Bax answered for me. “It means Finn can’t distinguish between jersey chasers and girls worth hanging out with.”
“Damn it, you two. You don’t need to taint my rep with people I just met,” Finn complained.
“Finnegan,” Tarvi intoned from his seat in the corner of the booth. “No whining.” Then he turned on the charm. “I’m Tarvarius Johnson—and you are...?” he asked Zoe.
“Turned on,” she said and slapped her hand over her mouth. When Tarvi gifted her with his thousand-watt smile, she dropped her hand and whispered, “Has anyone ever told you that you look like Keith Powers fromFamous inLove?”
Tarvi chuckled. “I might have heard that before.”
The other three of us football players let out a collective groan.
“He’s kind of a player, but so hot.”
Her orgasmic sigh was kind of embarrassing for the rest of us.
Awkwardly lifting her hand in the crowded space between Tarvi and Finn, Zoe introduced herself. “Zoe Lampee. It’s a pleasure to meet you, Tarvarius.”
Going for the whole cheesy move, Tarvi lifted her hand to his lips and brushed a kiss over her knuckles. “I go by Tarvi.” He grinned as she sighed again, and I think I spoke for the rest of the table when I say we were each worried about how far the two of them would take their introduction in a public place. Instead, Tarvi toned it down a notch when he turned his attention to Taryn. “Nice to see you, again. I didn’t know you had something going with one of my teammates.” He dialed down the thousand-watt smile he’d bestowed on Zoe to five hundred watts for Taryn, which didn’t improve my attitude when I remembered he’d frequented the Coffee Kiosk at the beginning of the semester.
T lifted a brow. “You spent your time talking to my coworker.”
I grinned at her sardonic tone. If anyone could put my cocky teammate in his place, it would be Taryn.
“Oh, yeah. Heidi.” He scrunched his face. “Or Hadley.” His smile returned. “The one with the braid.”
“Hailey.”
He snapped his fingers. “Yeah, that’s it. She likes going to football parties.” His mouth turned down. “And you don’t. Is that why you don’t even show up when the party’s at your place?” he asked me.
“I kind of outgrew them when I was in the service,” I said as I let my arm rest across the back of Taryn’s shoulders.
“How come you don’t like football parties?” Finn asked Taryn. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen you at one, so I’m not sure you can pass judgment.”
Bax raspberried out a breath. “Finnegan, so many people hit our parties—how would you know who comes and who doesn’t?” Tossing back the last drink of his beer, he reached across the table to where Tarvi had hogged the pitcher and poured another mugful.
“Now you’re dating Danny, maybe you’ll come to the party tonight.” The cheesy waggling of his brows cracked me up. “Help us celebrate that awesome touchdown he scored.”
At Finn’s rather pushy invite, I sensed Taryn stiffen beneath my arm.
“Or we can celebrate privately,” I whispered in her ear.
At my words, her body went as rigid as cement.
Shit. Guess she took that a different way than I’d meant it. Not that I’d be adverse to that kind of celebration. In fact, my dick went half hard at the thought of it. But her response said we had a ways to go before we were on that page together.
“I like parties, and I mostly like Danny—enough to cheer for him anyway,” Zoe piped up, laughter in her voice. “I’ve yet to go to a football party though.”
“You should come to ours tonight,” Tarvi invited. “It’s our turn to host, even though Patty is whining about it—something about his midterm projects scattered through the house.” His snort of disgust spoke volumes of what he thought of our QB Mick Patterson’s excuse. “But we’re going to have fun anyway. We’d enjoy entertaining classy girls like you.”
Conversation stopped with the arrival of our pizzas. Hanging out with guys who had NIL contracts with the pizzeria came with serious perks. We’d already demolished two pitchers of beer before the girls arrived, and now three extra-large pies covered the table.
Handing Taryn a plate, I said, “Help yourself.” Glancing across the table, I added, “You, too, Zoe,” as I passed a plate to her before handing the rest out to the guys.
Since everyone—the girls included—was starving, we bailed into the food, filling our mouths with succulent meat lovers’ slices, to the point we didn’t talk.
As she ate dinner, I sensed Taryn marginally relaxing beside me. With the party set to go at Tarvi, Patty, and Fitz’s house, I’d had an idea to invite Taryn over to my place. After all my bedroom alone was half the size of her entire apartment. But with the way she’d reacted to my teasing, I amended those plans. While we’d been best friends for years, this thing between us was new. I didn’t want to spook her back into the friend zone by moving too fast.
In short order, one pie disappeared. Then a group of jersey chasers arrived, and I watched in amused fascination as Finn tried to straddle the line between telling them to get lost while trying not to hurt their feelings or piss them off.
