“Just asking ’cause I haven’t heard fromthe teamsincethe road trip.” Because he hasn’t messaged me since that night. Maybe he’s a one-and-done kind of guy.
Asher quirks an eyebrow. “Theteammade it pretty clear how to get in touch with it, I thought.”
I pitch my voice low. “You haven’t texted.”
“You haven’t either, prin—" He doesn’t get the full word out when I hiss at him to stop.
“Bray’s gonna be here in a second.” I glance to the clubhouse door as if Brayden might materialize right there. Sweat begins forming in the lines of my palms.
Something in Asher’s face flickers. “Got it,” he says, too loud. A few of the WAGs dart glances our way. “See you around, Mrs. Forsyth.”
Please go, please go, please go. But no, he gets about twenty feet away, then positions himself against a hallway wall, shoves his hands in his pockets, and waits.
I shoot him a look. He shoots me one right back. I either want him gone or want him much, much closer, and I can’t have either. He might not beone and donebut I have to be.
I don’t have time to dwell. Brayden comes out and walks over to where I’m standing.A wife would kiss him.I rise up on my toes. Over his shoulder, I can see Asher watching us. My glare intensifies as I kiss Brayden’s cheek.
“Sorry,” Brayden says.
“Sorry?”
“I didn’t shave.” His cheek is a little rough with dark blond stubble.
Not knowing what else to do, I kiss him again, slightly longer this time. “I don’t mind.”
His eyes slide shut momentarily. He has long eyelashes, blond at the tips and darker at the roots. Somehow, without me noticing, his hand has come to rest on my waist, then higher, tracing the letters on my back. “Nice jersey,” he says.
“Figured I should wear something with your name on it.”
From twenty feet away, Asher clears his throat. Brayden turns. His expression sharpens into a glare as he tightens his hand. “I like everyone knowing who you belong to,” he says, thougheveryonesounds like a very specificsomeone. “I wanted to ask something?—”
Oh no. Not here. Not with everyone watching us.I put on my sweetest smile. “Really, what?”
Whatever it is, Brayden doesn’t ask immediately. He tightens his hand on my jersey again, fingers skimming just belowForsyth.
“Did you miss me while you were gone?” I tease, then immediately regret it. We’re not together like that. Asking it, even as a joke, feels mean.
“That’s what I wanted to ask you. Do you want to come on our next road trip?”
So he did miss me, and I’ve been…Unfaithfulfeels like the wrong word, but I don’t know another one.
I shouldn’t go with him. I have class. But he’s asking me—actually asking and not assuming or ordering—a tiny line forming between his eyebrows the longer I don’t respond.
“I could probably make that work,” I say.
Brayden smiles—a full, real smile that deepens the creases at the corners of his eyes. Maybe the first one he’s ever given me. Maybe the first one he’s done in a long time.
From behind Brayden, Asher throws me an indecipherable look, then peels himself off the hallway wall and stalks off.
Five days. We’re going on the road together. Five days, surrounded by his teammates and the other WAGs. Five days with Asher there, and the secret we both share. Five days…
So I swallow my nerves as Brayden threads his fingers through mine and leads me toward the car, my lock pendant tapping against my sternum as we walk.
Chapter Twenty-Six
Savannah
The next day after class,I approach the professor, paper in hand. “I figured you might want to chat,” Dr. Ghorbani says.
