Page 77 of Tempting the Player
“You won’t freeze. You light up when you sing. Even tonight, singing with your friends, I can tell how much you love it.”
“Yeah, well, I’d like to continue to love it. With everything going on I don’t know if I could give it the focus I’d need to learn and perform a show. Plus, Mackenzie is going to be amazing. It’s a great opportunity for her and the rest of the band.”
He doesn’t say anything, but he doesn’t need to. I know the thing I’m not saying is that it could also be a great opportunity for me. I have the world’s attention right now, but maybe not forever.
“Someday,” I say and promise myself that it’s true. “When the time is right.”
24
HENDRICK
“Oh my gosh!”Jane yells. “It’s like a playlist of all my favorite songs.”
She dances in a circle, smiling and bobbing her head side to side, as another song starts to play over the speakers in the backyard of the football house.
It’s a pretty cool spot. When I was in Seattle going to school, we had something similar. I was living in the dorms, but a couple older teammates had an off-campus house where we often hung out and had parties.
Jane and her friends are playing flip cup at a table just outside the back door with her roommate’s boyfriends and some other football guys, including Archer and Brogan.
The longer the night goes on and the tipsier she gets, the more she seems like that girl I was watching from afar months ago.
And I forgot how much that girl got under my skin. Don’t get me wrong, there are a lot of layers to Jane, and they all intrigue the hell out of me. It’s just that I’m not a guy who acts without running through the scenario ten different ways, but when she’s carefree and happy like this, I find myself moving toward her without thinking.
“She’s unbeatable,” Brogan says and points to Dahlia. “We need to mix up the teams. I call Dahlia and Jane with me, Arch, and Felix.”
“You took our best player!” Vi screeches.
“Yeah, but we also took Jane, so it evens it out.” Brogan puts an arm around Jane’s shoulders.
“I should be offended,” she says, giving him a playful glare. “But I am really, really bad at this game.”
My pulse ticks faster as Brogan’s arm lingers on Jane’s bare skin. She’s wearing a strapless black dress that barely contains her cleavage. One little tug of the zipper at her back would send the small scrap of black material to her feet.
I pull my hands into fists to stop the tingle spreading down my fingers at the thought. I’d also like to shove Brogan about five feet to the side.
“I think I’m done anyway,” she says. “I want to dance some more.”
That’s my cue.
She finally looks my way as she steps out of a disappointed Brogan’s hold.
“What?” He whines. “No, come on. I was kidding.”
She laughs. “No, you weren’t.”
I meet her halfway. She tosses her arms around my neck. With the tall heels she’s wearing tonight, Jane is only a few inches shorter than me. The perfect height to lean forward and take her bottom lip between my teeth. Fuck, I gotta get a hold of myself.
“Will you come dance with me?” she asks. Her fingers play with the hair at the nape of my neck.
“I’ll walk over there with you.”
Her head moves slowly side to side. “That’s not what I meant.”
I know exactly what she meant. “What about your friends?”
“We’ve reached the point in the evening where it’s no longer chicks before dicks.” She turns her head to look at them. Jordan and Daisy are kissing while everyone else figures out teams, Gavin has one arm around Violet’s waist holding her against him, and Felix’s hands are somewhere under Dahlia’s shirt.
A small chuckle rumbles in my chest. “I bet they’d still dance with you if you asked.”
