Total pages in book: 84
Estimated words: 80153 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 401(@200wpm)___ 321(@250wpm)___ 267(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 80153 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 401(@200wpm)___ 321(@250wpm)___ 267(@300wpm)
Still, I correct him. “Woman. As in one. Not women.”
“Okay. What’s the story with this woman?”
“She’s different. She’s not like anyone else I’ve been with,” I add as we turn the corner, Cletus leading the way around the block.
“It’s Jillian, isn’t it?”
I nod.
“Dude, you need to be careful.” His tone is a stern warning.
“I am careful, but look, I like her. I like her a lot. I’m fucking falling for her.”
Stopping in his tracks, Trevor stares at me, his eyes wide, his mouth hanging open. “Are you kidding me? You’re falling for a woman? For real?”
I shake my head, because that’s not correct. It’s well past falling. Everything I pictured earlier tonight clicks into place. I want the freedom to be with Jillian because I’ve fallen in love with her. My heart thumps a little harder as the thought shifts from bits and pieces of emotion to a fully formed certainty. “No, I’m not falling. I’ve fallen. I’m in love with her.”
“Whoa.” He holds up his hand like a stop sign. “In. Love?” He points at me, incredulous. “You? In love? For the first time, ever?”
“Don’t act so surprised. It was bound to happen.”
He shakes his head in disbelief. “I never thought you’d say those words,” he says, like he’s still processing the sheer magnitude of the bomb I dropped on him.
“It’s the truth. And listen, I know you think I can’t sustain a relationship for longer than a week, let alone a month, but I’ve had feelings for her for a while. I didn’t act on them because of what we talked about, and your concerns, but when we were in Miami . . .”
“You hooked up in South Beach?”
Anger flares through me. “Don’t you get it? I’m trying to tell you it’s more than hooking up. It’s way more than that.”
“Okay, it was more than hooking up. Fine. I get it. Are you still . . . doing whatever this more than hooking up is?”
I shake my head. “We’ve been behaving since we returned more than a month ago. The thing is, nothing has changed, and I still want her. I like her. I’m in love with her, man.”
He breathes out heavily through his nostrils as we turn back onto my block. “Don’t just chase a piece of ass, Jones.”
Faster than I captured the ball last week, I grab the neck of his shirt with my free hand and yank him closer. My eyes are full of fury. I stare hard into his irises, my jaw tight. “She’s not a piece of ass.”
He holds up his hands in surrender. He knows I’d never hurt him. But he also knows I’m so much bigger than he is.
I shake my head. “Don’t call her that.”
He doesn’t say anything at first, but soon he smirks. Laughs. Smiles.
I narrow my eyes. “What the hell?”
“You really like her, don’t you?”
I drop my fist from his shirt, letting my hand fall to my side as Cletus whimpers. “I told you I love her.”
“I had to test you, though.”
“You called her a piece of ass to test me?”
Trevor grins sheepishly. “It worked. You made your feelings for her crystal clear. That was all it took.”
“Dick,” I mutter as we resume walking Cletus.
“Yeah, but I love you.”
I drape an arm over his shoulder. “I love you, too.”
“What now? Are you going to tell Ford? Tell Liam? How are you going to pull this off? This is a big risk you’re about to take, dating your publicist.”
“I know that.”
He claps my back. “Just want you to be aware. Brands are cautious these days. They drop athletes for the smallest of reasons. That could happen to you. You do know that?”
“I’m aware, and I’m also well aware I don’t have a track record to stand on.”
He shoots a rueful smile, his tone shifting now to brotherly concern. “You don’t, though I understand where you’re coming from. You want Liam to believe what you know in your heart to be true.” He taps my chest. “There’s a first time for everything, and you’re feeling it, so you want him to line up behind you. But you need to know that Liam might not see things the same way.”
I sigh heavily. “I know.”
“He might not be convinced as easily as I was.”
I scoff. “You were easily convinced? We might have different definitions of easily.”
He stops, looking me square in the eyes. “I do believe you. I know you wouldn’t put your neck out like this with me if you weren’t in love. But I’m your flesh and blood. I’m on your side no matter what. And that’s why I want you to be realistic about how other people—people who haven’t stood by you since Mom and Dad brought you home from the hospital and all your big brothers and sister had to help give you a bottle and babysit you—”