My eyes snap open to a room I don't recognize. Slate-colored walls filled with tall windows. Dark hardwood floors span the room beneath modern, black and gray furniture. White charmeuse curtains barely block the sun glaring through the windows into the otherwise dark space. It looks like a bachelor stopped decorating halfway through and then hired someone with taste to finish the rest. Where the fuck am I?

The feel of velvet beneath me makes me look down. I'm on a couch—a huge couch—with a faux fur blanket covering me. I sit up and my head screams. Open bars are only enjoyable until the next morning. You would think I'd have learned that lesson by now.

I look around, my vision blurry with the throbbing in my head, and find the naked man on the floor next to me. The black tattoos on his arm and thigh make my heart race. "Heath?"

He groans as if to tell me to shut up.

Oh, shit. Oh, shit, shit, shit. I sit up straight and cover myself with the blanket. "Heath!" I shout.

His head darts up from his pillow. "What? Am I late?"

"Late for what, shithead? It's Sunday."

He looks over at me, his hair twisted with day-old product. "Then what the hell, Teags? Stop yelling, my head hurts." He lies his head back down as if nothing is out of place.

I nudge him with my foot. "What am I doing here?" I ask him. "Why are you naked?"

He groans again. "Chill, dude. Seriously." He sits up, pulling the blanket from his bare buttocks onto his lap. "We didn't have sex, if that's what you're asking—not that you didn't want to."

When my head stops pounding, I realize I'm still partially dressed. My hair is still pinned up, my bralette on, my Spanx still properly squeezing the life out of my midsection and thighs. Taking Spanx off is a simple job, but putting them on . . . That's either a two-person job or one person who is much more sober and dedicated to a smooth silhouette than I was last night.

"Do you remember the party? Coming home in the cab?" he asks. "Do you remember telling me to take my clothes off, or laughing yourself to sleep when I had trouble getting it up?"

"That does seem like something I'd do." The memories from last night begin to become clearer. The bar, the many, many drinks that led to my inability to walk or hold my tongue. Classic Teagan. "I need to pee."

"Bathroom's through there. Knock yourself out," he says, flopping back onto his pillow.

I get up and scramble through the door of what is apparently his bedroom. Inside is a huge bed with a jersey comforter the same dark color as the walls. It looks plush and comfortable. Why couldn't he have put me in here?

I slide the pocket door closed behind me and start tearing at my Spanx. When I finally get them off, I sit and sigh with relief. I am never putting those back on. No dress is worth that.

Wait. Where is my dress?

I clean up and leave the bathroom, Spanx in hand, and find Heath standing in the bedroom looking through his dresser. He looks over at me with tired eyes and smirks. I try to cover myself with the small segment of spandex and pretend I'm not mortified to be standing in my underwear in front of someone who could be an underwear model. Not that he hasn't seen it before.

"Can you let me borrow some clothes or something?" I ask him. "There's no way in hell I'm going home looking like I'm doing a walk of shame."

He chuckles. "Sure." He tosses me a shirt and after a moment of searching, a pair of joggers.

"Thanks."

"Yep."

I slip the shirt over my head and pull on the sweatpants. Heath has a soccer body, but his mom's Samoan genes work overtime. I'm tall for a woman, but compared to him at 6'4", his pant legs bunch up on my ankles. I pull the strings as tight as I can and smooth the shirt over them. When I glance up, I find him staring at me with a laughing expression. "What?" I bark at him.

"Why do you always act like you hate me?"

"Because I do hate you," I answer matter-of-factly.

"Yeah, well you're no sunshine and lollipops yourself, but that's not what I'm talking about." He gives me a mischievous grin. "You didn't hate me last night. And you definitely didn't hate me after Brett's wedding," he teases me. My eyes widen. "You remember that trip, right? The hotel right off the beach. That night the AC went out and we couldn't sleep, so we stayed up and spent hours having hot, sweaty se—"

"Stop."

I try my hardest not to remember that night. Not to say that the sex wasn't good—it was amazing, actually. But it's Heath. The biggest douchebag on the planet. I'd rather kick a rat while wearing open-toed sandals again than tell him that. 

He steps closer to me, impeding my line of vision. My eyes trace down the defined muscles of his chest and core. The low ride of his pants provides a teasing view of an ironic pair of Calvin Klein underwear, and the only dash of hair on his otherwise waxed body. It's frustrating how attractive he is, but Heath won the genetic lottery. His dad was a heartthrob quarterback, his mom a Ms. Universe contestant. Together they made one, objectively stunning human, and he absolutely knows it.

"You rocked my world and then didn't talk to me for six months," he says. "I didn't see you until the Christmas party and you acted like it never happened. Just like you always do."

The memory makes my heartbeat quicken, but I play it cool. "So?"

"So . . ." He steps closer but I refuse to shy away. "It didn't feel nice to get brushed off like that."

"There are a few women who might call that karma, Heath." 

He lets out a heavy sigh. "Oh my God. You hate me, I get it. Most of the time I hate you, too. We both know we'd have nothing to do with each other if it weren't for the guys and Levi."

My brick-wall façade cracks a little when Heath says his name. My brothers are my weakness. Levi worships the ground he walks on, and in part, Heath does the same with him. No matter how much I've wanted to be rid of him, Heath has always been in my life in one way or another.

While also being a douchebag.

He twists the drawstrings of my pants around his fingers and then tugs them. My eyes snap up to his, but I ignore the warmth it sparks in my core. "Why is it so hard for you to admit you want me?"

"I don't want you."

"You sure?" he asks. "You seem to want a certain part of me."

He takes another step closer. I step backward, my back hitting the wall. He reaches forward and places his hands on my hips, pulling them gently against his. I fight to ignore the pounding in my chest and somewhere much lower.

"You know and I know that under that control-freak bullshit is a regular, old freak. Everything we talked about last night . . . all the frustrations of missing an orgasm you know I could give you in five minutes," he says with a cocky grin. His hands slide up my waist slowly, making me shiver. "You want me, but you're busy wasting your time on some prick who can't get you off."

"So, you're saying I should waste my time on a prick who can get me off instead?"

He smirks. "That's still an upgrade."

I close my eyes with a sigh. "Apparently my bar isn't just low, it's in hell."

He laughs and lets me go. "Just think about it for a second, Teags. You're busy with law school. I have my residency at the clinic taking up most of my time. And that doesn't include all the party season bullshit we have stacked up this summer," he lists. "We're both too busy to be on Tinder swiping through randoms for the chance at occasional, mediocre sex."

Is he actually making a point? "Okay. So, what do you suggest we do instead?"

"Why don't we set up some kind of arrangement?"

"An arrangement," I repeat with suspicion. "That sounds an awful lot like a relationship."

"It's not a relationship, it's more like a . . . situationship."

I feel my brow tense as I try to find a way to hate his idea. "In theory, that sounds great, but how would that ever work?"

"The only reason it doesn't work is because people can't be real with their expectations. We can fuck each other's brains out and still manage not to talk afterwards. I think it's pretty clear what we do and don't want from each other." He steps away from me and crosses his arms, his biceps and abs flexing as he does. "You're the legal person here. Think up some terms. See if we can agree on something for once."

I stare at him, running through all the possibilities of how this could end badly. As much as I hate him, I have to admit he presents a rather attractive offer. Maybe he's the attractive part. Even reeking of last night's alcohol, he still has me drooling.

A smile spreads across his face. "The way you're looking at me right now makes me think we have a deal."

I take a breath and steel myself back into my poker face. "I'll think about it."

_____

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