Page 60 of Keeper
“I’m playing your game. Are you going to make me play alone?”
He smirks and peels off his jacket, laying it on the bench before removing his cufflinks and rolling up the sleeves of his white dress shirt. His sinewy forearms make my knees weak as he strides over to me. When he reaches the goal line ten yards away, I toss him the football.
Staring at his large, strong hands digging into the stitching, I say, “For every answer you give me that I like, I’ll remove a layer of clothing. Let’s call it Strip Football.”
“Answers thatyoulike?” He laughs and shakes his head. “Everything is a performance to you, isn’t it?”
“Don’t act like you don’t love my weird.”
His face heats and his eyes blink rapidly for a moment. He clears his throat. “Need I remind you that you’re wearing a dress?”
“I have undergarments on.” I shrug a shoulder, attempting to be coy and probably coming off like I’m having a seizure. “Are there security cameras in here?”
“I don’t think so,” he replies.
“Kismet.” I wink and then position myself between the poles, my legs spread as I clap my hands in front of me like I’m preparing to stop a ball. Thank goodness this dress is stretchy. “If you say something I don’t like, you have to strip.”
“I would have left my jacket on if I’d known that,” he argues, propping the ball on his hip.
“Come on, Harris. You’re not afraid to play with a girl, are you?”
His warm chuckle makes me feel like a million pounds. He drops the ball and holds it beneath his brown, wing-toed shoe.
“All right, so you’re a keeper,” I begin. “Balls fly at you all the time, correct?”
“Yes,” he replies skeptically, softly kicking the ball at me.
I bend over and scoop it up with my hands. “Are you ever afraid of them?”
He huffs a laugh. “You can’t be afraid of the ball as the keeper.”
“Why not?”
“Because, literally, your only job is to put yourself between the ball and the net.”
“So you sacrifice your own body for the save,” I reply, pulling the ball up and holding it to my chest. “You put yourself in harm’s way to protect the net. Why would you want that job?”
His brows lift. “The payoff of a great stop is worth it,” he responds simply, like the answer is obvious.
“Are you telling me the benefits outweigh the risks?” My voice rises as I throw him the ball. “I quite like that answer.”
Poppy straightens at my last comment, her smile warm, like I just touched her in a naughty place. My amused expression falls as she reaches over to her side and slides down the zipper of her dress along her ribs.
My hands tighten on the ball as she pulls her arms out of the top and shimmies the dress down her body. Now she stands before me in a black thong and a pink and teal polka-dot strapless bra. Mismatched. Quirky. Sexy.
Poppy.
She kicks her dress off to the side like a glittering football and then spreads her legs again, ready for round two. To keep my mind off of her body and the fact that I want to rush her and take her in my arms, lay her flat on this pitch and claim her, I turn my focus on the ball. I begin dribbling, my brown wingtips slippery on the turf.
“That’s precisely how I feel about us if we give this a go,” she says, gesturing between us. “We won’t just be Booker and Poppy. We’ll be more. And the rewards of that could outweigh the risks.”
I sigh, nerves prickling my fingertips as Poppy regurgitates similar words I’ve heard from Vi. There could be so many rewards if I let myself be with her. If I just dove in and gave myself a chance at more with her. But my old fears are still there, and I can’t make them go away. “But I’m not an offensive player, Poppy. I’m not used to glory moments on the pitch like Cam and Tan have as strikers. I’m a defensive player at my core, which means I’m constantly calculating risks and preparing for the worst case scenario. My knee-jerk reaction is to protect myself and what I hold most dear. In this case, it’s our friendship.”
“Take your shirt off!” she shouts, stopping my movement of the ball.
I snicker at her stern expression. “Don’t like that answer?” I ask, my head tilted. She’s so cute when her brow furrows like that.
“Nope. Strip, Harris.” Her face is all business.
