Love, Comment, Subscribe by Cathy Yardley

CHAPTER 31

“Thanks for helping us with this, Hayden,” Tobin said, after sketching out the rough idea of what they’d be filming for Lily’s video.

“No problem,” Hayden said. He was used to manning the camera, especially after going to film school, and Tobin was grateful for his help. The stuff he’d be doing with Lily needed more camera work than he could comfortably handle by himself, and they were going to be doing a skit here . . . telling a story.

“All right, so we’re starting with the couch, yeah?”

“Yeah.” He got on the love seat with Lily. She had dressed relatively casual, her makeup understated, her hair in a high ponytail . . . like she was just hanging out at home. Although, in this case, it was his home. He was wearing a pair of track pants and a T-shirt, one that she’d stared at. She seemed to like it. He clambered onto the love seat next to her. “Okay. Like we rehearsed, okay?”

She giggled, a little nervously. They started the camera.

“Thanks so much for the video series, Lils,” he said, his voice pitched just a little louder than usual, just a little more over the top. He put an arm around her shoulders. “I had a lot of fun.”

“I don’t know what I’m going to do now that we’re just doing our own stuff,” she said, and rested her head against his shoulder. “Although I will say one thing: it’ll be good for people to stop assuming we’re dating.”

“I know, right?” He stroked her shoulder. “It’s the weirdest thing. Why the hell would anyone think we’re together?”

“I know, right?” she said, then snuggled a little harder against his chest. He stroked her hair, forcing his body not to react to the proximity. That was the gag: that they were acting lovey dovey while saying things that were perfectly mild. “I mean, it’s not like we did anything really intimate.”

“I made you play a dating sim that turned into a murder spree, and jump scared the hell out of you,” he said with a laugh and was gratified when she nudged him in the rib cage with one sharp elbow. “Ouch!”

“You’re lucky I’m nicer than you,” she said with a sniff. “I made you hot.”

“Some might argue I was hot to begin with,” he protested.

She looked him up and down, and it was like being bathed in heat. “You might be right,” she said begrudgingly, but her pupils were blown, and she bit her lip.

God damn.He swallowed hard. “We did silly stuff too,” he said. “Doing each other’s makeup. And the horror movie.”

She nodded. “Really just stuff friends would do.”

They kept up some banter. Then they shifted, going to a lawn chair in the backyard. She’d changed into her bathing suit and was lying on her stomach. He applied sunscreen to her back, then rubbed her shoulders, segueing into a massage. Hayden snickered at the sheer lasciviousness of Tobin’s behavior.

“I mean, don’t all friends apply sunscreen onto their half-naked friends?” he asked.

“Of course,” she agreed, smiling, her eyes glinting beneath her sunglasses. “Your turn.”

She slathered him in lotion, and he had to admit: he could hardly remember his lines and could barely improv because she was really, really damned distracting. He took a deep gulping breath. “How about some lunch?”

The next scene was in his kitchen. They took turns feeding each other chocolate-covered strawberries. He decided to up the ante a little, “accidentally” getting some whipped cream on her collar bone . . . then wiping it off with his thumb.

Then she shocked him by putting his thumb in her mouth and sucking.

“Don’t tease,” he admonished softly, thinking he was definitely going to pay her back for that tonight. When the shot was done, Hayden was looking at him with a huge shit-eating grin. “What?” Tobin said, irritated with the scratchy quality of his voice.

“If I didn’t know you two, I would swear you two are already having sex,” Hayden said, his eyes curious. “Hell. I’m not a hundred percent convinced you aren’t.”

“Trust me, we’re not.” Close to it, but not sex itself.

But tonight . . .

“Not that there’d be anything wrong if we did,” Lily added with a grin, winking at Tobin.

“Hey, no judgment.” Hayden’s amusement was obvious.

“It’s a little bit of fan service, and part of it is to rub it in the face of whatever jackass decided to target Lily,” Tobin said. He wondered if they’d do a video “coming out” as a couple when they finally defined their relationship.

He then wondered when they were going to define their relationship.

One thing at a time.He ushered Lily into the master bath, where the tub was filling up with bubbles. She still wore her bathing suit, and he wore his trunks. Since the bikini was strapless, and the bubbles were high, it looked like the two of them were naked together in the tub, her back to his front, his knees around hers. He wrapped his arms around her.

“This okay?” he said, then swallowed against the lump in his throat and tried his best to not . . . well, poke at her. Think awful, nonsexy, softness-inducing thoughts. It wasn’t that kind of video, dammit. “Not too hot or too cold or anything?”

“Nope.” If anything, she sounded like she was purring. Glad she was having a good time, he thought.

Hayden got the camera going, suppressing a few guffaws. “This is so convincing,” he said.

“It’s really ridiculous that people think we’re in a relationship,” Tobin said, brushing a kiss against the rim of her ear and then cursing himself when she shivered against him—against a particularly sensitive part of him, to be honest. “I mean, what in the world would give them that idea?”

“And even if we were in a relationship,” she said, leaning against him, then twisting a little to face him, “what difference would it make, right? Lots of couples collab.”

“It’s not using someone if that someone is completely, utterly, and totally . . . willing to go all the way for you.”

She smiled, and it was like being handed the sun. “Besides, we work so hard together.”

Something was hard, that was for damned sure. He was losing the thread, so he forced himself to focus. “Um. Yes.”

She wiggled. Probably accidentally. But he felt it in the brush against the front of his swim shorts.

His body literally sprang to life He refused to look at Hayden, who thankfully seemed oblivious to what was happening beneath the bubbles.

“That’s good,” Hayden said. “Looks great. I’m gonna get set up in the bedroom for the last shot, okay?” Without another word, completely unconcerned, he walked out and shut the door.

Lily looked at him beneath damp lashes, her eyes dark and inviting.

“Don’t look at me like that,” he rasped. “We’ve got one final scene—then the video’ll be over.”

She laughed wickedly. “This is surprisingly fun. Teasing you, I mean,” she clarified, climbing out of the tub. He opened the drain. “If I had known you’d been interested in high school, maybe I would’ve teased you differently then, rather than trying to kill you all the time.”

“You are so going to get it tonight.”

“Maybe sooner than that.” She stepped into the shower, rinsing the bubbles off. Then, to his shock, she stripped out of the bathing suit.

He couldn’t help it. He stared. They’d always stayed clothed up to this point—he knew her by touch, but only with a layer between them.

She was gorgeous.

She glanced at him. “You’ll want to get out of those swim trunks,” she said as she wrapped up in a towel. “Don’t want to get your bed wet.”

He almost swallowed his tongue. He tugged off his trunks, unable to ignore her appreciative smile as she took him in.

“Come on, you two,” Hayden said on the other side of the door. “I’m meeting Juanita and some of the crew later. Let’s gooooo!”

Tobin loved Hayden like a brother, but in that instance, he wanted to yeet him into the sun.

“Let’s go,” Lily said, her smile slow and seductive. “Don’t want to make Hayden late.”

“Aren’t you putting on anything?”

“Nope.” She gestured to the towel. “This should be good enough. And it’ll make it . . . realistic.”

“Um . . . wait just a sec.”

He turned his shower to freezing cold, then jumped in and immediately yelped.

“You okay?” Hayden asked through the door, concerned.

“Just . . . yeah, I’m fine,” Tobin said through gritted teeth. Once his erection was gone, he wrapped up in the towel. Lily burst out in peals of laughter.

“Okay. Let’s shoot that last scene.”