Page 93 of His Hungry Wolf

Had he just said that? I panicked. When I had said it, I was joking. We always joked like that. Had he taken it seriously?

I mean, I loved him. Of course, I did. I had loved him forever. But there was a big difference between telling him that I used to be in love with him, acting like I’m in love with him, and actually saying I love him while doing the loving.

How was I supposed to respond? Perhaps any response would have been better than how I did, which was with silence.

God damn, was I a mess. This was Claude, the man of my dreams. There was a time when I would cry at night hoping to hear what I just had. Yet, I couldn’t say it back. What was wrong with me?

Luckily, Claude didn’t jump out of bed and run. It seemed that my particular brand of crazy wasn’t what triggered him. Thank God for that. And, if I were really quiet for the rest of the night, maybe he would let me fall asleep in his arms without reminding me of how awful I was.

That wasn’t quite what happened, but what did happen wasn’t bad. After what felt like forever, he asked me if I wanted to change. I told him that I was trying. But he had been talking about my clothes. That broke the tension.

Getting changed and returning to his arms, we fell asleep quickly after that. Waking to the sound of him showering after his morning run, I looked at the clock realizing I had to get going. I could only stare at his half-naked body as he got dressed for a short time today. Damn! Talk about the best part of waking up…

Hurrying into the bathroom after him, I almost missed the drawing on the mirror. I was excited to see it until I saw what it was. It was an image of two people lying with speech bubbles over them. One read, ‘I love you.’ The second was a series of ‘Zzzzz’, that bastard.

Rubbing it out without time to draw a reply, I hopped into the shower. Getting dressed and hurrying out, I told him that I would be back later to get ready for dinner. That was what I did.

Happy to see his hot body adorned in his tuxedo, I returned to the bathroom for another quick shower and found something else. Instead of there being a drawing on a fogged mirror, there was a fridge magnet stuck to the mirror’s metal frame. The magnet was an image of a clown saying ‘I love you’ while staring down at a pickle waiting for a response.

Did I used to think that Claude was a good guy? Because I was wrong. He was a dick.

Slipping it into my palm on the way out, I made sure not to acknowledge it when I saw him again. And the guy was amazing. There was nothing about him that hinted that he had left it.

Playing along, I put on my tuxedo and got ready to head out.

“Is that James Bond?” he asked, looking at me.

“What?” I asked, clueless.

“Sorry, for a second you looked like James Bond.”

Confused, I asked, “You do know what James Bond looks like, right?”

“Like the taller Hobbit from Lord of the Rings.”

“No, that’s… Merri,” I said, realizing what he was doing.

“Right! Yeah, that’s who you look like. Wait, who did I say? Anyway, should we go?”

Having had my fill of Claude, I then led my lovely date to the grand ballroom. Heads turned. And as much as I would like to believe that it was for me, there was no denying how great Claude looked tonight.

“You’re like the Black James Bond. Who is this, Merri?” one of my players asked me.

“I’m his date,” Claude said casually. Then, when Claude’s head was turned, the player gave me his impressed-bro face with a huge thumbs up.

As degrading and dismissive as I found his reaction, I couldn’t also help but feel really good. Because, yeah, I was with the hottest guy in the room, and I had seen him naked.

Forgiving Claude for his previous dickishness, I quickly relaxed and even dared to take his arm. For a guy who refused to label himself, he seemed amazingly comfortable with it. He would have made some rich old lady the perfect arm candy if I hadn’t gotten to him first.

“Oh, Claude, I would like you to meet Arny. Arny, this is the quarterback I was telling you about.”

Claude casually released my arm to shake Arny’s hand. I could tell the stocky middle-aged man was thrown by seeing Claude escort me, but he gathered himself quickly.

“Merri, tells me you’re hoping to be a part of the pre-season player showcase.”

“I was hoping. Merri’s been training me all summer. I think he has me right where he wants me.”

“In training, that is,” I added nervously.