Not in Love by Ali Hazelwood

“Um. The latter.” A beat. “It’s more of a reciprocally beneficial agreement.”

“Nice. Good on you guys.” She seemed sincerely happy. “Where did you meet?”

“I work for a company here in Austin. Harkness recently attempted to acquire us.” And had not succeeded yet. It felt good to remind myself. Softened my guilt, too.

“Holy shit, you work for Kline? You know Florence?”

The shame at hearing Florence mentioned in Eli’s house was so intense, I had to take a breath before saying, “Yes.”

“What’s she like? I picture her as a giant tentacled monster.”

Why did she know about Florence? “She’s a five-three redhead. Untentacled. Not particularly monstrous looking.” To trim the conversation before it could grow its own appendages, I added, “She is a close friend of mine.”

Maya’s eyes went saucer wide, but a second later her pleasant smile was restored. “Would you like some coffee?”

“No, thank you. I was just going home. Is Eli . . . ?”

“He’ll be back soon. I can text him, too.”

“No need.” I’d asked after him. I wasn’t sneaking out. I’d text him once I got back to my place and make up a nonexistent Saturday morning engagement. I man the arugula booth at the farmers’ market. I AquaGym. Did I mention I’m a mother of four? They’re waiting for breakfast. “Thank you, I’ll just—”

The front door—against which I’d nearly engaged in public sex the previous night—opened. The first to come in was the giant dog, who looked even larger and even happier in the daylight. He chose violence, and shook several gallons of rainwater all over the wooden floor, sparing no surface. The second, of course, was Eli. He pulled back the hood of a dark green windbreaker, and when his eyes found me, he said, “I was wondering if you’d still be here.” He was smiling. Half-pleased, half-challenging, half-all-knowing.

Something hot and cold ran through me. “I—”

“Rude,” Maya interrupted. “Are you trying to get rid of her?”

“If only you knew, Maya,” he drawled. He draped his jacket over a high-backed chair, gaze never leaving me.

“Knew what?” Maya petted Tiny, who this morning was supremely uninterested in me. Good boy.

“Rue was a figure skater with Alec,” Eli informed her instead of answering.

“For real? He’s the best.”

I nodded. “He is.”

“Do you still skate?”

“Not competitively.”

“What about for fun?”

“I do.”

“At Dave’s rink?”

“For the most part.”

“Wait.” Those Eli eyes of hers narrowed. “Rue Siebert. I know you! Didn’t you get a synchro scholarship for some place in Wisconsin?”

“Michigan. Adrian College.”

“Oh my god. I remember you! We only overlapped for a few months but you were so good.”

“I wasn’t that—”

“At mentoring, I mean. You taught me how to do a backward crossover, remember?” I didn’t, but she continued anyway, grinning. “I sucked. Four other people tried, and I could not figure it out. Come on, you have to remember—I’m the girl who burst out crying in the middle of the rink. You brought me to a bench, sat next to me, and neither of us said anything for, like, half an hour. Once I calmed down you asked me if I was ready to start again and then I got the crossover on the first try! It must have been in the spring of—”

A car honked right outside. I jolted, and Maya rolled her eyes. “That’ll be Jade.” She picked up her backpack and an oversized, over-stickered water bottle. “It was so nice to see you again, Rue! I’m going to spend the day at the library, so you two should feel free to have morning sex on the table.” She glanced at Eli from over her shoulder. “You know where the Clorox wipes are, right?” She was gone before he could reply, leaving us alone, looking at each other with something that felt a lot like understanding.

He knew that I was going to sneak out.

I knew that he knew.

And he knew that, too.

I lifted my chin with a hint of a challenge, and his lips widened into a grin, as though I was following a script he’d written in his head for me.

“Were you going to leave me a note?” he asked affably. “Or just text later?”

I kept my spine straight. “The latter.”

“Less time consuming.” He nodded, entertained, and opened a cupboard. Kibble tinkled into the dog’s metal bowl, and Tiny, who’d begun circling me looking for the kind of affection that other people seemed to give effortlessly to pets, instantly lost interest in me. On the table above him, I noticed a developed chess board.

“Is that your game?”

Eli nodded. “Against Maya.”

“You play a lot?”

“A fair bit. We’re not Nolan Sawyer level, or anything—”

“Mallory Greenleaf level, you mean?”

He just smiled. “Do you really not remember my sister?”

“I . . .” I did, actually, if only because of the way she’d sobbed silently next to me. It had felt heartbreaking and relatable, and I’d wished there was something I could say. But I was going through the exact same, and I knew that no words existed that would have helped. “Is it okay that she saw me?” I asked.