Page 91 of Half-Court Heat

“Areyou interested?” Jazz raised her hands in a surrendering gesture. “No judgment either way. With a face card like that, that woman can get it.”

“I’m not. Interested.” I hit the pause between the words, like I was hammering nails into wood.

Jazz squinted at me. “You sound … unconvincing.”

I sat up straighter, my chest tight. “I love Eva. Period. I’m not looking at anyone else.”

That seemed to satisfy my friend—for the moment.

Jazz smirked and grabbed a dumbbell. “Alright, Captain Monogamy. But just so you know, if Rayah Thompson offers to spot me,I’msaying yes.”

Chapter

Twenty-Seven

When athletes try to relax, it tends to be a bit chaotic.

We don’t know how to do ‘chill.’ We show up to a beach day like it’s a training session: stocked coolers, an assortment of beach chairs and towels, Bluetooth speakers, and at least a few volleyballs and footballs. Jazz and I had barely made it off the boardwalk before we heard the commotion down the shore.

“Is that Dez?” Jazz asked, squinting past her sunglasses. “Please tell me she’s not trying to race Briana in the sand.”

My aforementioned teammate flew past us, a blur of limbs and trash talk, with Briana chasing behind.

“Turning our day off into the damn Combine,” I snorted.

Further down the beach, Arika was setting up a massive shade tent with Mya and her wife, Penelope. The three of them were deliberating which side should face the water. Mya and Penny’s daughter, Reed, who couldn’t have been more than three or four years old, dug holes in the sand with a plastic shovel.

Rayah was stretched out on a nearby towel like it was a magazine cover. The strategic cutouts of her one-piece bathingsuit left little to the imagination. The white fabric glowed against her golden skin tone.

She raised a manicured eyebrow when Jazz and I approached.

“Look who finally decided to join the party,” she clucked. “We were about to send up a flare.”

“Traffic,” I said with a shrug.

“Lies,” Jazz countered. “This one spent twenty minutes deciding between swimsuits.”

“I did not!” I defended myself.

Jazz grinned and dropped her bag on the sand. “Okay, maybe it was only ten.”

I kicked off my slides and tugged my oversized T-shirt over my head. A few shrill wolf whistles filled my ears.

“Damn, Lex!” Arika called out from under the tent. “Warn the children before you bring the six-pack out in public.”

“Did your torso get its own trainer or something?” Mya asked, eyebrows practically disappearing into her hairline.

“Nah,” Rayah added, openly smirking. “Take that shirt off again—I need to see that in slow motion.”

I rolled my eyes, but I could feel the flush creeping up my neck. My stomach tightened—not from embarrassment, just instinct. I wasn’t flexing. Notreally.

A sharp breath and a thud to my right broke the moment. Dez collapsed dramatically onto the sand beside us, gasping like she’d been doing wind sprints. Briana followed a few steps later, far less theatrical, with that easy, gazelle-like gait.

“Who won?” I asked.

“Me, obviously,” Briana said, completely unbothered. “Old heads have stamina, baby. These young bucks gas out too quick.”

Dez, still heaving, lifted a middle finger.