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“Drive me to the moorlands. I’m going to that party.”
And I was going to fuck Tucker Reid and his bad poetry and his dubious intentions and my entire freaking future, all at once.
After all, I was Dylan.
Impulsive.
Overly emotional.
And a very sore loser.
DYLAN
The next day, after a morning walk, finger-painting, sensory play, and cookie baking, Grav decided she’d had enough of our quality time and retired to her new room to flip through her books.
I heated up some water in a MacKenzie-Childs check tea kettle I got for no other reason than the fact that I saw it in a Nara Smith video and wanted to feel wholesome and belligerently perfect. I didn’t even like tea—I was a coffee girlie through and through. Three shots, at minimum, before I started my day. But I felt like reinventing myself now that I was in the big city.
As I waited for the water to boil, I leaned a hip against the kitchen island and stared out the floor-to-ceiling windows. The apartment overlooked Central Park, and even though the parkwas just one small slice of lush, heavenly green in a concrete jungle, it very much felt like living in a tree house.
The water came to a boil, and I rummaged through the cabinets for tea bags, delighted to find some of the Italian staples Row and I grew up on. Caffè d’orzo, amaretti cookies in a colorful vintage tin, and grissini. A private grin tugged at my lips. My brother and I may have been born in the U.S., but we were hopelessly Italian: passionate, opinionated, and deathly protective of our family. I was grabbing my phone from the counter to call him when Kieran’s name flashed on the screen. I swiped to the right.
“Hey, handsome.”
“Hello, gorgeous,” he purred back in his deep, alluring tenor. “Changed your mind about marrying me yet?”
“Nope, but please keep trying. My self-control has always been wanting.” I grabbed a mug and the caffè d’orzo and fixed myself a cup, pinning the phone between my ear and my shoulder. Fuck tea. I was still Dylan Casablancas. “Whatcha doing?”
“Just finished physical therapy and about to hit the shower.” He groaned, and I imagined him naked, draped across the exam table, a tiny towel protecting his modesty. “The therapist twisted my legs like I was made out of playdough,” he complained. “I’m never recovering from this injury. How ’bout you?”
Lazily stirring, listening to the teaspoon clink against the delicate mug, I blew a lock of hair from my face. “Settling in at Row and Cal’s apartment. Manhattan is, um, a lot.” My laugh was self-deprecating.
“Once you get used to the big city, you fall in love with the anonymity of it.”
But Kieran wouldn’t know. Inconspicuousness was something he’d never experience again in this lifetime. He was one of the biggest soccer players in the universe. A striker forAshburn FC, known for his lethal penalty strikes and merciless dribbling that often had defenders stumbling over their own feet trying to chase him, he was, without a doubt, the fear of every goalkeeper in the Premier League and the one legendary player every kid in Europe and South America had a poster of on their wall.
“I’ll take your word for it.” I clucked my tongue, reaching for the remote on the kitchen island and turning on the TV. I flipped through shows on the streaming service, settling on Grey’s Anatomy. Something about complicated medical conditions and drama always soothed my soul.
An ad appeared before the episode started, and I sighed. I couldn’t believe my multimillionaire brother didn’t pay extra to avoid these. Just as well, as the ad was for a Tom Ford perfume and featured soccer player Marcello Sarratore. He was lying on a golden dune in the middle of the desert, sweat gliding down his sculpted, bronze six-pack. Groomed black curls graced the expanse of his mammoth chest, along with prominent stubble covering those knife-sharp cheekbones. Sarratore looked like a real-life gladiator, all bronze and bigger than life.
I swallowed hard. “Is Marcello Sarratore taken?” I blurted out.
Wow. I really needed some vitamin D. And I’m not talking sunlight.
Kieran yawned. “Dunno. I’ve never met the guy. He plays for Inter Milan.”
“You both play in the Champions League, though,” I challenged. Since Kieran and I became friends a few years ago, I’d made a point to learn about soccer.
“We’ve never crossed paths. He only transferred to Milan two seasons ago, after staying faithful to his shitty hometown team, which was at the bottom of Serie A,” he explainedabsentmindedly. “Trust me, if we had, I’d have passed the ball right between his legs on my way to their goalkeeper.”
As left defender, Marcello Sarratore had recently won the World Cup with Italy.
“Besides, he’s the only soccer player in the world who is actually openly out.” I heard the snap of a waistband slapping taut skin as he put his clothes on. “So I’m afraid you’re out of luck there.”
“Marcello Sarratore is gay?” I moaned. “Figures. All the good ones are.”
Kieran was deep in the closet. In fact, our friendship had started because last time he came to visit our hometown of Staindrop, he’d pretended to hit on me, telling everyone who was willing to listen that he wanted me as his wife.
He’d been up-front about what he was doing. He’d never led me on. But he’d pursued me relentlessly, wanting me as his beard to get rid of those pesky tabloid columnists and the persistent paparazzi. He’d offered me his kingdom, all the wealth and power he’d achieved. Gravity and I would be his family, he’d said. I could even take a lover on the side. All he wanted was for the entire world to stop asking him when he’d find a girlfriend and settle down.