Page 26 of Playing for Keeps

My dad had poked his ugly head out of the woodwork when I first made the Marauders lineup. Seemed he’d suddenly had an urge to catch up on the last fifteen years of my life. I’m sure it had absolutely nothing to do with the fact I was grown up and playing representative rugby.

Before I had Theo, I might have gone out for a beer with him, but by then I’d held my newborn son in my arms. I’d learned what it meant to be a dad. So I wanted nothing to do with a man who could check out of his son’s life as if that was a legitimate option.

Thinking about my old man now made me crave seeing Theo. Because that was my self-therapy every time my father entered my head. I doubled down on being the best possible dad to my kid.

After Jacob woke up, we headed over to the lodge for breakfast. The sun was already shining. Shit, it was pretty here, with the mountains all around. They were bare of snow right now, but it would only take a southerly front blowing up the country to top them with white.

I helped myself to scrambled eggs and toast, then sat down at the table with Reuban, Jacob, Ali and Jonesy. Then I spotted Luke carrying his breakfast bowl toward our table and my heart started to race.

What the hell? Why was I nervous? I knew Luke wouldn’t embarrass me over what had happened last night. No, my nerves were because last night his attitude toward me had seemed to thaw. Which caused hope to tick away inside my chest.

Luke hesitated. Then he sat down opposite me, looking me straight in the eye. “You alright?”

To the other guys it probably sounded like just a casual inquiry, but I knew what lurked underneath.

“Yeah.”

“Sleep okay?”

“Yup. I had magical dreams where I ran my own empire of minions.”

Luke gave me a flat look. This was the thing. He knew all my deflection tactics.

“Did you use the minions to pull off master crimes?” he asked finally.

It made me feel almost light-headed that he’d decided to play along. “No. I used them to make socks. I was the biggest sock manufacturer in the Southern Hemisphere.”

Luke nodded as if my words made complete sense. “Maybe you should have thought about diversifying into gloves.”

Reuban gave us a weird sideways look. “What the fuck have you two been smoking?”

But I didn’t give a shit what Reuban or the other guys thought. Because my heart was hammering out a happy tune. This was such a flash of the old “us” it almost hurt to breathe.

I looked down at Luke’s bowl, taking in the Weet-Bix with sliced bananas on top.

“I can’t believe you still have exactly the same thing for breakfast,” I blurted.

He shrugged. “Why change something when it’s awesome?”

“How did you manage that while you were in Japan?”

“Never underestimate the power of my mother’s care packages.” He smirked.

Luke’s parents had always doted on him, so I wasn’t surprised they’d kept it up even when he was in another country.

“That’s a whole lot of Weet-Bix,” Reuban commented, following my gaze.

“That’s nothing. Luke once ate twenty dry Weet-Bix on a dare,” I said.

Luke’s warm brown eyes met mine. “What Ethan fails to mention is that it was his dare. And I then chundered them up all over our teacher’s shoes.”

Ali and Reuban laughed. Even Jonesy cracked a smile.

“Year Nine school camp. Good times,” I said.

Luke continued to hold my gaze. “Good times,” he echoed.

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