When he lets go, there’s no time to catch my breath since he nips on my earlobe. “Mmm. Last night, you smelled like strawberries. Now, you smell like us,” he rumbles, and my knees weaken, then I ache when he rasps out, “Smell her, Weston.”

  Chase swoops in and drags his nose along my neck, and it’s too early for me to be this turned on again, and yet I am. “Yessss,” Chase murmurs, then brushes tender lips to mine.

  It’s a dust of a kiss that sends a ribbon of pleasure unfurling inside me.

  I’m overwhelmed with their kisses and their words once again.

  I leave, with two new roomies for the next week, and no idea what will happen when I return tonight.

  12

  A HOUSEWARMING PRESENT

  Trina

  Jaw agape, my sister clutches her pregnant belly, like her basketball baby is going to fall out from the shock of my choices. “You can’t be serious?”

  We’re standing outside Aubrey’s apartment building in the Outer Sunset, a chill whipping past us that evening. Nacho lifts his snout in the direction of the breeze, sniffing the air, his little tan nose working overtime.

  “Yes, I’m serious, but it’s only a week,” I say. Okay, it’s nine days, but who’s counting? I sling my backpack up on my shoulder as I curse this timing.

  I almost avoided my sister. I was out the door when Cassie ambushed me with a succulent ten minutes ago, arriving at the building unannounced while Aubrey was taking a call from a client begging for a balayage appointment. “Surprise! Just a little housewarming present for you and Aubs,” Cassie said when she showed up.

  Code for I’m spying on you to see if you’ve shacked up with a drug lord at your bestie’s place.

  That’s Cassie—she thinks she’s the helper but she’s actually the challenger. She’s willful and controlling, and I’m sure it’s because deep down, she doesn’t ever want anyone to overpower her, so she overpowers everybody.

  Or maybe she just really thinks I’m a loser.

  Cassie points to my pooch to make her argument. “You’re going to take your darling dog,” she says, and wow, she’s trying hard if she’s calling my pup a darling. “And let him live with someone you don’t even know?”

  Well, I know Chase biblically. Oops. I meant…them.

  “I know him,” I say, deliberately choosing to focus on one man only. Cassie doesn’t need to know there’s another super-hot hockey star bed surfing there too.

  If my sister thinks I’m a hot mess for rooming with a new guy for a week, imagine what she’d think if she knew I hooked up with not one, but two guys.

  I file that under things she will never know.

  “How do you know him?” she asks, continuing her rant. “You hate hockey.”

  “No, I don’t,” I insist.

  She gives me the look. The I’m your older sister and I know better look. “Trina, you despise sports. You actually wrote down a life goal to never go to a sporting event,” she points out.

  “Because you asked me for my life plan when you took me out for ice cream a few months ago!” I point out. “I put it on there as a joke.”

  “And you never wanted to go when Matthew and I invited you to see the Renegades. He has season tickets, you know.”

  I know, I know. I hear about them every time I see her. Her husband is the team dentist for the Renegades football team, and I’ve had the audacity—her word—to turn down their offer of tickets. Gee, I wonder if it’s the football I don’t like or the judgment.

  “Well, I like hockey now,” I say defensively, and that’s sort of true. I like some aspects of it. Like the fancy food and the suits.

  “But…” she says, flapping her hands, building up a head of steam and sputtering so much that Nacho cocks his head, staring at her with concern, then whimpering.

  I bend down to stroke him reassuringly. “She’s fine, honey.”

  Then Cassie blurts out, “But he could be a serial killer.”

  I laugh, scooping up my dog in my arms. Nacho rewards my love with a face lick. “He plays professional hockey. They probably vet for that.”

  “You don’t know for sure. Just stay with me,” she says, gentling her tone. “We can have sister time before the baby comes.” She holds her belly again, like she’s using it as a lure for me. Come to baby land. We can discuss whether I’m the size of a pumpkin or a honeydew. “I want to bond with you. Help you be the best aunt you can be.”

  Because that should be my life goal?

  I know my sister means well, but it’s time to play my trump card. “Cass, I appreciate the offer. Truly, I do. But he lives really close to An Open Book, and I’m working a ton over the next several days,” I say. I don’t add that I took an extra shift to earn some money for the security deposit at the new place. She’d probably sister-nap me and force me to live with her rent-free, which would have its perks when it came to my bank account, but that’d be about it. “And it’s going to be super easy for me to stay there till I move into the studio next week,” I say. Cassie lives across the bridge in Marin County, thirty minutes from my store.

  “But I come into the city a lot for work,” she says, and damn, my sister is tenacious. “Like tonight. I was here seeing a client. I could drive you to work,” she says in a sing-song voice.

  “Cassie, I will be a badass aunt for your little bambino, but I’m going to live with Chase Weston for a week, and I promise he won’t lay a hand on me to murder me. You have my word.”

  He might however lay a hand on me to, say, spank me. Pinch me. Bite me.

  A girl can dream of unlocking more kinks.

  Cassie sighs heavily, clearly frustrated she’s losing this battle. “At least let me drive you to his place.”

  Before I can say thanks but no thanks, the front door swings open and Aubrey shouts, “I’m ready to take you to The Pound—”

  I mime slicing my throat as Cassie peers at Aubrey. My bestie gulps guiltily, shutting the fuck up.

  “To the pound what?” Cassie’s tone drips with suspicion.

  I jump in before this conversation crashes harder. “The Poundcake Factory,” I supply, since there just aren’t that many compound words starting with pound.

  Cassie arches a well-groomed eyebrow. “The Poundcake Factory? What exactly is that?”

  Think fast. “It’s…a new pop-up shop in Hayes Valley. It sells pound cakes. Hence the name,” I say, improvising as fast as I possibly can.

  Aubrey smiles too big as she adds, “We saw it on social and got an invite.”

  Cassie crosses her arms. “I like pound cake. I haven’t had any in ages. I’ll go.”

  Uh-oh. Didn’t see that coming. Think faster. “Oh, I just remembered,” I say, snapping my fingers. “There’s a live jazz band playing too.”

  Cassie shudders. She abhors jazz music. I’ve seen her walk out of restaurants that play jazz. “Okay, can you get me a slice of pound cake and bring it to me when we have dinner with Mom and Dad this week?”

  I’m going to do everything I can to find a pound cake in this city. “I promise.”

  I give her a hug, thank her for the plant, then say goodbye. I breathe a sigh of relief when she drives off, and I can finally slide into Aubrey’s tiny car with Nacho in my lap.

  “The Poundcake Factory?” Aubrey asks as she puts the car in drive.

  “Well, if you weren’t calling it The Pound Palace I wouldn’t have had to make that up.”

  “No. If you didn’t bang them I wouldn’t have needed to call it The Pound Palace.”

  “I didn’t bang them,” I point out.

  “But you will. Or really, you better. Say, tonight?” Her voice rises with hope.

  At a light, I turn to her, uncertainty racing through me. “I honestly don’t know if they want to again.”

  She rolls her eyes. “He invited you to stay with him.”

  “But he didn’t say it was to bang him. Or them.”

  “Because that would have seemed transactional. But trust me, he’s wanting to make another transaction,” she says with a naughty little purr in her voice, then she hits the gas and cruises through the city. “You’re going to be a legend among women soon. You’re going to be the patron saint of Double Teams. I bet women are going to build a shrine to you at your bookstore. You should tell the book club.”

  “I’m not going to tell the book club about my escapade.”

  “Then just tell me. Like, did you spend the entire day googling different positions for three-ways?” she asks salaciously as we hit a light.

  Laughing, I roll my eyes.

  “I’ll take your silence as a yes.”

  I smile. “Not the entire day. Just during my break. I want to be prepared.”

  “If you want to be prepared, I can help you out with that. Here’s a little something I picked up for you.” Aubrey reaches a hand into the back seat, fishing around, then grabs something, and tosses it onto my lap.

  A bottle of lube.

  This is much better than a plant.

  But I still have the cake problem to solve, so I start a group chat with the guys and ask: Do you happen to know any place nearby that sells pound cake?

  Well, they’re competitive. Maybe they’ll get on my new pound cake problem as fast as they handled the O drought issue.

  13

  A VISIT FROM THE DRAGON

  Chase

  I’ve traveled around the world. Played pro hockey in Budapest, Vienna, Toronto, New York, and Rio de Janeiro.

  At twenty-seven, I’ve had a big life in five years in the NHL. But this, right here, is one of the coolest things I’ve ever seen. Trina’s pup is tearing up a seesaw, then racing down the other side, and the little guy is doing it while missing one of his back legs.

  “Mind blown,” I say, cheering on Nacho under the glow of outdoor lights in the evening.

  Trina too. Because look at her go. She’s guiding him through the agility course at a nearby dog park I scoped out in advance. It’s a busy park, with families pushing strollers and joggers tearing up the path even as dusk settles in. When Trina and Nacho arrived at my place a little while ago, I hustled them right out of there to take the little guy here for a treat.

  Bonus? It’s a perfect distraction from my incessant thoughts of her all day. From texts from my cousin, Lisette, too, telling me about every single friend she wants to set me up with at her wedding. It’s like the singles table is her personal buffet of options for me, and I’ve run out of evasive emoticons to reply with. Last time she set me up with someone, it petered out after a few dates, but Lisette kept asking me over and over what went wrong. The answer? I don’t have room for romance in my life.

  Most of all, though, the dog park is a distraction from all my thoughts about the possibilities of tonight.

  I home in on the man of the hour. So does a jogger from many feet away, craning his neck to watch the small dog soar over a little jump. He lands gracefully, then Trina points at the weave poles a few feet ahead. “Weave, Nacho,” she says, eyes only on him.

  That little tripod waggles his butt back and forth in a black and tan blur all the way to the end of the weave poles before he darts through a tunnel at Mach speed.

  She runs along the side, chestnut hair flying, platform sneakers slapping the dirt, then waits for him at the end, arms thrust high in the air. “Good boy!”

  Barking enthusiastically, he jumps up and down on one freaking back leg, eager for her praise.

  Trina scoops him up and slathers him in kisses.

  “That is officially the coolest thing I’ve ever seen,” I say as I trot over to the pair.

  “And my sister said I could never do it,” Trina says proudly, a little defiantly.

  “Let me guess. Big sister?”

  “Yup,” Trina says, then reaches into a pocket of her jeans and hands Nacho a dog treat. He chows down while a serious-looking dog trainer type pushes open the faraway gate, escorting a pair of Border Collies into the park. “It’s peanut butter. His favorite,” she adds.

  “Mine too,” I say.

  “Aww. Want a dog biscuit, Chase? You’ll have to jump through a hoop though,” she teases.

  Ah, that’s an opening to the big thing on my mind, and I shouldn’t take it, but impulsively, I answer with, “We already cleared the orgasm hoop.”

  I’m testing the waters probably sooner than I should, even though the other part of the us isn’t here. Ryker said he had to run some errands.

  “With flying colors,” Trina says, then tilts her face, looking at me with curious green eyes, maybe waiting for me to say more.

  I want to. God, how I want to. But I’ve got to play it safe, since I don’t know what Ryker wants. This morning, he took off ten minutes after Trina, saying he needed to let the contractors into his home. I haven’t seen him all day, so I don’t have a stinking clue if he’s been thinking nonstop about Trina too.

  Just like I have.

  Trouble is, I don’t want to have the “I can’t stop thinking about getting you naked again” talk with her without talking to him first. Pact and all. What if he’s not thinking about her the same way? Maybe she’s out of his system, and then where does that leave me? Confused. I’m not normally confused after one-night stands.

  This isn’t a one-night stand you dumbass. She’s now living with you.

  But what the hell is this?

  My only choice for now is to skate around the problem, focusing on the dog in her arms. I scratch him under the chin and he leans forward and swipes his tongue across my face.

  I grin like a fool. “That’s it. It’s official. He marked me, and I’m going to have to be his dog babysitter for the rest of time.”

  With a laugh, Trina sets her hand on my cheek, wiping off the remnants of dog kiss. I let out a low rumble, meeting her gaze for a few delicious seconds that makes me want to haul her over my shoulder once more.

  A shuddery breath seems to ghost across her lips, then she shakes it off. “I’m glad you like your temporary roommate,” Trina says, petting Nacho too. The little dude pants harder. “I think he’s tired though.”

  I glance toward the gate. “Can I walk him on the way back?” I ask, sounding like an eager kid. And I kind of am.

  “Sure. What’s the deal with you and dogs? You’re kind of obsessed. Like more than I am,” she says as we leave the park and she hands me his leash.

  I sure am, and there’s one reason for it. I take the leash, keeping a tight grip on my new buddy, who takes the lead on the sidewalk. “My dad was a veterinarian. He loved all animals, but especially dogs, so we always had them growing up. But our last dog passed away shortly before my dad did.”

  Trina looks my way with gentle eyes. “I’m sorry about your dad, Chase,” she says, sympathy flooding her tone. “That must have been so hard on you. And on your mom.”

  “Yeah, it was,” I say, downplaying that terrible year, the damage to my heart, the way I changed. The way I had to change. “And after, she decided not to get another dog. She was too busy with my little brothers and raising them solo.”

  “A dog would’ve just been more work for her, she probably figured, and she was probably grieving still, adjusting to a new life she never expected,” Trina says thoughtfully, understanding my family just like that.

  Maybe that’s why it’s easy for me to keep talking when I don’t usually get into the nitty-gritty. “When I was younger, my dad and I would go on long walks together in the evening with Bandit, and I’d tell him about school and the team and practices, and well, just life and stuff while Bandit trotted ahead of us, sniffing everything. I liked those times.”

  “I can tell. That’s a nice memory,” she says with obvious affection as we stroll past a thrift store with boxy army jackets in the window.

  I let the fond memories roll past me for another few seconds, then say, “He was a cool one. Part Border Collie, part cheetah. Fastest dog ever. Dad loved him too and he kept us busy.”

  “Sounds like you two had a lot of fun with him and got to spend some good times together because of him,” she says as we turn onto California Street while twilight wraps its arms around the city.

  “Yeah. We did. Someday, it’d be nice to have another Bandit, or a Nacho,” I say, wistful, then I shake that off too. “But it’s hard to have a dog since I’m on the road so much. That’s why I still try to volunteer as much as I can. It’s important to me, and it was to my dad too,” I say, and wow. Do I sound like I’m tooting my own horn or what? I shift my focus to her. “Why does your sister think you can’t handle a dog?”

  Trina sighs, a little resigned. “She thinks I can’t handle anything. Like, say, life. But maybe she’s not wrong. I mean, I’ve lived in three places in the last month. My douchey ex’s, my bestie’s couch, and now with a guy I met…um, last night,” she says with a wince. “She might be right.”

  Nope. No way. Not gonna let her doubt herself. “Your ex was a world-class asshole. He never deserved you, and you got the hell out the second you learned the truth. That takes guts. Hell, it takes serious ovaries, and you have them, Trina,” I say, giving her a pep talk she didn’t ask for but that I feel compelled to give. “And you take care of this awesome dog and look out for him and hold down a cool job. All while dealing with the aftermath of a shitty breakup. That’s a lot.”

  And so is a breakup, so I add, “It’s not easy dealing with the end of a relationship. My ex was a piece of work too, and sometimes you just need to take it easy and not expect too much of yourself. Know what I mean?”

  She takes a beat, then nods. “Thanks for saying that. Cassie got on my case earlier this evening, so I think I needed to hear something nice.”

  “If you ever need a pep talk, I’m your guy. It takes time to get over someone—even the jerks. I mean, I wasn’t in love with my ex. Romance wasn’t my jam to start with, but still, the whole experience soured me on romance even more,” I admit.

  She shoots me a sad smile. “You and me both.”