Jamey gives him a nervous glance. I think he’s jealous of Ryan. How sweet is that? Look at the way Jamey combs over Ryan’s muscular body… or maybe he’s thinking about getting a tattoo? Ryan’s arms are sleeved with complex geometric shapes. Jamey’s pupils dilate and it’s so obvious.

He’s thinking about working here.

"I'll see you tonight, beautiful. I'll bring Thai,” Jamey says, breathless, a genuine smile in his eyes. “Don't want you slaving over a hot stove when you could be rubbing my feet on the sofa."

Ryan gives him a weird frown, eyes doing that wide and narrow combination where you’re not sure what the person is thinking, but it isn’t good. He disappears down the hall to the men’s locker room for staff.

Jamey kisses me on both cheeks. So European. Then, without even looking at me, he disappears in the same direction as Zeke.

I love Jamey. Did I say that already?

RYAN

I fucking hate Jamey.

I tolerate him because Carrie thinks he hung the moon. When your friend is too clueless to realize she’s dating the wrong guy, there’s only one way to handle it.

Shut your mouth.

I scramble out of my street clothes and into my thong, moving quickly. Can’t have waistband lines marking my body. We show up a little early to get in uniform and adjust to the spa’s atmosphere. Women pay us a lot of money to be their oasis.

No man is an island, but for an hour or two, we can be a peninsula of pleasure.

“You rocked the Captain America costume yesterday,” Carrie says, her troubled look fading as she turns her attention away from the disappeared Jamey. She happens to stare down the hallway as I walk toward her. Now I’ve got her full attention.

Which is how I like it.

“Thanks, but we’re back to the standard uniform. In keeping with our new goal of remaining culturally relevant, the next costume is Dr. Strange.” Her eyes creep over me, my blood’s pace picking up. When Jamey gave me the once-over, it made my stomach clench.

When Carrie does it, other parts tighten.

“I wear more than that when I get a Pap smear, Ryan,” she says with a smirk. A vision of Carrie naked, honey-colored hair fanned out behind her and over the edge of an exam table in a doctor’s office with her shapely legs in stirrups flashes through my mind and oh, shit.

“How’s Jamey doing?” I ask. I don’t give a rat’s ass about him. Talking about anything that will deflate my ever-growing boner is my goal. Think about Donald Trump. Hillary Clinton. Betty White. Jamey.

Perfect. Deflation sequence activated.

“Jamey is so sweet!” Carrie gets that weird look again. Her eyes fill with a mild form of panic, which fades quickly, leaving her chewing on a pen cap. “He got us tickets for a holiday concert and just stopped by with my favorite coffee.”

“Nice. But every guy should do that for the person they’re dating.”

“Really?” She looks so surprised. I hate that she looks so surprised.

“It’s pretty basic Dating 101 stuff, Carrie.”

“Like you know anything about dating,” she lobs back at me. “You haven’t had a girlfriend since I met you.” She walks into her cubicle and nods for me to follow.

My heart just got decimated by a SCUD missile. I can’t look at her. I follow, then pick up one of the metal balls on her Newton’s Cradle and let it clack against the others. The force shoves the ball on the other end to strike out in an arc.

“Well, you know…”

She snorts. “Yeah, I know. Why settle for one woman when you can have a taste of so many?”

I’m not sure when she got the idea that I’m some kind of playboy Casanova manwhore. That’s Zeke. But no matter what I tell her, she doesn’t believe me.

“Right.” Our eyes meet and I can’t breathe. You spend years pretending and hiding your feelings and when those little slivers, fractions of time that don’t show up on a clock, protrude through your facade, you take them as they are.

Real, raw, and so hard.

But so good.

Her expression is serious. The world telescopes. Maybe now is the time. I swallow, my throat dry, and open my mouth as she keeps the gaze.

And then — smack!

A loud crack of a palm against ass cheek ruins the moment.

“You been upping the protein and dropping the carbs?” Zeke asks, butting in. He appraises me like I’m running for Mr. Universe, running his hand up and down my torso, counting my eight-pack. He mouths the numbers.

“You’re more cut than usual,” he adds. A smirk tickles his cocky English face as he widens his eyes, then gives Carrie a meaningful look. “What do you think, Carrie? Ryan’s looking damn good.” He turns me like I’m a piece of meat being inspected.

I fucking hate Zeke, too.

But Carrie, in that moment, does what people pleasers do. She follows his order, her inventory of my body starting with my feet. I can feel her attention, like a lingering touch, a visual caress that makes the hair on my body start to rally. Not quite gooseflesh, but damn close.

She passes up over my calves, across the knees, hesitating on my thighs, which are tight as I remind myself to unlock my knees. I have to control my breathing. Zeke crosses his arms over his chest and leans against the doorjamb. He’s wearing the same damn shoestring costume I’m wearing as we start our shift, so it’s not like I’m special here at the O Spa.

Carrie, though, makes me feel damn special as her look moves on to my package. I’m frantically trying to think about anything but how erotic this is.

Aside from Zeke, of course.

And then Carrie walks toward me.

Think about dead bodies. Rotting carcasses. Dead possum by the side of the road. Jabba the Hut having sex. Jamey having sex — wait, no, because then I have to think about Carrie having sex with that asshole, and I’ll get an angry boner.

Which is worse than a regular boner.

“ZEKE!” Henry Holliday, our master massage therapist and unofficial leader of all the male attendants here at O, calls for him. Peeling off, Zeke leaves me alone with Carrie, whose eyes have narrowed, head tilted, that long hair brushing her shoulder right in that spot I’ve fantasized about kissing a thousand times before.

“You look good, Ryan,” she says to my abs as Zeke walks away.

“Thank you. It’s that all-coconut-oil diet,” I joke.