The Love Wager by Lynn Painter

            God, was he out of his mind?

            He went into the lobby and pressed the up button on the elevator, wondering when the best time was to confess his terrifying feelings.

            The elevator doors opened, and a blond guy stepped out. He took a step forward but paused when he saw Jack.

            “Hey, you’re Hal’s friend. Jack, right?”

            Jack looked at the man’s face and realized who it was. Also, did he really have to call her “Hal,” like it was that hard to say her full name?

            “Hey, Alex. How’s it going?”

            “Good, good. Are you going up to see Hal right now?”

            Jack gave him a nod and didn’t think he could take it if the douchebag said Hal one more time. Also, where the hell else would he be going?

            “Would you mind taking something up with you?” Alex put his hands in the pockets of his bomber jacket and said, “I bought a few toys for Tigger but left them in my car.”

            “Sure.”

            Jack followed the guy to his car, hating the fact that Alex was spending time with Hallie every day. Hating that he was buying toys for her damn cat, even as Jack’s own pocket burned with the catnip he had taken care to bring. Alex popped open his trunk—a goddamn Camaro, of course—and Jack stood there, feeling lower than ever as Alex dug around, rambling about his life like they were buddies.

            “Hal is such a sweetheart. I have no idea how I got lucky enough to land her as a girlfriend.”

            Jack squinted, forcing himself not to say that it was way too early for Alex to call Hallie his girlfriend, even though it absolutely was. “It’s, uh, yeah—she’s great.”

            The fact that she’d invited Alex to her sister’s wedding was still mind-boggling to him, but he refused to think about it.

            Alex kept digging—how much shit could one person have in their trunk—and said, “But I’m blown away that someone like her was even on the app, y’know?”

            Jack felt like his jaw was going to break from clenching it so hard. “Yeah.”

            “I’m a huge believer in fate, in things happening because the cosmos wanted them to, so her reaching out to me feels epic, y’know?”

            Alex stopped digging and said with a grin, “Listen to me—I sound like a fucking lovesick little girl.”

            “Now you sound like a fucking sexist.”

            “Right there I did, didn’t I?” Alex laughed, which bugged the hell out of Jack. “Thank God there are no feminists loitering in the parking lot to overhear.”

            “That would be the worst, right?” Jack said, unsure if the guy was serious or not.

            “The last thing I’d want to do is look bad in front of Hal, so for sure the worst. Although, honestly, she seems way too sweet to care about something like that.”

            “You’d be surprised,” Jack said, remembering her at the speed dating event.

            “No, I wouldn’t.” Alex looked one hundred percent confident in his opinion as he said, “Even though we haven’t known each other very long, I feel like I already know know her.”

            Jack didn’t even know what to say to that, so he just muttered, “Is that right.”

            “I think it’s that fate thing.”

            Jack couldn’t stop himself from saying, “I wouldn’t really put much stock in fate on this one, by the way. Sometimes you get lucky, but this sure as hell wasn’t because the stars aligned.”

            Alex said, “Says you.”

            “Says life.”

            “Nope.” He shook his head and grinned like Jack was the one saying ridiculous things. “It’s fate, my guy, and you just don’t get it.”

            “Listen, buddy,” Jack said, really fucking irritated at this point. “Don’t tell Hal I told you this, but we had a bet. We made a wager on who could find love first. So her feelings for you might be real and you might be the luckiest son of a bitch on the planet, but it wasn’t the cosmos or your good karma that made her swipe right on you. It was the will to beat me and win a free vacation.”