Chapter Twenty-One

Chessly

" W hat's your preference for lunch? We can call it in and pick it up on the way to my place," Finn said as he swung up into the driver's seat of his truck.

"I don't know. Have you eaten?" I stared at his big hands as he buckled himself in. Those hands fascinated me, especially when they touched me.

"I ate half a pizza about an hour ago for a snack, so I could do with lunch."

That grin should probably be added to an infectious disease list. As much as I wanted to ignore it, to my disgust the corner of my mouth twitched. "You ate half a pizza as a snack ? Wow."

He patted his fit abs. "It takes calories to keep this motor running."

Though I shook my head, I couldn't help but smile at his ridiculousness. "I could go for a Pickle Barrel."

His grin ratcheted up several watts. "Excellent plan. Their subs are my favorite." Putting the truck in gear, he added, "And their monster cookies—mmm, mmm, mmm. I might have to order a couple of those."

"You have kind of a sweet tooth, don't you?" I asked as I watched his beautiful hands expertly grip the wheel.

He slid me a side-eye. "After one taste of you, I might have developed one. Yes."

My eyes roamed the ceiling of his pickup. "Where do you pick up these lines?"

Tapping the side of his head with his index finger, he said, "I don't use all this massive brainpower solely to solve chemistry problems."

"Uh-huh. Don't quit your day job."

My sardonic tone pulled a laugh from him. But maybe he picked up on the little shiver that stole over me at his words.

The Pickle Barrel was a tiny hole-in-the-wall only about a block from my dorm. Its size and location were two reasons I frequented it to the point the sandwich makers knew my order the second I walked through the door.

"Half a Beach Comber, hold the onions!" called the skinny girl whose name tag read "Anna" from her place behind the register.

Finn glanced around the space. Both indoor tables were weirdly empty on a Sunday afternoon. He looked back at me. "Is that your order?"

"Yes." I peeked at him from beneath my brows. "I might get that every time I come in."

He smirked. "Alrighty then." Stepping up to the register, he perused the colorfully scripted menu on the chalkboard behind the counter and said, "Add a full South of the Border Cheesesteak and three monster cookies." He pulled his wallet from his jeans pocket.

"Anything to drink?"

"Got it covered." He turned to me. "Unless you have a regular drink too?"

"I'm good," I said, pulling my wallet from the pocket of my hoodie.

Swamping my hand with his, he pushed it and my wallet back toward my waist. "I got this."

"We're studying together. It's not a date," I protested. "You don't have to pay for my lunch."

"Not up for debate, babe." He tapped his card on the reader and put it back in his wallet.

Shaking my head, I mumbled, "Not necessary."

Putting a hand to his ear, he asked, "What was that?"

I crossed my arms over my chest. "Thank you."

His gorgeous whiskey-colored eyes warmed. "You're welcome."

As we headed over to his place, the heavenly scent of sautéed peppers and cheesy meat from his sandwich permeated the interior of the cab, causing my stomach to rumble.

"Is this a thing with you?" he teased.

I crossed my arms over my middle and willed my stomach to be quiet. "Asks the guy who eats half a pizza for a snack."

"Point taken." He smirked.

A few minutes later, he swung his truck in behind another truck already parked in the long driveway fronting the old Victorian where he lived. A Mustang was parked beside it, and I couldn't decide if I was glad or not that two of his roommates were home. The hand-holding and buying me lunch felt more like a date, but the presence of roommates signaled "study session only."

Finn grabbed the bag containing our lunch and hopped out of his truck, jogging around the front of it to open my door for me even before I'd unbuckled my seat belt.

"Thank you," I said as I snagged my backpack from the floor at my feet and followed him up the steps into the house.

In the foyer he toed off his boots and set them neatly on a rug in front of a closet, so I did the same. Then he led me through the eerily silent living room to the kitchen where he set our lunch on the table in the corner. Glancing over at me, he said, "Oh, hey. Let me grab those for you."

He tugged my backpack off my shoulder and held out his other hand for my jacket then disappeared back into the living room. A few seconds later I heard the creak of the stairs as he jogged up them. Guess we were studying in his room. A door closed, and next I heard him thunder back down the stairs. For a big man, he was deceptively quick.

When he reentered the kitchen, he headed straight to the fridge. "What can I get you to drink? A beer? An energy drink?" He pushed something around on a shelf. "Looks like we have some orange juice left."

"Water's fine, thanks."

He closed the door of the fridge and pulled two glasses from a cupboard above the sink, filled them from the tap, and set them on the table. Then he rummaged in the pantry beside the fridge and pulled out a jumbo-size bag of chips, setting it on the table beside the bag of sandwiches.

Nodding to a chair, he said, "Don't wait for me, babe. I wouldn't want you to faint from hunger with lunch in easy reach."

I narrowed my eyes at the mischief tipping up the corner of his mouth. My stomach chose that moment to let loose a cascading series of rumbles and gurgles that filled the kitchen. He snorted a laugh and slid across the floor on his stocking feet to pull two plates from the cupboard, setting one in front of the chair he'd indicated. The guy was such a big goof.

"Like I said, Chess. Dig in before you die of starvation."

"You're hilarious."

"I'm not the one packing around a lion inside me clamoring to be fed."

Wrinkling my nose in his direction, I sat at the table and reached for the bag of sandwiches. Even though my stomach had been the one making all the noise, Finn attacked his cheesesteak, devouring half of it before I'd swallowed three bites of my turkey sub.

When he put his sandwich down for a drink of water, I gestured at the remains and said, "Looks like I'm not the only one who needed lunch."

He tore open the bag of chips and shook a pile onto his plate. "Sorry." The tops of his cheeks took on a ruddy hue. "My mom's always calling me out to slow down, but in this house, you get conditioned to eat up before it's gone." For the next few minutes, he made a point of eating one chip at a time.

"Where are your roommates? At least two of them are home, yeah?"

"Danny has Sundays off from his job." With a smirk, he added, "I imagine your best friend is studying in Callahan's room with him."

"And we're studying in yours?" The thought of being alone with him in a room with a bed in it left me a little breathless.

His eyes dipped to my mouth. "That's not a problem, is it?" With a blink his eyes found mine. "I mean, we can study down here, but we'll be interrupted and distracted, probably more than once."

I was already distracted, and we hadn't finished lunch.

Sliding my tongue over my lips, I said, "Probably better to study without interruptions or distractions."

When his gaze strayed to my mouth again, my skin flashed hot, and I seriously wondered what I'd been thinking when I dressed in layers for the day.

Needing a detour from the direction my thoughts had gone, I picked up my sandwich and filled my mouth with turkey and Italian sausage sub goodness. Finn's eyes remained on my mouth. I stilled in mid-chew as he lifted his hand to my face to gently brush something from the corner of my lip.

I blinked, and he said, "A shred of lettuce escaped."

The ghost of his touch rippled over my skin, and I did my damnedest not to let him see my response. The fleeting dimple in the side of his cheek told me I hadn't kept that to myself. Swallowing my bite of sandwich, I said, "Thanks."

A secret smile revealed that dimple again as he turned his attention to the remnants of his sub. We finished our meal in a charged silence broken only by sideways glances and heated cheeks (mine) and little grins (his). It was like sitting near my sixth-grade crush in the school cafeteria all over again.

As Finn cleaned up the kitchen after lunch—he insisted I didn't need to help with sliding plates and glasses into the dishwasher—Danny wandered into the kitchen, rubbing a hand over his chest. "Hey, you bought lunch? Didja pick up any extra?" Doing a double-take, he said, "Hey, Chessly. I didn't see you there." Returning his attention to Finn, he repeated, "Didja bring home any extra?"

"Sorry, dude. You're on your own." Finn smirked then lunged for the bag containing the monster cookies we'd left on the table.

"Story of my life this weekend," Danny grumbled as he wandered over to the fridge.

Chuckling at his friend, Finn caught my hand in his and led me from the kitchen. In my experience study partners didn't hold hands, but Finn's warm, calloused hand engulfing mine felt so exactly right I couldn't protest.

"Behave up there, kids," Danny called after us. "My room shares a wall with yours, Finnegan."

Even while holding a bag of cookies, Finn managed to flip Danny the bird and kept walking, his long-legged stride forcing me to double-time to keep up as we crossed the living room to the stairs. At least he slowed down as we climbed up the steps to the second story of the house. Stopping outside a door opposite the bathroom, he motioned for me to go ahead of him into his room.

I didn't know what I expected when I entered his private domain, but the perfectly made up king bed and the tidy floor surprised me. Of course a man his size would need a big bed. A squeak of a giggle escaped me as I thought about him trying to fit his tall, broad frame into a narrow dorm bed. The fresh scent of clean laundry and Finn's woodsy cologne, which left me a bit light-headed whenever he moved in close, permeated the air. It was all I could do to stop myself from sucking in a massive noseful and savoring it inside me for a minute.

My backpack sat on the floor beside his desk in the corner on the same wall as the door. His books were stacked neatly on top of the desk, but short of me sitting on his lap on the lone chair tucked beneath it, there was nowhere for me to work.

Turning to share my observation, I ran smack into the brick wall masquerading as his chest. Automatically, his arms wrapped around me, and I had no idea what to do.

"Whoa there, Speed Racer."

The laugh in his voice vibrated through me, sending tiny jolts of electricity arcing through my veins.

"Um," I said into his chest, "there's only one chair." At last I glanced up at him. "Maybe we should try the kitchen after all."

"Most of the time, I spread out over my bed, so you can have the chair and the desk—unless you want to flop down on the bed too." He grinned down at me. "I'll make room."

Pulling out of his embrace, I wandered over to the desk. "This is good." I frowned. "Why do you have it pushed against the wall? Why not over here"—I pointed to spot below the window—"where your body doesn't block out the natural light?"

"When I located my desk by the window, I never did any work."

My brow slid up.

He chuckled. "Step over there and look outside."

I did as he suggested and immediately figured out the problem. His window faced the street. Across the road from their house was another old Victorian whose front porch was teeming with people even though it had started to snow on this fine February Sunday afternoon.

"The basketball team won an away game yesterday. We're supposed to be over there helping them celebrate. If my desk looked out on that, the temptation to stroll over to play flip-cup would be damn hard to ignore." Stuffing his hands in the front pockets of his jeans, he explained, "With my desk facing the wall, I can pretend I don't know what's going on across the street, so I won't feel like I'm missing out when I'm plowing through a mountain of unnecessary physics problems purely designed to stroke my prof's fragile ego."

I let the corner of my mouth tip up. "Guess we should tackle those problems so you can show off in class tomorrow."

I hefted my backpack onto the edge of his desk and unzipped it, pulling out my laptop, my notebook, and my own physics book, stacking my gear beside Finn's before returning my bag to the floor. Taking the hint, Finn stepped up beside me and snagged his books from the desk to deposit them in the middle of his massive bed. His eyes danced wickedly as he hopped up onto it and stretched out, his back resting against a mass of pillows piled against the headboard. He reached over to the nightstand where he'd deposited the bag of cookies and pulled one out. Breaking it in half, he said, "You want some?"

Planting my hands on my hips, I said, "You're offering me half? I want the whole cookie."

His eyes heated. "Me too."

Somehow I didn't think he was talking about sweets.

While taking a man-size bite of one half while holding up the other and crooking his finger, he motioned me to the side of his bed. I took a step in that direction then abruptly changed course and raced to the nightstand with the idea of snagging the bag with the other two cookies in it.

Finn must have figured out my intention the moment I made it because he managed to grab the bag and toss it over his body to land it on the bed on the other side of him a second ahead of me reaching the nightstand.

With a magnanimous wave, he offered me the half a cookie again. "We're sharing, Chessly. Catch up." Those incredible eyes of his teased me as he watched me over the top of the second bite of his half.

Baring my teeth at him, I snatched my treat and retreated to the foot of the bed where I leaned a hip against the mattress and savored a bite of nutty, chocolate-and-butterscotch-chip delight. As we ate our dessert, we watched each other, wheels turning in both of our heads. I worked to devise a distraction that would allow me a shot at stealing that bag so I could enjoy a whole cookie. No doubt he was thinking about how he was going to deny me my goal and remain in control of our treats.

As I finished off my half, Finn swung his long legs over the side of the bed, giving me a better shot at hopping up there and attaining my goal. But right as I made my move, he wrapped his hands around my waist. I landed on his lap with a squeak, and he laughed.

His gaze zeroed in on my mouth. "You're kind of messy, you know that?"

"I am not," didn't come out as forceful as I intended—not with him staring at my mouth like it was second dessert.

Leaning in, he touched the tip of his tongue to the corner of my lips, teasing and licking my skin as I closed my eyes and held my breath. Tiny tremors rippled over my cheek as my body tightened in anticipation of what he'd do next. When he pulled back, I lost myself in the dark depths of his eyes, their whiskey-colored irises rimming the black pools of his pupils.

"You had a little chocolate there." The hoarse sound of his voice shot straight to my center.

"Oh," came out on a whisper.

"Looks like a little butterscotch got left behind here." He licked the opposite corner of my mouth—the barest of touches that made my blood bubble in my veins.

Somehow, my hands had found their way to his wide shoulders where I gripped him out of fear I might melt into a gooey mess right in the center of his lap.

Then he brushed his lips over mine, and I melted all over him.