Lyric’s eyes lit up with recognition. “Cash’s friend! Tight end, right? Number... eighty-nine?”
“You got it.” Cassidy grinned. “And clearlyyouneed no introduction.”
“Well, it feels bizarre not introducing myself, so...” She stuck out her hand. “I’m Lyric, Cash’s girlfriend.”
Cassidy’s brows disappeared beneath her bangs. “Girlfriend, huh?” She darted a quick glance at Poppy before reaching out and shaking Lyric’s hand. “Welcome. I was about to head to the bathroom, but you want me to introduce you to a few of the other players’ partners?”
Lyric beamed. “I’d love that.”
Cassidy linked her elbow with Lyric’s, setting off across the suite.
As if sensing Poppy wasn’t following, Lyric paused after a few steps and looked over her shoulder. “Poppy? You coming?”
Across the suite, Nina and Alexis, wives of Devon and Jerome Daniels, brothers and both linebackers who’d been drafted from Miami and Tampa respectively, waved at Lyric.
“You go ahead.” Poppy wasn’t a WAG—a wife or girlfriend of one of the players—and sometimes it felt a little like some of the wives were humoring her. Like, if she wasn’t dating Cash, they didn’t quite understand what she was doing hanging around. “I’ll catch up with you later, okay?”
A soft, skeptical frown creased Lyric’s forehead. “Are you sure?”
“Positive.” Poppy pasted on a smile. “Have fun.”
Lyric, who was originally from not far outside of Orlando, could bond with Alexis and Nina over... hurricanes and humidity, sinkholes, and... falling iguanas. Poppy didn’t know. The farthest east she’d traveled was Denver. Florida was as foreign to her as the moons of Jupiter.
“Pathfinders are favored by three points.”
Poppy jumped, elbow knocking the waist-high table in front of her, a frisson of pain shooting down her arm to her wrist. “Jesus Christ.” Her hand flew to her chest, heart fluttering frantically under her palm. Rosaline stood beside her, staring out at the field, arms crossed over her black-and-green plaid shacket. Poppy blinked at her. “Where did you come from?”
Rosaline looked at her askance. “The door?”
Poppy rolled her eyes. No shit. “You took me by surprise, is what I mean.”
Rosaline turned slightly, pivoting to face Poppy. “You knew I was coming.”
Again, not what she meant. “You could’ve, I don’t know, walked less like a freaking jungle cat.”
The corner of her mouth twitched. “I’ll make sure to announce my presence next time.” She gestured to the field. “I’ll borrow a megaphone from one of the cheerleaders, maybe.”
Cheerleaders in the NFL were dancers, really. “They don’t use megaphones.”
Rosaline’s stare bore into the side of her face. “I was joking.”
Poppy tugged the sleeves of her sweatshirt down over her wrists. “Funny.”
“Question: Are you going to ice me out over our phone call all game?”
That was rich, coming from her. “The game hasn’t started yet.” Hurt bled into her voice, words wobbling and mortifyingly reedy.
Rosaline heaved a sigh. “You want to talk this out right now?” Her brows rose. “Really?”
You know what? “Forget it.” Rosaline was right. Now wasn’t the time to be having this conversation, assuming there was even a conversation to be had at all. “The game’s about to start.”
The Falcons had already taken to the field along with the Pathfinders, the captains heading to midfield for the coin toss.
“Poppy.” The way Rosaline said her name, almost plaintive, made Poppy sigh and, against her better judgment, turn, reluctantly meeting Rosaline’s eyes. Her gaze was already trained on Poppy, piercing and inscrutable, the rest of her expression equally hard to read, giving Poppy nothing. “I’m sorry, okay? I don’t often find myself in a position of needing to apologize.” She shrugged tightly, her voice dropping not to a whisper, but close. “Clearly, I don’t really know what I’m doing.”
“Something Rosaline Sinclairdoesn’texcel at?” Poppy scoffed under her breath. “Alert the presses.”
Rosaline flinched, a flicker of hurt flitting across her face. “That’s less of an anomaly than you seem to think.” Her jaw shifted, her tongue pressing against the inside of her cheek. “Trust me.”
