Luka hasn’t been the biggest baseball fan, but in New York, he used to go to Mets games for me.
“Tied for second in their division, right?” Before I show surprise, he continues, “Send some of that luck to my team, please.” He means basketball. I already know which team before he says it—the same way that I’m realizing he knew mine. “I’m in literal pain watching the Knicks.”
They only won one game in February. I don’t like basketball, but I always check the scores of the Knicks. It’s one of the only ways I can picture Luka, even when I should’ve been forgetting him.
We both held on.
That’s a real fact now. It nearly overwhelms me, but I take a deep breath.
“I saw their February scores,” I tell him. “Terrible.”
Luka smiles and teases, “Don’t hold back on what you think.”
“I won’t,” I say with a grin.
He takes a step closer, and our chests rise at the exact same time. A blip of Luka from the locker room flashes in my head. His large hand barely covering his package, his washboard abs and lean muscles, and the cascade of tattoos up his right leg. To his thigh.
I rub my lips together, trying not to appear hot and bothered. Play it cool. “You still like Broadways?” I wonder, wanting to know everything about twenty-year-old Luka.
“Oh yeah.”
“Rent still your favorite?” I loosely stretch my arm. Acting as normal as possible.
“No.” Another step closer.
I try to mask my disappointment. Now I know how it felt when he learned I like watching TV. “Chicago then,” I guess.
Luka nods, moving closer.
My pulse thumps, and my body throbs, sensitive spots awakening that have been dormant for ages. His muscles flex like he’s experiencing a similar reaction, and he’s still at least five feet away from me.
The intensity of the moment, the tension that strings us together, engulfs me in a hot second. My gaze falls to the concrete.
“How’s Rudy?” he asks.
My chest swells. “Alive,” I say as I look up.
His soul-bearing eyes touch mine, knowingly. Years blaze through us. The week my parents passed away, Luka Kotova gave me Rudy. I was crying about how ridiculous it was that everyone kept bringing flowers when those just die, too.
That very afternoon, a bulbous slightly lumpy cactus showed up on my coffee table.
And Luka said, “That won’t die. It’ll probably outlive us all.”
“And it has character,” I said tearfully. We were all about things that had “character”—because life contained more that way. We weren’t sure what “more” meant—what it was. But we always sought after its existence.
“It has character,” he nodded. “What’s it named?”
Rudy’s name was completely and utterly random. And he’s still alive today.
Luka nears, four feet away.
Three feet.
Two.
He reaches out and clasps my hand. Already drawing me to his body. “Come here,” he says softly, and a magnetic force pulls us together. Bodies melded.
And his lips touch my lips, kissing me with years’ long pent-up emotion. His hands encasing my soft cheeks, drawing me as close as can be, and my pulse speeds. The deep force of the kiss says, I missed you.
I love you.
I burst, lighting up. And I reciprocate with the same desperate aggression. Our tongues tangle like they remember where they once were. Natural and scorching.
I grip his shoulders tight, and his hands clutch my head, my waist, with masculine energy that turns me on to the millionth degree.
My hips bow towards his body, and he pushes me closer by pressing on the small of my back. Glued together, he drives another kiss deeper, further.
Luka breaks apart, just to breathe, “I’m picking you up.” His lips brush my ear. “And spreading your legs wide open.” Before I register, he hoists me effortlessly to his waist, my legs stretched apart around him.
A noise tickles my throat.
Luka used to call out what he was going to do to me, before he actually did it. I liked hearing him unflinchingly say I’m putting my hard cock inside of you.
He was confident back then, but he’s ten times that now.
My lips sting and swell beneath the spine-tingling force of our kisses, and my legs wrapped around him, I pulse and pulse. Dizzying, I run my palms down his back, our lips never breaking.
He walks forward with me in his embrace.
My back strikes the brick wall with a gentle thud. Letting me catch my breath, Luka sucks the nape of my neck, hard and so sensitive—a moan escapes my lips.
I shudder against his build, and he presses his weight completely to me. The force is amazing. His hand returns to my cheek, and as I pant, he looks deep into me. His eyes caressing mine.
He’s fucking me with his gaze. It’s honestly so powerful and intimate that my head tries to loll backwards—and it hits brick.
Luka breathes shallow breaths with a rising grin. And then he kisses me, tenderly this time, and he whispers, “That was number two on your list.” Kissing.
I think about the list’s stipulations. “Does that mean it’s the last kiss?”
“No,” he murmurs. “We can do everything again.”
But the list has an ending. We’ll get our closure. On our terms. “Just until the list is completed,” I state and breathe heavy, fisting his shirt, scared to let go.
Our noses brush as he dips his head lower. “Exactly.” We’re about to kiss again, but the cab’s headlights glare, and a beam of light sweeps our bodies.
He eases back, and I drop down off of him. I’m tense.
He’s tense.
I’m also more aroused than I’ve been in years. A sheen of sweat coats our skin, and the chilly night pricks my neck. Yet, I burn up from the moment.
I expect a wedge to drive us apart, but we’re clinging to one another as long as we can. In secret. I hug him around the waist, and he hooks his arm around my shoulders, bringing me even closer and kissing the top of my head.
He also used to do that all the time as we evaded AE employees. A warm side-hug and a head kiss. While we walked and talked. Everywhere we went.
And I miss falling asleep in his arms.
We have to go. But I never want this night to end. Once we reach the Vegas strip, reality looms, and in time, we’ll have to fully separate and act like nothing happened here.
I try to remember the good. I try to hang on.
I’ll see Luka again. Not just as co-workers, but as something more.
Act Twenty-One Luka Kotova
47 Days to Infini’s Premiere
February in Vegas on a Friday afternoon. It’s weirdly hot outside, and less strangely, overcrowded.
We’re given an hour lunch break from practice, and I push through the throngs of tourists taking selfies.
Of course they choose to congregate around the Masquerade’s street entrance. It’s known for its mammoth marble replica of a regal ball. People can walk through the legs of marble masked men and women.
I duck beneath a selfie stick and spot Bay by the curb. Staring at the vast row of food trucks. I begin to smile.
Food trucks only stop by the Masquerade on the last Friday of every month, and I haven’t been in the past. Always avoiding her. But I’m done with avoidance.
For once, I’m getting what I want.
After we kissed outside the diner, we agreed to keep it professional for a few days. Just to throw off any suspicion. We’re not actively trying to be caught, but that cautiousness lessens today. Earlier, I texted her about grabbing lunch.
It went something like this.
Me: Lunch?
Baylee: it’s food truck day. I can’t miss it.
Me: so then food trucks.
Baylee: it’s right outside the hotel. Unless you’re okay with that.
Me: I’m okay with that.
If someone sees us, we can blame “coincidence” and that we just happened to want the same food. We’re still co-workers.
This whole plan is going to work.
It has to work.
I approach Baylee, and she catches my gaze. Her lips partially upturn, sunlight glittering her brown eyes. Her sporty braids are a little bit frizzy (adorably so), both of us beat from six hours of morning practice. I notice an icepack melting in her hand.