proposition if you will.”

God, now he probably thinks I want to chain him to the bed and peg him.

His phone pings on his desk, Maverick’s name flashes on the screen with a text. “All right, sure. I’ll text you later. I’ve gotta check on Maverick. He didn’t make conditioning this morning. He’s got the flu or something. He hasn’t been by all day.”

I stand to let him up. “Well, then he really must be sick.”

He takes a step toward the door and then backtracks and brushes his lips against mine before hurrying out to go check on Maverick.

34

HEATH

“Mav? Buddy, where are you?” I call as I enter his apartment. He’s got a one-bedroom ground level unit. On a normal day it’s already darker than ours upstairs, but today all the lights are off, the TV too, so it’s like a cave.

The place is awesome. Nice leather furniture, a huge TV that takes up the better part of one wall, he’s even got throw pillows. Why he always wants to hang at our place is beyond me.

Charli barks and I follow the sound to the bedroom where my buddy is on his back with the comforter and blanket thrown off the bed and an arm over his eyes. Charli lies at the end of the mattress near his feet.

“You don’t look so good.” I step closer and then back. “Or smell so good.”

“I think I threw up a kidney.” His voice is raspy and pained.

“What can I do? Do you need water? Soup? I can make a call about getting you a new kidney.”

A knock at the door has me looking back through the living room to the front door. “Are you expecting someone else?”

“It’s food. Can you grab it?”