The One That Got Away Read Free Page B

shoots me a startled glance over his shoulder. “Seriously? She was really talented.” His informed use of the past-tense verb is the first acknowledgment, all evening, of the fact that he and I have ever had any interaction more personal than a passing conversation at one of Danny’s get-togethers.
    The ache blooms, right below my rib cage, as it always does when I think of her. “Yes, she was. Well, I’m at the end of the hall if you need anything,” I say, then feel heat creep up my throat as I realize that not only does he already know from personal experience exactly where my bedroom is, but it sounds as though I have just invited him there. All that was missing was a sexy lift of my eyebrows and a slow-motion lip-lick.
    “But, um, you should be all set here,” I add, stumbling over my embarrassment. “The bathroom’s right through that door.”
    He smiles, politely ignoring my discomfort. “Thanks, Sarina. I’ll see you in the morning.”
    “Sleep tight,” I say, and pull his door shut behind me.
    In my rush to enclose myself in the privacy of my bedroom, I trip over a pair of boots I’d left lying by the door.
“Chrrrrrist,”
I mutter, and belly flop onto my unmade bed. If Eamon really is moving back to town, he’s good enough friends with Danny that I’m going to be seeing a fair amount of him, so I have got to quit with the staring and the blushing.
Especially
the blushing. Addressing it directly is out of the question—we have too little history together, and it’s too long ago, for it to even merit a clearing-the-air conversation. Admitting that it’s still on my mind would do more harm than simply continuing to stand on the carpet it’s swept under. I’m over it—I just have to make sure from now on that I act like it.

3
    Dread pulls me out of sleep the next morning like a kid tugging on my shirtsleeve. When my eyes snap open, I remember: I’ve got my one-night stand as a houseguest. And I am apparently supposed to spend the day Miss Daisying his ass all over Austin as a prelude to helping him renovate a house I have neither time nor inclination to work on.
    I stack my hands under my head and trace my eyes along the wood beams traversing the ceiling of my bedroom. They were hidden under a grid of yellowed acoustical tile until Danny and I got our hands on the place. As I study them, I wonder how serious Eamon is about renovating. It’s the kind of thing that sounds like fun to people unfamiliar with the process—you get to pick all kinds of cool stuff and totally customize your space to your own taste. But although he said he wants a fixer, the reality is that a young, single guy is much better suited to a place he can move right into.
    It also occurs to me that, if he really does want an architect’s help with the project, he could probably find a less awkward candidate than a woman he slept with once upon a time. Ancient history or not, there’s no way around the fact that we’ve donethings to each other’s bodies that have no place whatsoever in a business relationship. Unless, of course, I’m the only one who remembers the details.
    I wholeheartedly wish I
didn’t
remember them.
    —
    When we met, I was new to Austin, having only been living with Danny in his tumbledown Barton Hills split-level for a few months. He would
not
shut up about his old roommate Eamon, God’s gift to backstroke and butterfly (“Nobody can compete in both of those strokes, Sarina! Nobody!”), who was so cool, so funny, so talented, oh, and had he mentioned he was also hot like sun flare? This being before my forced indoctrination into the cult of swimming, I’d warned Danny that if I heard the name Eamon Roy one more time I would Sharpie it across his forehead while he slept.
    Eamon was, I had been told no fewer than five times, coming to the demolition party we were throwing to celebrate the start of our renovation work on Danny’s house (guests were welcome to bring hammers and chisels to join