“I mean, in their defense, I didn’t ask,” she said. “I was too focused on the fact that my best friend is getting married. I’m sure you were excited too, when you found out about all this.”
He hummed noncommittally.
A spike of irritation worked its way through Harper. Was it too much to ask for a real answer? She was doing her best to get to know this man, and he seemed determined to behave as if she was a huge inconvenience to him. As if he didn’t really even want to be here.
“All right,” she said, because it was the only topic he had shown any real interest in so far. “What is it you do for work, then?”
“I’m the owner of the Stallions.”
“You own stallions? Like you’re a rancher or something?”
“No, the Houston Stallions,” he clarified. “The baseball team.”
“Oh.”
“Not a fan, I take it?”
“Well, it’s not like I’magainstthem,” she said. “I’m not really a baseball fan, that’s all. I like other sports more.”
“What other sports?”
She shrugged. “I’m into soccer.”
“We don’t even have a soccer team here in Houston.”
“No, I know that,” she said.
“So you’re just fine with not having a hometown team to support?”
“Well, obviously I would prefer if wedidhave one! But I’m not about to give up on the whole enterprise just because we don’t.” She appraised him, noticing the way his jaw had clenched. His whole body seemed to indicate tension. He was leaning away from her, sitting back in his seat.
It was an odd time to have the realization, but it washed over her nonetheless — he really was very attractive. She had expected to find Max Davenport’s brother cute in the same way she found Max himself cute — easy on the eyes, yes, and pleasant to be around in a way that could make a woman cut loose and relax. She had expected someone she could flirt with easily and casually, knowing that it would come to nothing; someone she could make some fun memories with and say a friendly farewell to when their time together reached its natural end.
Theo was almost none of those things.
He shared Max’s good looks, but it was as if they had been translated into a different font. Where Max’s hair was unkempt, always as if someone had just run their fingers through it, Theo’s was immaculately styled. Where Max had a softness to him that betrayed the fact that he spent a lot of time sitting around at ball games and watching, Theo had muscles that Harper could make out through the fabric of his clothes. And even though she had come here to do a job, she found herself wondering what those muscles might feel like.
Don’t do that. This clearly is not a man who enjoys casual flirting. She couldn’t have that kind of fun with him. It was disappointing — part of the reason to look forward to Tara’s wedding had been the possibility of a harmless flirtation, but that didn’t seem possible with Theo.
The truth was, Harper wasn’t confident she could flirt harmlessly with this man, either. He wasn’t the sort who made her laugh and then left her thoughts as soon as they were out of one another’s sight. He was the sort who was bound to linger in her thoughts, and that wasn’t what she wanted; not after all the trouble she’d had in the past, all the ill-fated romances, all thefalse starts and flirtations that had proven to be anything but harmless.
After having the second of her two children, Tara had become intense — almost aggressive — about her desire for Harper to settle down and have kids of her own. The two had dreamed, in their youth, of their children growing up together and being best friends the way they had been. With every year that passed, that dream got further away.
But Harper had never, not once in her thirty years of life, been on a date with a man she’d have wanted to be the father of her children. She couldn’t compromise on that just because of her dream of raising children alongside her best friend.
Still, she couldn’t stop herself from smiling at Theo now. “Maybe you can get me tickets,” she suggested. “I wouldn’t mind taking in a game.”
“Thought you weren’t a baseball fan?”
“I could get into it. Besides, you and I are going to have to see a lot more of each other before all this is over, and maybe it would be more convenient for you if we could meet where you work.”
He pressed his lips together, and for a moment she was afraid she’d offended him. But then he nodded. “Thatwouldbe convenient, as a matter of fact.”
“So, I’ll come to a game, and when it’s over, maybe I can sit down with you in your office or something?”
“We don’t need to do it like that,” he said. “You can watch the game from my private box.”
“I can?”
