Page 110 of Hometown Halftime

He laughs while I drop my purse onto a chair at the kitchen island.

“Have you eaten yet?” he asks.

“I grabbed soup before I left.”

“Good. Way to go on having dinner. Proud of you,” he teases.

I lazily flip him off while heading toward the stairs, but I can still feel his eyes following me.

“Hey, Kinsey?”

I pause halfway up the stairs and glance back. Riley leans one arm across the back of the couch.

“Are you coming back down?”

“Yeah,” I answer. “Just need a quick shower.”

His eyes hold mine for another beat, then he nods once. “Okay.”

Upstairs, I close myself inside the bathroom and lean against the counter for a second while exhaling slowly.

Our little arrangement keeps looping in my head while I stand there in the bathroom. This afternoon, I decided tonight is the night I make my first move.

Have I run through a thousand ways to do it in my mind all evening? Yes.

Was I a little harder to handle during my shift because I was thinking about Riley’s penis? Most likely.

Heat spreads through my body all over again while I turn on the shower.

I step beneath the hot water and take my time shaving my legs. After I towel off, I moisturize from head to toe. And I tell myself it’s completely normal to dig through my drawer searching for the sexiest pair of underwear I own instead of the boring cotton pairs I usually wear.

Totally casual behavior. Absolutely not the actions of a woman preparing for potential sexy time activities.

After standing in front of my dresser for an embarrassingly long amount of time, I finally grab the black lace thong shoved all the way in the back of the drawer. Then I pull an oversized t-shirt over my head and purposefully forget to wear shorts. The hem brushes the tops of my thighs when I move, and after staring at myself in the mirror for too long, I point at my reflection.

"We're acting normal tonight. Don't act nervous, or you'll make him nervous."

My reflection looks unconvinced.

I brush my hair and suck in a deep breath before opening my door. Every step I take toward the living room feels charged with a nervous energy I haven’t felt in years.

I walk into the living room and purposefully walk right between Riley and the coffee table, interrupting his view of the TV. His eyes flick over my legs, and I catch it—his quick realization that my T-shirt is the only thing covering me. My pulse races under my skin, but I force myself to keep walking.

Riley clears his throat and shifts on the couch.

“Feel better?” he asks casually.

I tuck one leg beneath me as I settle onto the couch. “I do. Apparently, mozzarella-stick-related rage washes off with hot water.”

He chuckles. “That’s good to know for future emergencies.”

A smile tugs at my mouth while I grab the remote from the coffee table and lower the television volume. Football highlights continue flickering across the screen, but neither of us seems invested in them anymore.

The man sitting beside me has captured every ounce of my attention.

Riley stretches one arm across the back of the couch, relaxed on the surface, but I’m recognizing the signs underneath. The tension in his jaw, the way his fingers flex against the cushion. How his eyes keep drifting toward my bare legs before snapping politely back upward again.

It should not be this hot watching a man try to behave himself.