I cough at him, amind your fucking businesscough. “Adler.” I don’t bother with anit’s nice to meet youbecause it isn’t.
“You’re Savannah’s husband.” He doesn’t say it like a question.
That should be funny. All my life I’ve beenBrad’s sonorBlake’s brother, and now I’mSavannah’s husband.I should be annoyed—she’s my wife in name only—but somehow, I’m not bothered by the title. Just by who’s saying it. “Yeah.”
He flicks an eye over me. “Huh.” As if I should be embarrassed by standing here. As if he’s not the one in tiny little shorts or with the vestiges of an earring in one ear.
I did that briefly: paid someone at a tattoo place to put a bar through my ear cartilage, just to piss off Brad, who threatened to unscrew the damn thing while I was sleeping.How is your mother supposed to explain that?But the piercing was hell in a batting helmet, so I took it out.You lack commitment, Brad said, as he dragged me out to take fielding practice at five a.m.
“I gave her a ride home from the airport, you know,” Adler adds.
Sav said she’d ridden home withone of my teammatesbut wasn’t specific as to who. That it was Adler makes a muscle in my jaw jump. “I thought the team sent a car.”
Adler sniffs. “You didn’t.”
“I sent her money for a cab.” I blurt it out before I can help myself. None of this is any of Adler’s business and yet he’s standing here making it—mywife—his business. “Savannah’s independent.”
“Sure.” Adler shrugs. “Sounds like she has to be.”
That’s it. I march up to him and poke him with exactly one finger, right on the glistening arc of his shoulder. “Watch your fucking mouth.”
That gets that same cocksure smirk that makes me want to grab him—to shut him up. “Noted,” he says, as if he’s notingsomething, but I’m not quite sure what.
I ball my hand into a fist just to scare him, even if he’s apparently not the type to scare easy. Then a cool breeze—possibly the only cool breeze in the entire city—blows in the small gap between us. A reminder of where we are. Someone might be watching. Hell, Coach is probably lurking in the dugout, waiting for me to screw up.
So I draw back to all of two feet away, close enough to see each curl of Adler’s chest hair, the sarcastic curve of his unchapped lips. I bet he uses a shit ton of Chapstick. I bet he’s vain about it.
“You know what, Adler?” I say, “I’m going to do you a solid. No matter what Coach just said about doing your little stretches or whatever?—”
“Do you not know whatyogais?” Adler interrupts. He sounds like he doubts I know whatreadingis.
“Like I said—it’s not really the team culture to be this…” I scan the length of his body, searching for a derisive enough word.
“Sexy?” Adler supplies.
“Showy.”
“Yeah, wouldn’t want to be showy while playing a game in astadium.”
So he’s not just showy. He’s stubborn. “Fine. Keep doing that. See how it works out for you.”
“I’m the one they traded for, remember?”
But they drafted me. Something that every commentator now seems to regret. “I’ve been on this team longer than you have.”
Which gets me a snort. He mumbles something that sounds likewe’ll see about that.
My back goes stiff. That muscle jumps in my jaw again. Somehow, myfatiguereturns, head throbbing. “Didn’t catch that,” I snap.
“I said?—”
Whatever he’s about to say, I stop listening when my phone buzzes. I pull it from my zippered shorts pocket, glance at Asher to tell him to take his yoga mat and clear out.
He doesn’t move. Of course.
Whatever, it’s just a text.
Savannah: Your mom just got here. She has a binder of wedding party things we need to pick from.
