Page 38 of Pitcher Perfect
His attention swept her body, a ripple going through his jaw. “I don’t know, Rocket. I still think I should.”
Why was her pulse going so fast? “Okay. Why?”
“I’m worried I’ll be half asleep and... touch you without thinking.” He huffed a sound. “I mean, Christ. It takes concentration not to touch you when I’mawake.”
The bedding started to feel different against her skin. Softer. More alluring.
Bad.
Fine. Maybe she could admit to being... attracted to Robbie. Nothing too unusual about that. He was a hot professional athlete who probably appealed to most women who crossed his path. It stung to be one of thousands, but she couldn’t do anything about it now. Except to remember that the attraction was physical in nature only. She didn’t have grand, once-in-a-lifetime, momentous feelings for anyone but Madden. That’s why Robbie was here in the first place. Luckily, she’d found someone she found attractive to help weed through her insecurities with men, but that’s all this could be. That’s all shewantedit to be.
And most importantly, that’s all he was offering. He definitely couldn’t wait to get back to his carousel of one-night stands.
“Yeah.” Finally, she nodded in agreement, tossing him a pillow and the spare blanket folded on the end of her bed. “You’re right. Maybe it’s best if you sleep on the floor.”
Robbie couldn’t sleep.
Not because he was bedding down on the floor. Although trying to catch some z’s while Skylar was within reaching distance, breathing softly in her little tank top and shorts... not easy. Not easy at all. He’d lost count of how many times she’d checked him out while completing their trust exercise, those gorgeous brown eyes glued to his abs like she was on a stakeout. Did she realize every thought in her head played out on her face?
Did she realize he loved that so much?
Would she care?
Robbie dragged a frustrated hand down his face and focused on the second reason he couldn’t sleep—he’d only eaten one dinner. A small one, at that. The objective of tonight’s cookout had been to size up the competition and find out tomorrow’s challenge. Being the newcomer, he’d hesitated to be too forwardand ask for a second helping, but Jesus. One measly burger for dinner?
Giving up on falling asleep, Robbie got up and quietly left Skylar’s room.
“One burger. What am I?” he muttered, now on his way down the dark hallway. “A toddler?”
Robbie turned the corner into the kitchen and drew up short. Slumped forward at the white-and-gray marble island was Elton, his gaze locked on the phone in front of him. A picture on it showed a smiling young woman with black curly hair and a medal around her neck. In the space of two seconds, before Elton noticed Robbie’s arrival, Robbie witnessed something other than irritation or exasperation on the baseball player’s face for the first time. Heavy, hollow sorrow. That’s what it was.
He tried to back out of the kitchen before Elton clocked him, but it was too late. The other man’s jaw hardened and with a swipe of his thumb, he darkened the phone.
“What do you want?” Elton asked.
“Like, four times the amount of food I ate earlier.” Robbie slipped behind Elton and made a move for the refrigerator, opening the freezer first. That was where his favorite foods were usually hiding. “Does your mom keep any Stouffer’s lasagnas in the house?”
“Pretty much everything in this house is from the farmers market.”
Robbie blanched. “Aha. So this is going to be the real test of survival, is it?” He reached in and found a frozen bag of cauliflower crinkle fries. What thefuck? “Feeding me normal-sized portions until I’m too weak to compete.”
“You’ll get used to it,” Elton said, sounding as though he was fighting off weariness.
Even though he had an intense dislike for this prick, Robbiecouldn’t quite stem the impulse to break up the sadness he could still feel lingering in the air. Laugh through the pain, that’s what he’d been taught. Being the class clown growing up had turned the tide from being laughedatto being laughedwith. Was his court jester personality also the reason a lot of his veteran teammates constantly rolled their eyes at him?
Yeah.
Too late to change now, though, right?
Robbie gave up on the freezer and opened the fridge, a little surprised to find himself checking for orange juice before locating food for himself. The no-pulp kind Skylar liked. Why didn’t they have any on hand for the morning? Mentally planning a trip to the store before she woke up, Robbie sighed in relief when he saw a plastic-wrapped platter of leftover burgers, buns and all. “I assure you, I will never get used to regular human portions of food. When I was a kid, I got kicked out of summer camp for breaking into the cafeteria in the middle of the night.” He set the plate down on the counter and whipped off the plastic like a magician revealing a rabbit. “They found me with my face submerged in a five-gallon tub of corn chowder. That’s how I got my summer camp nickname. Robbie Corn-igan.”
“Wow. Sounds like you’ve always been a pain in the ass.”
“You’ve got that right,” Robbie said around a mouthful of meaty goodness. “Like recognizes like, I guess.”
He put his hand out for a fist bump.
Elton gave it a withering look.
