I smile, running my thumb along hers, loving the way she shivers and tries to hide it from me. “You do therapy. You knowhow to help me manage my anxiety long term. As a matter of fact, I’m almost positive you’ve had every player on the team on your couch over the last two weeks talking about how to manage all of their anxieties. All of them except one.”
Maddy huffs out a laugh. “Noticed that, did you?”
“Wildcat, I notice everything when it comes to you. Especially when fifty-two of my teammates get to talk to you and I don’t.” I wink at her. “I really, really like to talk to you.”
“Tone it down there, Casanova,” she says dryly. “It’s unethical for me to treat you, and you know it. The optics are nuclear level bad. The niece of the Renegades’ general manager, head of psychology for the team, found to be having a close, personal relationship with one of the players?” She shakes her head. “The headlines practically write themselves, and I don’t want any part of that. For me or for Uncle Brian. Someone else from my staff will be sending you an email about your weekly mental health check-ins, and when you’re on their couch, you can talk to them about your anxiety. That’s what they’re there for.”
I give her a sly grin. “If you’re not treating me, does that mean we can have that repeat?”
Maddy rolls her eyes. “Have you always been this persistent, or is it special for me?”
“Nah, persistence has always been my very best thing. It’s how I became a football player, how I got my wife to marry me when we were both barely old enough to drink at our wedding, and how I know that even if all we are for the time being is friends, eventually, I’ll have you back under me, moaning my name.”
Maddy’s eyes darken, her throat working as she swallows, and her hand clenches in mine. This is not a woman who is unaffected by me—by what happened between us in that hotel room—and nothing could make me happier. She opens her mouth, and I think she’s going to say something about us, about what we are or aren’t or can or can’t be. When all she mutters is, “I need popcorn,” I bark out a laugh because god, this woman.
I fucking adore her.
Without warning, my mind flips to the last time I adored someone like this. How that time felt like a revelation too. And it was. It was right. So, so right. And this feels right too, sitting here with Maddy, telling her my secrets, talking to her and saying Lainey’s name. It makes me feel like I can have this second chance while also honoring my first one, and that’s a heady thought I tuck away to dissect later.
Maddy unwinds her hand from mine and stands, walking over to a lounge chair on the other side of the pool and grabbing a massive to-go cup and a bunch of other stuff before stalking back to me and dropping back onto the ground, setting down a bag of kettle corn, the remainder of the bag of M&M’s I gave her earlier, tortilla chips, and a huge container of queso.
“Queso with all your usual snacks is an interesting combination.” I lean back on my hands and watch as she tears open the bag of popcorn and tosses a handful into her mouth.
Maddy pins me with the cutest fucking glare I’ve ever seen. “Are you making fun of my snack choices which are, inarguably, the best snack choices of all time?”
Sitting up straight, I hold up my hands. “I wouldn’t dare, because if I did, you wouldn’t share with me, and I’m fucking starving. I spiraled before my room service was delivered.” At the reminder of my spiral, I eye my phone and clench my fists to keep from picking it up. The storm is not going to have magically stopped, and calling my family is a bad idea. Even though the sharp edge of panic is gone thanks to Maddy’s company, if I call them and they’re still out in the bad weather, the panic will come roaring back, and I don’t want them to see that.
“The queso is cold because I abandoned it when you burst out here, but it’s still awesome because, cheese.” Maddy slides the chips and queso towards me, and when I look up, the understanding in her eyes has a hot rush ofsomethingarrowing through me. It’s been a long, long time since someone could read me like this. I wonder briefly if it’s just because Maddy is a therapist andshe’s trained for it, but something tells me that’s not it. The pull between us is too strong for it to be anything other than what it is.
Inevitable.
Shaking off that thought for the time being, I grab a chip and dunk it in the cheese, popping it into my mouth. “Fuck, that’s good,” I mumble.
“Right?” Maddy asks, taking a chip of her own. “There’s nothing better than Mexican food. I think I could only eat Mexican food for the rest of my life and be perfectly happy. As long as there are M&M’s too. And kettle corn. And also orange soda. And waffles. I really, really like waffles. Oh! And grilled cheese. Anything with cheese really, especially if it’s melted.”
She nods, satisfied with her list, and I laugh, grabbing her soda and taking a sip. “So, what you’re saying is that what you actually want is all your favorite things, at all times.”
She shrugs, eating more popcorn. “I like what I like, and I have a lot of favorites. Also, I hate making decisions. I would prefer to just have everything than to have to choose one of anything.”
“What are some of your other favorite things?”
“I mean…” She gestures to the snacks sitting between us. “These are most of them.”
I reach out and rub my thumb over her bare knee just to see her reaction, and I’m not disappointed when she inhales sharply. “What about your non-food favorites?”
She gives me a wry smile. “We could be here for a while.”
“I’ve got all night, Wildcat.”
Her eyes flash at the nickname, and I grin at her because even though she tries to cover it up with a sip of soda, I see it and I love it. “I love Celine.”
“Are you talking about the person or your car?”
She throws her head back and laughs. “You remember that I named my car Celine?”
I lean back on my hands again, unable to look away from her.It has nothing to do with the tiny cotton shorts she wears, or the way her ponytail brushes her bare shoulders, or the way the tops of her perfect tits are almost visible above the low neckline of her tank top.
It’s her.
