girl, but I need a break in the monotony.
Cole clears his throat. “Yeah, we’ll be there.”
“Bring your own beer.” Teddy crinkles his nose. “Or in your case root beer, I guess.”
I can’t believe I’ve agreed to go to a party with a bunch of jocks.
It’s ironic, really, since I always swore to stay away from that type, especially basketball players because of my dad. But now here I am living with one and becoming friends with other guys in sports. Todd was the complete opposite. He was the tall skinny, nerd. Cute in his own right, but he wasn’t showy. He wasn’t a king on campus like I’m gathering these guys are. I thought he was safe. But he broke my heart.
Did he really, though? My thought stops me in my tracks. You can’t break something if it was never yours to begin with.
And if I’m honest with myself, despite agreeing to marry him, Todd wasn’t some great love and therefore he’s not the great loss I’ve made him out to be either.
I glance over my shoulder, barely catching a glimpse of the two guys before I walk into my room.
I think I’ve been looking at things all wrong.
15
Cole
Whenever something’s on my mind, I find myself with a basketball standing on a court somewhere. When I’m there, ball in hand, dribbling up and down, it’s like I can focus my thoughts better than any other way.
Lifting the ball, I toss it. It swishes through the net on the small court next to our apartment beside the playground.
I don’t know what to do about my growing feelings for Zoey, so here I am.
I jog after the ball and grab it before it can roll into the bushes. Bouncing it up and down, I walk around the court. I’ve been out here for a while already, my body damp with sweat, but for once I’m not getting the answers I normally do.
I’m still confused, lost when it comes to my complicated feels for her. I like her. She’s quickly become my friend, but I can’t ignore that tug, the undercurrent for more. She’s like a magnet, pulling me in.
“I wondered where you were. I saw your truck, but you weren’t in the apartment.”
Her voice rolls over me. My eyes roam over to her where she stands at the edge of the court. She’s in the same ripped jeans and Aldridge University t-shirt she cut into a crop top that she wore to go with the girls and some of the guys to the football game. I lied and said Joe called me into work today so I wouldn’t have to go. I needed time away from her, to figure out how I’m feeling, but it hasn’t done me a whole lot of good like usual.
“I needed to be outside,” I go with, instead of the honest truth of wondering how the hell I’m going to get her out of my system.
“Pass me the ball.” She walks forward hands held out. I bounce it to her, and she catches it with a tiny smile. She looks at the ball in her hands with wonder, like it’s both somehow familiar and mysterious. She walks over to where I stand, dribbles it three times, and shoots. “I still got it.” She does a little dance when it goes in.
Fuck me. Clearly, my time out here has done me no good, because I find myself wanting to take her by the waist and pull her against me, press my lips to hers. I wonder if they’re as soft as they look.
Snapping myself out of my thoughts I jog after the ball and toss it back to her. “Think you can do it twice in a row?”
“Is that a challenge?” She holds the ball against the side of her hip, brown eyes sparkling with humor.
“If you want it to be.”
“What do I win if I get it in?”
“I don’t know. What do you want?” I shove my hands in the pockets of my loose athletic shorts.
She thinks for a second, tapping a finger against her lips. “If I make the shot, you have to make me dinner. Whatever I want.”
I laugh. “That’s all you want?”
There’s a hesitation in her eyes, like there’s more, but she shakes her head. “That’s it.”
“And if you miss…” I rock back on my heels. “You have to tell me a secret.”
Her breath catches. “What kind of secret?”
I itch to step closer to her, to wrap a curl around my finger. But I