“Shut up, you idiot.” I smack his shoulder lightly.
“I’m serious. No going over fifty. No more than three drinks. No drugs. The only male to touch you is Cirillo. No—”
“He said that?” I hiss, trying to ignore the way my stomach tightens at the mere mention of my husband.
“Yep. Don’t be thinking I’m here for the fun, Shorty. I’ve got more rules than I can remember.”
“Well, you’d better be a good boy, then, Xanny.”
“Really?” he asks, his lips twitching in amusement.
“Really.”
Climbing on the back of his bike behind him, I wrap my thighs around his arse and my arms around his waist.
“Wait. I’m allowed to do this, right?” I ask, squeezing him tighter.
He doesn’t answer for a beat and I’m about to let up on my teasing, but his hand covers mine reassuringly.
“Falling off the back of my bike would probably break more than a few rules. Hold on tight, Princess. I’m about to rock your world.”
“At no more than fifty?” I mock.
“Yeah, we’ll see.”
“Woohoo,” I squeal when he revs the engine and guns it down the street in the exact way I’m sure Cruz told him not to ride with me on the back.
* * *
“Oh my God, I fucking love you,” I squeal, my face aching from smiling like a complete maniac all the way here.
Take it steady he did not, and I loved every hair-raising second of it.
“Don’t let someone else hear you say that,” he mutters, pulling his helmet off and ruffling his hair into the messy style it usually sits in.
“Cirillo can kiss my arse,” I announce happily, bouncing on the balls of my feet as the adrenaline from the ride continues to flood my veins.
“I bet he’d fucking love to, Shorty.”
I flip him off over my shoulder and head toward the stadium, which is fucking insane for a school building. If I thought Knight’s Ridge was over the top, then clearly I’ve seen nothing, because All Hallows is beyond ridiculous.
I feel like I’m about to walk into the Etihad for a premier league game—if I were at all into football of course—not a school football match.
“This wasn’t quite what I was expecting.”
“Oh, so you didn’t go to a school like this?” I ask, faux shock evident in my tone.
“Nah, I’m more at home in the middle of Lovell, Shorty.”
“You and me both. I’ll take the poverty and depravity any day over this show of privilege and wealth.”
“Let’s go and surround ourselves with the pricks, shall we?” He wraps his arm around my shoulder, and together we walk toward the entrance.
Despite our hair-raising ride here, the game has already started. Actually, it’s coming toward the end. I was insistent that if I was doing this, then I wasn’t spending an entire ninety minutes, or however long it is with half-time, standing, freezing my tits off and watching some—albeit hot—guys run around chasing a ball. Well, that was the story I fed everyone. Mostly, I just didn’t want Theo to read too much into me being here, because I’ve still not convinced myself that I’m even doing the right thing.
We’re directed toward the Knight’s Ridge supporters and we find ourselves seats at the end of a row.
I spot both Stella and Calli right at the front of the crowd and laugh to myself as Stella screams bloody murder, despite openly admitting she knows nothing about soccer—her words, not mine—as the game plays out in front of us.