And I wasn’t sure that my heart felt happy about any of it.
The sound of voices and movement shook me from my thoughts, and while I poured myself a glass of juice, Jake wandered into view wearing only his boxers.
He came over and picked up the juice carton that I’d placed next to the cell. He gave it a little shake, and the sound confirmed it was almost empty. He opened the lid, placed it to his lips, and gulped the remains right down.
While I watched in silence, I wondered whether to tell Jake anything of my discovery or my thoughts. But Kay might hear me from the next room.
“What is she to us?” I whispered to Jake.
He replied in an equally hushed voice: “A future Mrs. Rollins?” He was trying to be smarmy about it, but clearly, he too definitely felt something for the woman.
“What if she is seeing Ty or Ethan. Or Ty and Ethan?”
His brow furrowed in confusion.
“Those dudes aren’t blind. They met her the same night we did, and I think they made a move sooner than us.”
He still looked at me as if I spoke a foreign language.
I glanced down at her cell, which I’d left face up. “Our teammates have been messaging her. You can see it right there.”
“But even if they have her number, she took us home.” He moved his head closer to mine and whispered even more quietly. “I really like her, ya know? I want to see her again, for real. It doesn’t matter to me if those dudes got there first; we made her happy last night. But what about you, Lewis? Are you into her too?”
I didn’t have to answer because she wandered in and interrupted our conversation.
“Good... whatever time it is,” she said, her voice groggy.
Something was off in her get-up. “Why are you wearing two shirts at the same time...?” I asked.
“Well, um, I woke up, and I wasn’t sure what to wear. Your shirts were there. And I couldn’t decide which one to wear. I didn’t want to show favoritism.”
Jake and I exchanged glances and laughed.
I’d never met any woman who could be so funny, sweet, and sexy all at the same time.
I walked over to her and proceeded to pull one shirt up and over her. “There, now you’re not overheating.”
“But now I’m only wearing Jake’s shirt instead of both of yours.”
I feigned offense. “I guess I’ll have to settle for the fact that Jake is your favorite. I understand I’m only second best.”
She glanced away from us, nibbling her lip, nervously. “You’re not, though. You’re just as lovely as each other. Just um, I put Jake’s shirt on first because I found it first. Then yours to avoid this.”
“Yeah, well, I get it. You don’t have to sweat your ass off for us, Kayla. We get you. We understand you.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
TYLER REED
Let me introduce my parent.
The price I had to pay for daring to be good at football: fame.
The whole sunglasses and baseball cap thing bought me some anonymity, but I didn’t exactly like wearing them all the time. Especially indoors, sitting in a restaurant next to my mother, so I dropped that look as soon as we sat down.
We were early and had a while to wait for her fiancé to arrive, and it was nice to spend a little alone time like that with my mom.
“Have you been eating right, Tyler? You look like you’re losing weight.”
On the plus side, the sunglasses would hide my astonishment when I stared at my mom for saying such a thing. “I’m eating great, Mom.”
“Not just meat and potatoes, right? You need to eat other things.”
“I’m eating plenty of veggies, Mom. We’re all under the supervision of a dietician. We get whipped for too much cheating.”
“Whipped?” She frowned. “You better not order nothing but meat when the waiter comes. You should have a salad as well.”
“Mom, I eat salad by the bucket full. Don’t worry.”
“Madam,” one of the waiters said, ending our questionable debate as he stepped in. “The rest of your party has arrived.”
I looked up at who followed the waiter. First in line was some silver fox. Of course, there was always more to a relationship than looks, but he’d clearly looked after himself and made an effort for the date.
As he stepped closer to my mom, all of my attention focused on the woman who’d followed him.
Kayla!
Fuckin’ Kayla.
She stood right there and looked as shocked to see me as I was to see her.
And she’d made an effort for the date.
I thought she looked great when dressed for work, but now I discovered she could be super fucking classy as well. Make-up, earrings, a dress that would have been better if cut much shorter, in my opinion, but I could understand a dose of modesty when meeting the future mother-in-law.