“I’m over Tessa.” I interrupt him with this news flash, my voice hard as stone and just as cold. “I was over her before you started sleeping with her. And we’re talking Zoey here. You know how I felt about her in high school. You really think I’m going to treat her like a puck bunny?”
He looks genuinely perplexed, and if my blood was boiling before, that expression on his face turns it into an inferno in my veins. “You don’t get it,” I say, “and that’s the part that fucking makes me hate you the most.”
The word “hate” causes his eyes to widen and his jaw to drop just enough that his mouth opens. He’s hurt, but I don’t feel any guilt about that. “I’m still staying away from you, and I’m still resentful because you were a brother to me. And you decided to throw that all away.”
“It was her or you.”
“You made it her or me when you picked her over me,” I argue and shove my feet into my shoes without bothering to do them up. “You decided you had to start a secret relationship with her because it was easier on you than trusting me with the truth. You didn’t care enough about our friendship, all ten years of it, to be honest with me.”
“You would have been furious,” he argues back, and his shoulders are rigid and pulled up sharply. “Youwerefurious.”
“Fuck, yeah!” I bellow, and I know if any of the coaches or staff are walking around the halls they can hear me. I just don’t give a fuck right now. “I still would have been furious. She was my fucking ex-girlfriend, Levi. You broke the code. But I also would have accepted it eventually. I just wouldn’t be reminded every time I look at you that you lied to my face. That’s the difference, asshole. That’s what you’re not getting.”
I storm out of the locker room. He follows me. “Jude! Wait.”
I turn, briefly scanning the long narrow hall and all the doors along it to make sure we’re alone, and then I step closer so I can keep my voice low. “We’re teammates. I’m cool with that. I like playing with you, but that’s all we are now. So I don’t care if you trust my intentions with Zoey. You don’t get to comment on my love life unless my dick ends up on the internet again, in which case, pull your captainly duties and tell me I’m embarrassing the organization or whatever.”
“Jude, come on…”
“Bye, Captain. See you tomorrow at the preseason game.”
“Are you seriously still not over your bromance breakup with Casco?” Eddie asks, and I frown as I lift my eyes from the foam on my beer and glare at him.
Eddie shrugs. “Being out with some warm and willing college chicks should be enough to get your mind off him is all I’m saying.”
My mind isn’t actually on Levi. It’s on the teapot I saw in the weird little shop a few blocks over next to the place we ate dinner at. I haven’t been able to get it out of my head since I saw it. The girls Eddie’s been chatting up come back to the table. They peed in pairs because that’s what girls do at twenty-one. The brunettewho has her boobs pushed up so high in her V-neck sweater that they’re basically a shelf under her chinlooks at me. “Your beer is almost finished. Let me buy you another.”
“No, it’s okay. I’ll buy a round for everyone,” I tell her and smile.
She smiles back. “If I have another, I’m definitely going to miss my eight o’clock class tomorrow.”
“Oh, no,” I say, and I hope it doesn’t feel as sarcastic as it actually is. I guess it doesn’t, because she’s still smiling as she puts her hand on my knee under the table.
“Oh, well, fuck it. I’ll miss one class. It’s worth it to let loose and have some fun,” she announces.
Her friend claps in favor of the terrible decision and yells, “Shots!”
Eddie looks so happy he might cry. I try to smile, but all I can think about is how her clammy hand is probably making my jeans wet. It’s gross. Thankfully, shots isn’t just a mating call, it means we’re getting up and going to the bar, so she lifts her hand from my knee. I follow along behind my brunette as Eddie walks beside the girl with the darker brown hair, his hand on her lower back precariously close to her ass.
I spot our rookie Carter Payne and Noah playing pool over in the corner, and I wave and start to head that way. Perfect excuse to get out of this shot situation. But the girl grabs my hand as I try to break away. “Where you going, gorgeous? You can’t expect me to do shots alone.”
I don’t bother to explain she’s got her friend, Eddie and his mustacheto get drunk with. I just let her guide me to the bar. Maybe a shot of tequila will get that teapot out of my head. It was really unique, though. A pretty jade-green color with roses swirled right into the porcelain. I wonder if Zoey has seen anything like it.
“What should we do?” the one Eddie is macking on asks excitedly.
The one next to me, who I realize still has a grip on my forearm, announces, “I’m a baby when it comes to shots. I need something sweet that goes down easy.”
She’s looking right at me with that comment, and it suddenly feels like it’s some double entendre, and now my forearm feels itchy from her clammy hand. Why the fuck is tonight a disaster?
I step up to the bar, pushing between two seats because it makes her let go of my arm, and the seats barricade me from any more unwanted contact. That’s what it is, I realize, unwanted. Jesus, I’m not me right now. And then, as Eddie starts explaining how much fun these are with two people, I know I have to get the fuck out of here. Right fucking now.
His girl listens intently as he explains how you lick the salt off someone’s neck, do the shot, and then bite the lime wedge out of their mouth. Her friendnods in agreement. “I’ve done a ton of these before. They’re super fun!”
The bartender’s looking at me, annoyed. I think I missed it when he asked me what I wanted the first time. I order four shots and drop money on the bar top before he even goes to prepare them. Then I look across the room and wave Carter Payne over. He looks confused, but I just keep motioning. No rookie in his right mind is going to keep playing pool when his alternate captain iscalling for him. So Carter puts down the stick and starts to weave his way through the crowd.
The bartender puts the shots on the counter in front of me with four lime wedges, then turns to hunt down a salt shaker. Someone is breathing down my neck, so I turn around. It’s Eddie. “You going to do your signature move again?”
He’s talking about the way I habitually drop the lime from my mouth a second before the girl puts her lips on it so it ends in a kiss. I’ve done it probably a million times. It’s a lame-ass, cheap move as old and original as polyester. I’ve always known that, but it’s never bothered me. Until now. I shake my head, and he looks like he might faint. “Really? Are you retiring it?”
