Page 142 of Relationship Goals

I force a smile, and Gold grimaces.

“That’s just worse.”

From the floor, a pitiful mewl sounds, and Princess stares up at me with her huge blue eyes, one paw raised in the air.

“Little beggar,” I tell her.

“Since when do you have a cat?” Gold asks, astounded. “I figured you were more of a big-dog type. Rottweiler. Doberman. I don’t know, an Irish wolfhound.”

Bending over, I feed Princess a tiny piece of chicken off my plate. “Don’t need a dog.”

“She’s a very cute cat—” He frowns at me. “Wait. Michelle told me you rescued a cat with Abigail…and then adopted the cat out.”

I grunt. “So?”

“So…Michelle also said that Abigail was beyond heartbroken—but even angrier about the cat.” He eyes where Princess is gobbling down the bite of chicken like it’s the best thing she’s ever had in the world. “That…wouldn’t happen to be the cat, would it?”

I grunt again.

“You kept her fucking cat,” Gold whispers. “Oh, this is good.”

“What’s good?” Marino wanders over, then makes a wordless noise of excitement when he spies Princess. “Oh, mi amore, look at you.”

He scoops her up, and Princess looks at him with those blue eyes, hopeful for another bite of chicken.

“This is your woman’s cat?” Marino asks, scratching under her chin.

“Abigail isn’t my woman.”

“But you have her cat?” Marino presses. “I was there when Michelle was talking about it.” His dark brown hair flops over.

Princess’s purrs are absurdly loud, and I sigh in resignation.

“Yeah. That’s the cat.”

“Dude,” one of our midfielders, Logan Steel, says from where he’s spooning queso over a plate of chips. “That’s the actress’s cat, right?”

“How many people heard Michelle talk about the cat?” I ask, slightly irritated.

Marino raises a hand, and Gold…and then the rest of the team follow.

Logan laughs. “That was ice-cold, brother. And man, you fumbled the bag with her. Can I have her number?”

My hackles go up immediately. Gold’s hand weighs heavy on my arm.

“Kidding, Wolfe, kidding.” Logan, who’s the youngest on the team, at twenty, backs off, looking slightly terrified.

It’s petty, but that’s probably what calms me the most—the memory that Logan is barely an adult and that he’s clearly scared of me.

He clears his throat, and all our teammates, who are doing a horrible job of pretending not to watch, are suddenly incredibly interested in their plates.

Guilt washes over me, and I heave a sigh, staring at the wooden beams crossing my ceiling as I regain control over myself.

“I’m just saying, I think Abigail, er, Ms. Hunt—she seems really nice. And, I don’t know, it seemed like she really liked you. And she’s pretty.”

A couple of the guys laugh, and Logan has never seemed as young as he does now.

Heartened by the fact I’m still staring at him and haven’t tried to physically assault him, he clears his throat again, glancing around nervously. “That’s all I was saying. We were rooting for you.”

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