Never Just Friends (Spotlight New Adult Book 2) Read Online Free PDF Page A

and they all seemed inappropriate.
    Because they were friends? You don’t think about boning friends.  
    “You’ve passed my test, is all,” he said. “Maybe you can be my Amazing Race partner. Do you know the show?”
    She nodded enthusiastically. “Do you drive stick?”
    “Yes. Can you solve puzzles?”
    “I don’t do heights though, or tattoos.”
    “We can work with that.”
    That thing went on for a few weeks, and it was fun, never mind that they were never ever going to really be on the show anyway. (The heights aversion would have crippled them as a team, to be honest.)
    Then he asked her out to a movie, one that featured zombies, and they talked all night on her front porch about how to fortify their neighborhood against the apocalypse.
    “I’ll need to teach you to drive stick,” Jake found himself saying. He never spoke to a girl that way, never made future plans like that. The hypothetical situation, and the absurdity of it, made it safe somehow. It was probably his first taste of acting, fooling himself.
    “But you know how,” she said. “Won’t our survival be improved if we split tasks efficiently?”
    “What if I’m being chased and you have to get the car and swing by to get me?”
    She smiled at him then. “It depends. What are you holding?”
    “Do I have to be holding anything? You’re just going to save me, Lindsay.”
    She shook her head. “I know why I’ll learn to drive stick. Because I might have to take the car, Jake. If you’re infected, you get left behind. Like everyone else.”
     
    ***
     
    She sent him a message after eight: Where are you?
    Jake: Downtown. Cutest hipster tea shop in the world. You?
    Lindsay: When are you going back to your hotel?
    He paused. Now, if you’re meeting me there.
    Lindsay: Come on over then. Don’t get too excited.
    The speed with which he packed up all his new books and settled his bill with the nice young woman might be misconstrued as excitement.
    Because this was early. Dates didn’t start yet at this time, even on work nights. She had what looked like just enough time to meet Victor, dump him, and walk several blocks over to Waldorf Astoria.
    He had been taken aback that she was still seeing the guy. Jake was aware that it might have become more than that, but dismissed the possibility of him being an actual rival, an equal. Except for that one time when she first told him about Victor, she never mentioned him at all. He brought it up a few times, sneaking it into small talk about the weather and how she was, and she’d always said “fine.” Not exactly indicative of a passionate, life-changing affair.
    Still, two years though. Sex without feelings. Lindsay had a fuck buddy , for fuck’s sake. For a second, jealous rage burned through him. It could have been him, all this time, giving her what she wanted. How often did she want it? Did Lindsay call Victor, or did he call her? Or was it a regular thing, like Fuck Buddy Fridays? Shit.
    But Jake didn’t want just that, did he?
    Also, what were you planning to do? Take weekend trips to NY? Fly her over whenever you got horny? Stick to the plan, Jacob.
    He managed to get a cab to take him midtown, but traffic was building up. So he sat there stewing; jealous, hopeful, then jealous again.
    Jake had never met Victor, even though he was in New York when he first found out about him. Filming on the first season of Rage Eternal had just ended, in August. Lindsay had moved to New York a few months earlier, and he decided to fly over to see her.
    “You don’t have to,” she had said then, graciously, probably not remembering that money was no longer a problem for him, and he had travel perks anyway. “You’re still spending Christmas over at Cordelia’s right?”
    “But it’s August and I’m all clear,” he said. He took that STD test twice a year, April and August, and got into the habit of celebrating his results with Lindsay. “I need to celebrate. Take me where we can happy