You lying sack of lies! “Pretty fucking much!”

“I want to take a shower,” he explains calmly. “Get all this road grime off me.”

You have to calm down. Make your response sound natural, like nothing’s wrong at all. You sound like you’re about to shit yourself. “Sure! Swell! That sounds super! Road grime!” Much better. Make a joke. That’s all you need to do. Make a joke. I look back at him (resolutely ignoring just how tan his skin is) and grin a grin that is probably far too wide and reminiscent of a hyena. Tell a fucking joke! “I could use one myself. Maybe I could join you.” OH MARY, MOTHER OF GOD, NOT THAT KIND OF JOKE! STOP TALKING! STOP TALKING RIGHT NOW. “Er, I mean, ain’t no thang. Go take your shower, home slice. I’ll just chillax in here.” Why am I talking like I’m a WASPy white kid from the suburbs going to the inner city for the first time? Dear Jesus, I know you just forsook me, but please make me have a stroke right now. That’d be super cool, and I’d totally owe you one.

“Chillax?” Dom asks me, sounding confused. “Home slice? Are you sure you’re okay?”

No, no, I’m really not. I’ve got stress sweat like a motherfucker, and I’m pretty sure it randomly smells like old french fries, and I would give anything, literally anything, to have this moment be over. The more I open my mouth, I remind myself, the worse it gets. The answer is simple. Stop. Talking.

But, alas, my last name may be Thompson now, but I am still a McKenna through and through. “A-okay, Captain Steroids!” I say brightly. “Could you be any more jacked?”

He shrugs. “You know I like to work out.” I swear he flexes his arms and chest on purpose. Either that, or he has a severe case of muscle spasms and should seek out the nearest acupuncturist as soon as possible.

“You look like you like to eat bricks,” I say. Because it makes so much sense.

He laughs. Ye gods, that sound.

I laugh, too, but only because I don’t know what we’re laughing at. His is the most erotic laugh I’ve ever heard, all dusky and full of gravel. I sound like a chipmunk getting run over by a car. Inappropriate erections, french-fry stress sweat, and dying chipmunk chortling. I am not fit to exist in this world.

I eventually stop braying and there’s this weird crackle of electricity in the air as we look at each other. My skin thrums with the current of it.

“It’s weird,” he says suddenly.

“What?”

He catches my eye. “You. Here.”

I’m confused by the sudden change in subject. “In Tucson?”

He shakes his head and gestures between us. “Here. With me. You know. Us. I think I’d forgotten how this could be.”

I’ve pushed him too far. Goddammit. “It’s weird.”

He nods.

“Good weird or bad weird?”

He sighs and says, “The best kind of weird there is,” like it’s the easiest thing in the world.