private garage for the players, and Ryder took the elevator up, trying to keep memories from surfacing again as the bell chimed on each floor it passed. He let his attention go fuzzy. He let his mind drift, something he’d forced himself to avoid for years. He’d never wanted to relive those memories. Now, though, with Reese everywhere he didn’t want her to be, it was harder to fight the recall.
Reese had been beautiful that night at that party. Ryder had seen the dress on his sister a thousand times, mainly when her and that asshole Luke Ford started dating. But Rhiannon hadn’t filled out the top the way Reese had, and Rhiannon’s hips hadn’t been wide enough for the fabric to curve around her the way it had on her best friend.
It took effort for Ryder to not bust up Reese’s fun that night. He tried telling himself it wasn’t him she was glancing at every minute or so. It wasn’t Ryder who kept her turning down offers to dance. When Mike Jefferson lowered his hand over her ass, Ryder stood, ready to take a few steps away from his Chevy, ready to clock the asshole for touching her. But Reese didn’t need the back up. She pushed Mike’s hand away and walked toward the fire, spotting Ryder as he hurried to sit back down on his tailgate, hoping she hadn’t noticed the way he almost took a leap across the yard to topple Jefferson. She approached, smile wide, sweet, looking nervous.
“Come dance with me,” she demanded, not waiting for a no before she pulled Ryder out onto the patch of bare grass that served as the dance floor. “Been waiting on you all night.”
“For what?” He knew. No need for her to answer, but Ryder liked the way she rolled her eyes at him. She’d done that often enough since her sophomore year and Ryder seemed to like it more and more, the older they got. They’d been flirting toward this night for well over six months. Since spring training. Tonight, wearing that dress, smiling at him the way she was, seemed like a test he wasn’t going to pass. He liked the way she felt pressed close against him, her thick, dark hair brushing along his neck.
“Stop being estupido,” she told him, slowing when he turned them so she could get her arms around his neck. She stood so close Ryder could make out the small dots of sweat blooming across her nose. “You know I wore this dress for you.”
He was surprised at her confession and how easily it slid from her tongue. He held his breath, staring down at her, wondering what she wanted from him, hoping it resembled something close to what he wanted.
“Me? Why do I get such a treat?”
Reese touched his face then, fingers soft, gentle, a contrast to the athlete he’d seen every day on the field. Against him, there weren’t any grunts of effort and energetic movements that looked like work and struggle. Right there in Ryder’s arms, he held a Reese he’d never met, one that had quickly become someone he wanted all to himself.
He’d lied to Gia. There had never been any real rivalry. There had never been anything but appreciation, despite her being a little irritating. Then there had been so much more.
The elevator chimed for the fifth floor, and Ryder shook his head, pushing back that sweet, long-dead sensation worked up by the memory. That kid was gone. She didn’t exist anymore, and the guy he’d been, the one taken aback by her boldness and beauty, took a hell of a lot more to impress than soft skin and a pretty dress.
To his left, Ryder heard the chirp of an alarm disengaging and glanced across the parking garage, slipping behind a concrete pillar when he spotted Reese heading for her Challenger. She stretched, opening her trunk and tossing her bag inside it, peeling off her jersey, and tugging the elastic from her hair. Something old and forgotten stirred in his gut, something that reminded him of the past and things he wanted and would never have again.
Reese was beautiful, still. But there were a thousand beautiful women he could have. Greer was one, but there were others. Reese wasn’t the only woman that could make Ryder forget the past.
Liar, he reminded himself, replacing the memory of their first dance with one of their last fight. It had only been an hour before they’d made it to