“You look good, Aston.”
My pulse kicks up. My stomach tightens in a good way.
This feeling right here—where one simple compliment from this girl makes me want to fall to my knees—is dangerous. Very dangerous.
“You too.”
She arches an eyebrow.
I chuckle. “What?”
“That’s it?”
“You know you’re gorgeous.”
She smiles, and my heart starts to pound in my chest.
“I just wanted to hear you say it.”
Lord help me. She’s still full of fire.
Eva steps closer, and the smell of her perfume hits me. It’s a soft scent of jasmine and something warm, like vanilla.
“So, how’s life in the league? I see your highlights. You still jump the snap count like a maniac,” she teases.
“It’s called timing, Carrington,” I joke, my eyes falling to her lips for a fraction of a second before I move them back up. “And life is good. Better now that I don’t have to answer your smart-ass postgame interview questions.”
“Aww, still sensitive,” she says, her dimple popping. “I notice you still use red tape on your fingers like you did in college.”
I slide a hand into my pocket. “You remember that?”
She shrugs. “You did it on specific fingers for every game.”
“I’m superstitious.”
“You’re ridiculous.” She laughs into the back of her hand. “You also insisted on tapping the goalpost three times.”
I shake my head. It’s unbelievable that she even remembers that about me. Rituals I’ve carried into the pros.
“It works,” I say with a smirk. “Didn’t know you were paying such close attention.”
She bites her lower lip, as if caught doing something wrong. I grin at the way her cheeks redden.
“I’m a journalist. It’s my job to study my subjects.”
I take another swig of my drink, the courage I lacked two years ago replaced by the knowledge that the girl he watched from afar was watching him right back.
“Do you still braid your hair when you’re nervous?”
She scrunches her brows. “I didn’t do that.”
“You’d stand on the sidelines and braid your hair when we were down or it was a close game. We’d come out of the tunnel after halftime, and it would be fully braided.”
“I was … keeping my hands busy.”
“I always knew whether we’d win by how tight your braid was.”
She laughs. “You noticed my hair?”
