He expected it to be awkward, but instead, he’d closed his eyes, was assaulted by Nate’s body heat, and fell asleep within thirty seconds.
Tuesday Aubrey sneaked out of bed before Nate could open his eyes.
Ignoring the consequences of his own bad decisions was a lot easier when he was with Nate, but that was mostly because he kept forgetting the whole thing was fake.
By the time he dropped off to sleep, alone in his own bed, it was technically Wednesday morning.
He woke up after a half-remembered dream that he immediately wanted to purge completely. He needed to get out of his apartment—out of the whole building, preferably to do something that wouldn’t permit any distraction.
When his cell phone beeped an appointment reminder, he smiled.Perfect.
There were seven cars in the arena parking lot when he pulled in. Aubrey picked up the stuffed dog and yellow roses from the passenger seat, snagged his skate bag from the trunk, and hightailed it to the locker room.
Greg groaned when he saw him. “What is this? Aren’t you supposed to be in Hawaii? I don’t need someone documenting my failures.”
“Obviously I should’ve brought vodka for the kiss and cry,” Aubrey said wryly. Greg always got like this before a big skate, and he was always fine. “Come on, suit up. I’ll warm up with you. Take your mind off it.”
“You’re a terrible man and I hate you.”
Aubrey clapped him on the shoulder. “Love you too, buddy. Let’s go break a leg, okay?”
“Don’t think you’re getting out of telling me why you’re not three mai tais deep right now.”
“It’s, like, six in the morning in Oahu.”
Greg had the ice for twenty minutes of warm-up time before his Cirque audition was scheduled. They spent ten minutes stretching and skating, and then Greg’s jitters got so bad Aubrey gently checked him into the boards and called up their playlist on his phone.
“Change of plan. You need to loosen up.” Aubrey’s portable speakers pumped out the opening bars of “Hot Stuff.” “You remember how it goes, right?”
For a few seconds, he thought Greg might really balk. He skated backward away from Aubrey a half meter or so, shaking his head.
Then he shot him the finger and launched into their routine. For three minutes and forty-seven seconds, Greg and Aubrey dance-fought to Donna Summer. Greg kept his part simple to conserve his energy, but Aubrey lost himself in the rhythm and the pure athleticism, reveling in the stretch of his body, pushing his limits. He nailed every landing and couldn’t keep from grinning as he mentally awarded himself top marks.
When the song wound to a close, Aubrey caught sight of a man and a woman dressed in business suits making their way into the stands. He clapped Greg’s shoulder again. “You got this.” Then he skated over to the visitor’s bench.
He was right too—Greg nailed the routine, putting on a very entertaining program for the Cirque officials. Aubrey watched them when he wasn’t watching Greg, and though they didn’t give much away, he thought they were impressed.
At the end of the program, they came down to the ice and shook Greg’s hand, and Aubrey could tell from the mutual smiles that Greg was in.
He grinned and collected the flowers and stuffed animal and skated over to deliver them. “I guess we can skip the crying this time?”
Greg snorted but accepted the gifts. “Yeah. I still want my kiss, though.”
“Smartass.” Aubrey gave him another gentle bump and then a loud smack on the cheek.
“Mr. Chase!” The male Cirque rep extended his hand. “Pleased to meet you. I’m Lucien Bastille, and this is my colleague, Sharice Kim.”
“Pleasure’s mine. But please call me Aubrey.” He shook with both of them.
Sharice palmed a card and slid it to him. “We know you have commitments in Chicago. Greg’s been very forthcoming about that.” Oh,hadhe? “But if you ever find yourself in need of a diversion or a change of scenery and you think you might like to spend some time in Las Vegas, please don’t hesitate to give us a call. You’re obviously in competition shape, and your choreography would be a good fit for us.”
Aubrey blinked and looked sideways at Greg. It had never occurred to him that he might end up with a job offer at the end of this, but judging from Greg’s tiny smirk, he wasn’t surprised. “Thanks,” he said, taking the card. “I’ll keep that in mind.”
He held on to his questions until Lucien and Sharice left and they were packing up in the locker room, but they came rapid-fire after that. “What just happened? You looked like you knew something was up, but I thought I was going to be in Hawaii for this until two days ago.”
Greg shrugged. “I knew they were looking for more talent. Your name came up when we arranged the audition.”
“I didn’t book my vacation until last week,” Aubrey realized. “You sneaky bastard.”
