Operation Meet Cute by K.M. Neuhold

Chapter 7

HARLOW

“I’ve got it,” I say, whipping open Teddy’s apartment door and sliding inside.

“The inability to knock?” Teddy guesses teasingly.

“No, the perfect meet-cute idea.” I stop to catch my breath. The idea hit me as I was getting out of my car, so I sprinted all the way up from the parking garage.

“Ah.” Teddy doesn’t seem overly enthusiastic about my breakthrough as he continues to watch whatever he has on the TV, his socked feet up on the coffee table, his T-shirt slightly rucked up to show his belly… Thoughts of my meet-cute idea screech to a halt for a minute while I enjoy the view of the little patch of skin.

Things ignited so quickly last time, I hardly had a chance to play around much. I wonder if he’s ticklish. Like if I tugged his shirt up a bit more and nibbled on his soft, warm skin, would he laugh or would he moan? My brain is kind enough to supply memories of the deep, rich tenor of his moans from last week, my cock hardening immediately.

Wait. Jesus, it’s just a half inch of skin, get it together, Harlow. I shake my head and drag my eyes away from Teddy’s body and back up to his face, which has remained passive, still fixed on the television while I mentally undressed him.

“Do you have ice skates?” I ask, remembering why I barged into his apartment to begin with.

“Ice skates?” He raises one eyebrow. “We live in LA.”

“I know, but there’s an indoor ice rink and that’s where I’m going to meet the man of my dreams.”

“Is it now?”

“Yup. It’s going to be perfect. I’m going to skate around for a while, scope the place out, then fall and fake an injury. Mr. Right will come to my rescue, and just like that, I’ll get my happily ever after. It’s foolproof.”

“You say that a lot, and I’m not sure you know what it means,” Teddy deadpans.

“Ha. Ha,” I reply flatly. “So, do you?”

“Do I what?”

“Have ice skates.”

“We live in LA.”

“I’m having deja vu,” I complain, and he smirks. “Okay, so I’m guessing that’s a no. I guess I can rent some. It’ll be a small price to pay for a lifetime of love and happiness.”

“That checks out.”

“Hey, you should come.” The idea hadn’t occurred to me until it was out of my mouth, but damn is it a good one. I’ll feel less conspicuous skating around with someone else while I scope it out. “It’ll be fun, plus you’ve been single forever, and I’m sure there are plenty of men at the skating rink for both of us to go on the hunt.”

“I didn’t realize that the skating rink was the new Grindr.”

“You’re being intentionally difficult. Put on ice-skating clothes and let’s go.” I turn back to the door. “In fact, I need to go change too. Meet you back here in ten minutes.”

I dash down the stairs to my apartment and go straight for my closet. Teddy made a good point about us living in LA. In my mind, I’m picturing a stylish, puffy vest and maybe a cute scarf, but I don’t own anything like that. I do have a T-shirt with little snowflakes on it that I usually wear around Christmas. But it’s July, so that would probably look a bit odd.

I hem and haw for several minutes before settling on a black V-neck and a fashion scarf that I bought ages ago when scarves were in.

When I get back to Teddy’s apartment, he’s in exactly the same spot I left him, in the same clothes.

“Dude,” I complain.

“I don’t know what skating clothes are. Also, I’m not sure I want to go ice skating.”

“Please, Teddy Bear.” I plop down on the couch next to him and put my chin on his shoulder. “It’ll be fun. And if we don’t meet the men of our dreams, at least we’ll get to have fun together. I’ll even buy dinner after.”

“Hmm,” he grunts, but I can tell he’s softening to the idea.

“Dinner, and if we don’t meet our soulmates, I’ll give you a blowjob when we get home,” I bargain to sweeten the deal.

“Hmm,” he hums again, shifting in his spot and then looking at me. “Fine, but only because you’re offering to buy dinner.”

“Oh, well, if you hate blowjobs, that’s fine,” I say innocently, grinning when he frowns. “Come on, Teddy Bear, we’ll have fun, I promise.” I scratch his beard like I’m petting a dog, and he pretends not to like it, but I don’t miss the way he leans into it for a second before standing up.

He doesn’t bother to change, just puts on his shoes, grabs his keys, and ushers me out the door.

“It’s cold,” I complain sometime later, a pair of raggedy ice skates pinching my toes as I clumsily move my feet along the ice.

“You cannot tell me you didn’t know an ice rink would be cold.” There’s more than a hint of teasing in his words.

“Not this cold,” I huff, wrapping my arms around myself. There are goosebumps all over my skin. I should’ve brought a jacket. On top of that, there are no single men here from what I can tell. It’s all kids and their moms. I feel lied to by Hollywood. Where are the hockey players? They have to practice, don’t they?

“The more you move, the warmer you’ll be,” Teddy says.

“If I move faster than this, I’ll fall.”

He ignores my protest, grabbing both my hands and dragging me along. Holy hell, he’s skating backward more skillfully than I’ve ever seen anyone skate forward before. Is he a witch?

We speed up, the cold air whipping past us faster, which does not make it warmer, just for the record, but it does make it more fun. I look down to check how my feet are doing and nearly stumble.

“Keep your head up,” he instructs. “And don’t worry, I’ve got you.” Teddy winks, and my heart gives a funny little flutter.

“I didn’t know you were Tanya Harding.”

“More Sidney Crosby,” he offers with a shrug.

“Who?”

“Pittsburgh Penguins,” he adds, which clarifies absolutely nothing. “Hockey,” he finally simplifies.

“Wait, you were a hockey player?”

“I grew up in Minnesota,” Teddy says as if that explains everything.

“Were you good?” I look down at the way his feet are moving across the ice effortlessly.

“I was decent,” he answers vaguely, but his cheeks turn the slightest shade of pink, which is a dead giveaway that he’s lying.

“How good? Did you play in college or just for fun? I can’t believe I’ve known you for five years without ever hearing about this.”

“When has the subject of hockey ever come up between us?”

“Fair point,” I concede. “So, how good?”

Without answering my question, he smirks, tightening his hold on my hands and spinning us around.

“Oh my god.” My gasp turns into laughter quickly as we whip around in several circles before Teddy rights us without any trouble at all.

“I played in college, and I had an offer to play in the AHL. The minor leagues,” he explains when he no doubt sees the confusion on my face.

“So, why didn’t you?”

“I wanted more security. There was no guarantee I’d get a spot on an NHL team or that I wouldn’t get injured before that could happen. I weighed out the options and decided that finance was the safer bet.”

I look him up and down, seeing him in a totally new light. “I could totally see you in a pair of hockey pants and nothing else.”

Teddy barks out a laugh. “I did look damn good in the pants.”

“I bet.” In fact, I’m so busy picturing him nearly naked…for the second time today, I might add, that I accidentally move my foot too suddenly and go down. Teddy tries to keep me upright, but it’s no use. I’m just glad it’s not my face that meets the ice.

TEDDY

“Fuck,” I mutter, trying and failing to catch Harlow before he crashes onto the ice. He braces his hands to protect his face at least, but the groan he lets out isn’t promising. Luckily, he weighs next to nothing, so I have no trouble scooping him up, one arm around his back and the other under his knees.

“Oh shit,” he gasps, grabbing onto my neck and looking nervously down at the ice.

“I’ve got you.” My feet are steady under me. I’ve carried guys bigger than him off the ice and skated in worse conditions. It only takes a minute to whisk him off the ice and set him down on one of the benches.

“What hurts?” I ask immediately, running my eyes over him to assess any injuries. My eye catches on a rip in the knee of his jeans, and I kneel down to take a look. There’s blood visible, but the tear in the fabric is too small to get a good look. And since his jeans are too damn tight for me to push the leg up to get a look at his injury, I do the next best thing. Hooking my fingers in the seams of the tear, I rip it wider.

“Hey,” he protests.

“They were already ruined,” I point out, and he huffs but doesn’t argue.

It’s scraped up and bleeding a bit but otherwise doesn’t look too bad. “We should probably ice it,” I deadpan, and Harlow chuckles. “Sit right here. I’m going to go see if I can get something to clean this up with and a bandage.”

“It’s not that bad. I can put a Band-Aid on when I get home,” he says, starting to get up.

I growl and frown, and he plops back down, putting his hands up in surrender. “Fine, Grumpy Bear, go get the first-aid kit.”

“Thank you. Don’t move.”

I bend down to take my skates off, so I don’t have to awkwardly clomp around in them, and then head up to the customer service desk to ask about a first-aid kit. It only takes a couple of minutes before I’m back on my knees in front of Harlow. Now there’s an image. Not that I need to be thinking about the cheeky offer he made earlier while I’m at a skating rink surrounded by children and their frazzled mothers.

“Hey, at least my plan worked,” he muses as I use alcohol wipes to clean off the cut and then some gauze to dry it off.

“What plan was that?” I ask, smoothing the Band-Aid down.

“Getting hurt so a handsome man would save me.” The playful lilt in his voice tugs at everything inside me, unraveling and loosening things that shouldn’t be unraveled or loosened when I know he doesn’t really mean it.

“Sorry it wasn’t the right handsome man,” I say wryly, looking up and offering him a crooked half-smile.

His teasing grin slips, and his eyebrows pull together. For half a second, something unspoken passes between us, something charged and heavy. But it’s gone before I can really latch onto it. “There’s always next time,” he says.

“Yeah.”

I loosen the laces on his skates and slip them off, one and then the other before reaching for his shoes.

“You don’t have to do that.” He tries to tug his foot away, but I hold tight.

“I’m already here.” I slide the shoe onto his foot and then tie it. “Besides, you can’t tell me you haven’t always imagined a prince slipping a glass slipper onto your foot. We can call this practice.” I grab the next one and do the same thing.

“Meh. I was never much of a Disney guy.”

I snort a laugh, getting to my feet now that Harlow is all taken care of. “Let me get my shoes on, and then we can see about that dinner you promised me.”

“How about we go back to your place and order takeout?” he suggests.

“Works for me.”

HARLOW

“Tell me about the best blowjob you’ve ever had,” I say conversationally, setting my container of orange chicken on the coffee table, along with my fork.

He studies me for a few seconds like he’s trying to decide if I’m joking or not.

“Why?” Teddy asks, eyeing me suspiciously.

Because you saved me today, and you’re not the wrong guy. I don’t say that. I can’t believe I even thought it. Teddy’s not the wrong guy, he’s just…it wouldn’t work. But men who bandage injured knees deserve killer blowjobs, that’s an indisputable fact.

“Because I’m competitive,” I answer instead, throwing in a smirk for good measure.

He’s quiet for a few seconds, taking one more bite of his egg roll before adding it to a half-eaten box of sweet and sour chicken and chewing slowly. I’m almost expecting him not to answer, the silence stretches on so long, and then he looks at me again.

“Bradley Cunningham.”

“Bradley Cunningham?” I repeat curiously. “Why was Bradley so dynamite? I need details.”

“You saw my cock when we fooled around,” he says, and I nod. Boy, did I ever see his cock. It’s definitely worth another look though. “Well, then you know it’s a little larger than average.”

“Mm-hmm,” I hum, hoping I don’t sound as hungry as I suddenly feel. Two seconds ago, I would’ve sworn I couldn’t put another thing in my mouth after all that food, but damn was I wrong. I lick my lips and dart a glance down to the growing bulge in the front of Teddy’s jeans.

“Bradley is the only one who’s ever managed to take the whole thing. Some guys have tried, others don’t bother, just kind of half-assing it before moving on to anal, but Bradley fucking went for it.”

No offense, but fuck Bradley.

I eye Teddy up and down again, a new determination coming over me. By the time I’m done with him, he won’t even remember Bradley’s name.

I close the distance between us, climbing onto his lap and finding his mouth. There are a number of shocking things I learned about my best friend during our last…encounter, but the way he kisses is at the very top of the list. I’ve never been kissed so fucking thoroughly by anyone. It’s like Teddy kisses the way everyone was always supposed to kiss before we all got too bored and lazy about the whole thing and moved on to fucking.

His mouth is slow and deliberate against mine, his tongue stroking my tongue, every movement of his lips hypnotic and cock-hardening. Jesus, did I mention that the man can fucking kiss?

I’m not sure how long it is before I manage to drag myself away from his mouth, but by the time I do, my lips are sore, and my cock is throbbing. I grab the hem of his shirt, tugging it up. He gives me a questioning look but helps me get it over his head.

“I want to see your body,” I explain shamelessly, loving the heat that flares in his eyes at my boldness.

I press kisses from his bare shoulder down to his pec, wiry hair tickling my lips. He lifts his arms up, showing off his hairy armpits. Goddamn, I think I have a new fetish. Why have I been with so many men recently who wax themselves bare? Not again. I officially have a new rule: hair from here on out. I brush my mouth against his peaked nipple, and a shudder runs through him, a deep moan falling from his lips. Holy hell, I could spend the rest of the night just finding ways to elicit that sound from him again.

I use my tongue on the other one, the flat of it first and then the tip to flick it. Teddy gasps and writhes, canting his hips and reaching down to dig his fingers into my ass through my jeans. I kiss my way down, working his jeans open as I kiss and nip at different patches of his skin. I’ve always loved the slightly soft swell of his body when it comes to cuddling, but this is the first time I’m noticing how fucking hot it is. I could lick every inch of him and probably bust just from that.

He helps me get his jeans and underwear down, lifting his hips and then kicking them off once they’re low enough. I sink to my knees in front of the couch, spreading Teddy’s thick, hairy thighs and crawling between them. Okay, I’m starting to wonder if I even knew my own damn type before this moment because I’m on the verge of building a shrine to these thighs.

I kiss one and then the other, dragging my tongue up the inside of his thigh and then pressing kisses to the sensitive flesh not far from his balls. He grunts and twitches, his hands balled into fists beside him like it’s taking everything he has inside not to grab me and flip me over. Maybe next time.

He was right about his cock being on the hefty side. It lays long and thick against his belly, reaching just past his belly button. The crown is already sticky with precum, glistening in the light. His cock twitches under my attention, his balls flexing tighter and then relaxing. I brace my hands against his thighs and lean in to circle my tongue against the head of his cock. More precum bursts against my tongue, hot and tangy.

Teddy makes a low, rumbly sound deep in his chest that manages to somehow vibrate through my entire body. Even without the challenge of Deepthroat Bradley, I’m aching to fill my mouth with his cock, take him as deep as I can and make him moan wildly. My body prickles with heat at the thought.

I slide my hands up his legs, to his belly, and finally to his nipples, teasing them between my thumb and forefinger while I wrap my lips around his cock and take him to the back of my throat. His skin is hot, and his cock is so fucking hard that I’ll be surprised if he lasts. He grunts and groans, his hips twitching and his hands clenching.

I pull back a little, stroking my tongue along him and sucking when I reach the head. When I take him back in, I go deeper, fighting my gag reflex and relaxing my throat until my nose is pressed against his body and my throat is so full of his cock that I can’t breathe. I’ve always thought breathing is overrated anyway.

I tug and flick his nipples, deep throating his cock over and over, pulling back just long enough to drag in a breath before filling my mouth with him again.

Teddy laces his fingers through mine, and the sensation jolts me out of my rhythm for a second. I look up to see him just holding my hand against his chest, his lips parted on deep, hungry moans, his eyelids half-closed. His fingers tighten against mine, and his cock swells inside my throat. I hum and moan, moving my head faster, sucking harder, sloppy, filthy sounds filling the room as a mixture of spit and precum drip down my chin.

“Low,” he pants, arching into me, his thighs tensing and his cock throbbing so hard it jerks, trapped between my tongue and the roof of my mouth, and then starts to pulse, spilling cum down my throat.

I pull back so I can get some on my tongue and then take him deep again, swallowing and sucking until his cock starts to soften and his grip on my hand eases and slips.

I release him from my mouth and lick my lips, greedy for a last taste.

“Did I beat Bradley?” I ask, climbing back up onto the couch and leaning my head against Teddy’s shoulder as he tries to catch his breath.

“Who?” he asks, looking at me with genuine confusion.

I grin widely and press a kiss to his cheek. “Good.”