This Spells Love(39)

I reach for him, my blood humming with the anticipation that I’m getting exactly what I want tonight, time with Dax, alone. However, my head can’t help feeling a little guilty, abandoning Sunny at this party.

“Are you sure you don’t want to come along for the ride?”

She shakes her head. “No thanks. I just spotted a friend from the hospital. I’ll catch up with the two of you later?”

I swear I see her wink as Dax drops his arm and instead places his hand on the small of my back. We navigate the sweaty bodies, finally making it to the kitchen at the back of the house. There’s a literal keg set up in the corner next to a rowdy game of flip cup happening on the kitchen table.

Dax fills a fancy rose-gold cup with beer, hands it to me, and then proceeds to fill a second.

“Not drinking Guinness tonight?” I ask between sips.

He holds his beer glass up to the light. “I was actually drinking scotch before you got here, and you can’t play flip cup with scotch. I mean, I guess you can, but then you wind up passing out behind Dougie’s couch and scaring the shit out of him when you reappear the next morning while he’s watching Sportsnet—not that I’m speaking from experience.”

“You want to play flip cup?”

Dax has never been a flip cup guy. In fact, we usually spend Dougie and Brandon’s parties together on the couch, making fun of Dougie’s friends who use flip cup as an excuse to get their dates wasted.

“I was going to suggest we play flip cup.” He holds his beer out for a cheers.

There’s a look to Dax that I can’t quite decipher. Not to mention that I have no idea where his head is at, wanting to play this game. But I cheers him back with an enthusiastic “Let’s do this,” deciding that my objective tonight is to show him that I’m easygoing, fun Gemma. And tonight, easygoing, fun Gemma plays flip cup.

When the next game starts, we take our places at the table. It’s five on five. The opposing team is made up of guys who used to play rugby with Dougie back in the day.

On our team is a set of twins, Miranda and Mariah, who are dating two of the rugby players and claim they’ve never played flip cup before in their lives. We also have Brandon’s younger brother Peter, Dax, then me in the anchor position.

My guess is we won’t be crushing the competition.

We sing the obligatory olé to kick off the game, then get a run of what I’ll deem beginner’s luck, as both twins drink, then flip their cups on the first try. We have a stellar lead on the rugby boys until Peter gets too excited and flips his cup so hard that it completes two full rotations, hits the table, bounces right off, and rolls underneath. By the time he recovers it and flips, our opponents are on their last player, with both Dax and me yet to go.

But our luck continues.

Our opponent, Jessie, whose name I glean from the aggressive chanting of his rugby bros, seems to have the yips. He can’t get his cup to flip. And although he’s lightning fast with his attempts, nothing sticks.

On our side of the table, however, Dax flips his on the very first shot, and all of a sudden, we’re all tied up.

It’s just me. The only person standing between loss and sweet victory, and although it’s situations like these that make me hate being the anchor, I manage to down my drink in a single gulp.

I place my cup on the table and focus on giving it just the slightest of flicks. It completes a textbook ninety-degree rotation and lands on the table with a thwack.

My hands shoot up into a V, and all of a sudden, my feet leave the floor as I’m scooped up into the biggest, tightest bear hug and spun around in circles.

The ceiling swirls above me. My flip-cup beer hits my bloodstream, combining with my euphoric high from our win.

Things are perfect.

Exactly as they’re supposed to be.

I’ve won in more ways than one.

But then Dax stops and lets me down slowly. My thoughts shift to how hard his body feels as it’s pressed to mine.

And how I can smell him.

All scotch and sweat and pheromones. And although I should be thrilled that I’ve finally received the Dax McGuire bear hug my body has been craving, now all I can think is that his eyes are such a beautiful shade of green. And that our faces are unnaturally close right now. And how everything about this moment is borderline dangerous.

No. Wait. This isn’t how things go.

Dax and I do not have sexy moments like this. We high-five. We make asshole remarks under our breath. We do not get mesmerized by each other’s eyes and the flecks of forest green we never noticed despite four long years of deep friendship involving ample eye contact.

“We should check on Sunny.” I end the eye business, completely chickening out on whatever is happening.

Dax takes a step back, putting much more pheromone-free air between us.

“She texted me while you were flipping. She got called in to the hospital and had to leave.”

“Oh,” is the best reply I can come back with.

Okay. This is fine. It’s just me and Dax. Dax and me. We’ve done this more times than we can count. NBD. Nothing to get worked up about—

“Hey, Dax—” a male voice calls.

Oh, thank god.

I welcome the sight of yet another one of Dougie’s rugby dudes.

“We have a bit of a situation outside.” He inclines his head toward the back door.