Total pages in book: 133
Estimated words: 128069 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 640(@200wpm)___ 512(@250wpm)___ 427(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 128069 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 640(@200wpm)___ 512(@250wpm)___ 427(@300wpm)
“Sounds like working here. I never know if I’m going to have to wrangle a pack of ornery kangaroos or not,” she says, then whispers playfully. “Usually it’s ornery kangaroos.”
I think I love her. We speak the same language. “I hope you wear armor then.”
“Part of the job, along with fetching sisters for the captain and, oh yeah, organizing publicity,” she says as she guides me through the upper concourse, past chichi food vendors peddling organic and sustainably grown food, and toward the lower level. I’ve been here a few times, including for a game last season. But it’s still helpful to have a guide so we can move quickly past the throngs of exiting fans. “But tonight the pack of kangaroos-slash-dogs will likely be happy since the Sea Dogs beat the Coyotes.”
“Oh! That’s great,” I say. I hadn’t even bothered to check the score. But that’s great news for my brother and my new roomie.
“Ah, and there they are,” Everly says as we round the corner toward the locker room where my brother’s waiting outside in his post-game suit, and he’s standing next to a tall, broad, ridiculously handsome man.
My heart stutters.
Then stops.
I can’t breathe. I’m a computer that just beach-balled as I come face-to-face with the guy I tried to track down last night. “And that’s Wesley Bryant,” Everly says.
I cough. I part my lips to try to speak but wheeze out a question that I already know the answer to but have to ask anyway, “Wesley Bryant?”
“Yes, and he got an assist tonight so he’ll probably be in a very good mood,” she says.
I’m not so sure about that.
When he turns toward our voices, his brown eyes lock with mine. It takes a beat for his brow to furrow. Then it goes tighter, then tighter still.
When Christian sees me he says, “Hey, Jay! Here’s your new roomie.”
Wesley’s jaw comes unhinged.
Just like mine.
I guess I was dead wrong about not liking athletes.
11
FATE HATES ME
Wesley
I don’t believe in luck. I believe you make your own luck through work and practice and skill.
But what in the ever-loving fuck is this bullshit? Does fate hate me? Is this my comeuppance for eating ice cream five nights ago when it’s not on my meal plan? That’s a helluva price to pay. Maybe this is the universe’s payback for the time I didn’t read To Kill a Mockingbird in school, but looked up the SparkNotes instead? Then did the same for every other book that followed.
If so, karma has a funny sense of humor, but I’m not laughing.
Hold on. I know what this is. This has to be a prank. A fantastic, elaborate prank. Like the time Max and Asher loosened the top on my water bottle before my first game last season, and the liquid spilled all over me while I was on the bench. The ESPN cameras were on me and caught the whole thing.
I laughed it off then. Except I’m not laughing now as I rasp out, “Josie?”
When…shit.
I’m not supposed to know her name. Christian’s only ever called her Jay, clearly a nickname based on her first initial. But he must not notice the way her name is strangled by my throat since he claps me on the shoulder and says, “Thanks again for helping out. Always knew you were a good one, Bryant.”
He yawns, checks his watch, and says, “I gotta go.”
He strides over to the flirty, outgoing brunette with the scar on her chin and the cat-eye glasses. She’s wearing a black skirt and a white button-down shirt, unfairly sexy. I jump back in time to before the game when Christian was telling us about her. How the hell could he call her quiet? There was nothing quiet about Josie. Especially when she asked me to bend her over the bed and fuck her hard.
Christian wraps her in a big bear hug. “Bryant lives in a safe ’hood,” he says, then lets go and flashes her a satisfied grin. “Guess that means I won and you got yourself a bodyguard after all.”
Right. He wants me to look out for her—not date her.
No shit, Sherlock.
Still, my help-a-teammate-out vibe has never been so flattened like a pancake as it has been tonight.
“Yes, a bodyguard,” Josie repeats, clearly flustered, but Christian doesn’t seem to pick up on it.
Everly does though. Tilting her head, she lifts a brow curiously, studying Josie’s reaction, then mine. But she’s our PR woman, and I don’t want her thinking I don’t want to help. Or worse, figuring out I’ve already fucked my teammate’s sister.
That’d be bad.
Christian is so by the book. So rules oriented. I straighten my shoulders, adopt my media grin, then close the distance to…my new roommate. I stick out a hand in the world’s most awkward handshake. “Hey. Nice to meet you,” I say, the lie sailing off my tongue as easily as of course I read To Kill a Mockingbird did in eighth grade.