Page 23 of Meet Your Match
“Yes,” he said. “Andmaking them cream their panties.”
“Ew!” she screamed at the same time I said, “Gross!”
Vince smiled victoriously. “Alright, we need to get downstairs for the bus. Let’s go.”
“Fine,” she sang again, and then she propped her phone up so she could stand in the middle of the room. I didn’t know where she was, but it looked like a college dorm, and she swung a leg out like she was testing the space around her.
I pulled out my phone and recorded Vince from behind, arching a brow at him and then the screen.
Then, Grace started singing.
Well, it wasn’t reallysingingas much as it was half-cheering, half-squawking like a bird. She did the most ridiculous dance, her hair flying about as she chirped something aboutforty one, best under the sun,forty one, let’s have some fun, Vinny, Vinny, you’re so cool, you’re so cool you rule the schooland then she ended it all with a back tuck into a split.
Vince held up his fist when she finished. “Perfect ten.”
“I know,” she said, climbing to her feet. “Go get ’em, big bro.”
“Later, sis.”
The call ended as abruptly as it had begun, and I turned off my own video, momentarily stunned.
“Um…” I laughed. “What was that?”
Vince shrugged, and I noticed he’d slipped out of his usual goofy demeanor into one more serious. The transition had been slow, starting from the moment I’d walked in the door and getting more severe as the hours ticked on.
He was mentally preparing himself for the game, that much was easy to see.
“Just a little tradition,” he said.
I couldn’t help but laugh again. “What — your little sister doing a bizarre dance and backflip?”
“Yes,” he said, snapping his eyes to mine. “Is there an issue?”
I swallowed under his gaze, which was harder than it ever had been when it was on me. “No,” I said. “I just wasn’t aware you needed someone to squawk like a bird to feel game ready.”
He narrowed his gaze, standing from where he had been on the couch. It always took my breath away, how tall and broad he was. “It was something she did to cheerme up before a game in high school when I was on a shit streak. I got a hat trick that game, and so now it’s routine.”
“But… you’ve lost games since then,” I pointed out. “So it can’t always work.”
“You don’t get it.”
He was gathering the last of his things to head out the door when I cut him off. “So explain it to me.”
He sighed, looking up at the ceiling. The movement exposed that long column of his throat, and I traced his Adam’s apple with a bolt of electricity firing off between my thighs.
Howis this man’s throat so damn hot?
“I can’t. It’s just… I don’t know. Something I have to do.”
He walked toward his bedroom then, which confused me, since we needed to head downstairs. I followed him, and when he turnedonhis closet light instead of flicking it off like a normal person would do before they left, I laughed.
“Don’t tell me this is part of it, too?”
He didn’t answer, but the muscle in his jaw ticced.
I shook my head on another quiet laugh, jotting it all down in my notes. “What’s next? Going to hop on one foot, rubbing your belly and patting your head at the same time?”
At that, Vince gritted his teeth, the muscle of his jaw flexing under his skin. “Can you stop being such a bitch?”
