Page 39 of Only Between Us

“What the hell’s going on, Josh? Do I have a shot with the Rebels or not?”

“You definitely have a shot. It’ll just take a bit more to finesse them than we initially thought.”

“More than faking a relationship?”

“We need to make you desirable. The Tigers are interested. They’ve invited you to join them for an off-season scrimmage and their annual charity gala. To see whether you’re back in playing shape. How you mesh with the team.”

The Tigers? They’re the top team in their division here on the East Coast. A stand-up organization from everything I’ve heard, and I’d be lucky as hell to return to the league with them.

But they’re not the Rebels.

“We’ve gotta play the game a little. Nail this scrimmage with the Tigers. Bring Cece with you—”

“Her name is Siena.”

“Whatever. Bring her, let her charm them. The second the Rebels catch wind that you’re being wined and dined by the Tigers, they’ll come crawling. They won’t want you playing there.”

I put the call on speakerphone and pull up my text thread with Siena. We haven’t made an official appearance since the alumni game, so it’s only a couple weeks’ worth of the same type of texts every evening at around six thirty.

SIENA:Limo service requested, please advise ETA and provide the most expensive bubbly in the ice bucket.

BROOKS:I’m here.

SIENA:With champagne?

BROOKS:Get your ass over here, Pippen.

Even though she’s relented on the rides to and from work, I’ve caught her trying to sneak her helmet out of my back seat on more than one occasion. I’ve never been particularly domineering as a boyfriend—of the real or fake variety—but I promised her that if she’s ever riding that bike again, it’ll be because I’m six feet under.

Which only prompted her to advise me to sleep with one eye open.

BROOKS:Can you get away from work next weekend for a scrimmage and gala in the city? It’ll be a weekend thing.

My knee bounces as I stare down at my phone, waiting on her reply.

Since the day I became her reluctant chauffeur, I’ve felt trapped in a dizzying cycle with Siena Pippen. I know better than to trust her or become invested in anything more than the sham we’ve been thrust into.

But then there are the fleeting moments where I forget to be that guy. The overthinker, the one trying to sniff out a motive.

In those moments where I simply let myself be, I find myself irritatingly intrigued by the nuggets she lets slip about her life. I become irrationally driven insane over things that shouldn’t raise my heart rate.

And yet, they do.

Several things about Siena Pippen have come to drive me insane, in fact.

I don’t understand how her hair is so shiny. I don’t get how her scent lingers. Itlingers. In the air in my car. In my clothes. I take a whiff of anything and I’m served that bright, sunshine scent. I can’t get rid of it, no matter how many times I put my clothes through a wash cycle.

Every day since starting my second career as her personal driver, she’s greeted me with a freshly made, still-warm breakfast sandwich. Eggs, cheese, and bacon bits that belong nowhere near the diet of an athlete deep in training who reserves the bulk of his caloric intake for candy. But I eat that goddamn sandwich every morning, because it’s her way of repaying me for the lattes and the rides. And it ticks me off that she wouldn’t simply let me drive her around without feeling the need to repay the favor in the first place.

Plus, she admitted to cutting off Fuck Toy Aidan the day she and I met. Before we’d even agreed not to sleep with other people.

What the fuck was that about?

She could barely stand to look at me then. Meanwhile, Naomi slept with my teammate during a committed relationship. That confession and the fact that she handed it to me so readily, like she knew I needed it, makes it hard to slot the two women in the same category.

Except Siena is, quite literally, dating you for money.

I don’t get it. Don’t get her. Don’t get why I even give a shit.