“We listen!” Mason said.
“Eh, sometimes,” Jonny said with a chuckle. “Sometimes I have better things to do.”
“Like stare at your boyfriend’s arse,” West said dryly, smirking across the table at his former housemate.
Devon flushed slightly as he glanced down at his plate and shifted in his seat, probably so he could nudge Jonny fondly with his knee. I had a sneaking suspicion, which I’d never been able to prove, that they’d hooked up in the club changing room at least once. In all honesty, I didn’t want to think about what they were doing because I’d never be able to look at the changing room the same way again.
Sometimes ignorance was bliss.
And thinking about them only reminded me how fucking lonely I was.
“Who is this person then? Do you know anything about them?” Devon asked.
“Nope, nothing. Only that it’s a man.”
“At least that saves them from Danny’s terrible attempts at flirting,” Mason said, pushing his plate to the side and picking up a small bowl of noodles which was basically a second lunch. The front row needed to consume a lot of calories during the seasonto maintain their huge bulk and muscle mass, and luckily the club’s chefs were good at providing decent meals to support that.
“And it saves all of us from having to watch,” West said. We all nodded and there was a smattering of chuckles and hums of agreement. Listening to Danny talk about his relationships was painful, mostly because I didn’t know how anyone could lack such self-awareness.
Although, knowing my luck, he’d find someone willing to put up with his shit long before I managed to start dating again.
Our conversation moved on to the next games we had coming up, including the knockout stage of the European Rugby Champions Cup, something none of us had expected to reach. It had been a dream of mine for a long time to take the Knights to the level I knew we were capable of, but seeing the team actually start to reach it was another thing entirely, and I was so fucking proud of every single one of them.
I wasn’t naive enough to think we’d walk it, but I had enough belief to think we stood as good a chance as any of the other fifteen teams remaining of lifting the cup.
After we’d finished lunch, we headed upstairs to the large briefing room near the gym, filing into our normal seats. Clive was stood at the front alongside Tommy, the assistant head coach, other members of the coaching staff, and a man I didn’t recognise.
“Jesus Christ,” Mason said as he dropped into the seat next to me. “I didn’t realise we were hiring fucking models.”
“Keep it in your pants,” West hissed from his other side.
“I’m just being honest! That man is fucking stunning.”
“That’s enough, the pair of you,” I said, shooting them my best no-nonsense look. Mason wasn’t wrong, though; the man was objectively gorgeous with a sharp jaw dusted with stubble, piercing dark eyes, dark hair that was starting to go grey around the temple, and a white shirt that hugged his athletic frame.But… in my heart, Harper looked better. There was something beautiful about the softness of Harper’s features, his bright smile, and how he exuded sunshine from every pore.
This man was classically sexy, but Harper… Harper wasmykind of sexy.
“Okay, all right,” Clive said as he waved a hand, his general signal for us to quieten down. “Afternoon, gentlemen. Just a couple of quick things before we move on to this afternoon’s drills. As you all know, the Knights have been looking to expand our social media team for a while and I’d like to introduce you to Ezra Kowalski. You’re going to be seeing him around quite a bit as he’ll be taking charge of our content and social media strategy, so play nice. Ezra, do you want to say anything?”
Ezra nodded, looking around at us all. I followed his gaze as he started speaking, my eyes lingering on various members of the team. As expected, there was the usual range of emotions from engaged and interested to bored and barely managing to hide it. Not everyone enjoyed getting roped into the marketing team’s content creation attempts, but somehow I didn’t think Ezra would give us a choice.
I glanced behind me to where Danny and Charlie were sitting. The two of them always sat in the back row, like two kids trying to goof off. Charlie was nodding along, but Danny…
Danny was staring open-mouthed like he’d suddenly seen God.
Jesus Christ. If I was going to have to watch Danny go through the world’s most awkward and clumsy queer awakening while drooling over the sexy new social media manager, I might just give up on the idea of ever getting laid again. Because if Danny’s terrible mullet, seventies pornstar moustache, and ability to put his foot in his mouth every time he opened it didn’t put Ezra off, then I was fucked.
But then again, maybe the reason Danny would likely get laid before me was because he actually put himself out there.
Yes, he seemed to get rejected or dumped ninety-nine percent of the time, but at least hetried. All I did was complain and moan about being single, as if the universe would magically hand me a date on a silver platter.
It had sent me Harper, though.
And while the idea of dating my nanny should have been a huge red flag, absolute no-go zone, I couldn’t stop myself from thinking about what it might be like. Harper was everything I’d ever dreamed of in a partner, plus he’d already seen half my faults and hadn’t run screaming, and he adored Jack, which was the most important thing of all.
I just had to decide if the risk of asking him out was worth it, because if he said no, it would destroy everything in the blink of an eye.
And I wasn’t the only one who’d suffer from that. Jack’s happiness and care had to be my priority, not my own selfish desires.
