Page 62 of Reverse Pass

“But I don’t like it. Especially at practice.” Her arms wrap around my waist from behind me, and she rests her head against my back.

“Violet…” I sigh.

“You were gone late. I assumed you were out with your friends.”

“So you thought you could get him in and out before I got home?”

“No. He’s a friend of Joss’s.”

“That’s not what it looked like when I walked in.”

“He was flirting with me. That’s all.”

I grunt. That much was fucking obvious.

“Ben, my own best friend flirts with you constantly.”

I grunt again. She’s not wrong.

“Joss is harmless. That guy wanted you naked and under him,” I grump.

“That’s too bad.” She shrugs.

I turn to face her, and she lets her arms drop from me.

“Why’s that?” I push some of the hair that’s still disheveled from her nap out of her face, tucking it behind her ear.

“Because there’s a much younger guy I’m fucking, and he keeps me way too busy to think about anyone else.” She smiles, an almost giddy look on her face that twists my heart.

“That good, huh?” I can’t help but smile back at her.

She nods.

“Please let me do something for you.” She gives me a pleading look.

I should have the talk with her. The big confessional that Mac suggested. Confront the truth whichever way it falls, but right now I feel too raw to face the truth. I do, however, need the answer to one question which is haunting me.

“You can tell me something.”

“What’s that?”

“When Cameron was here… did you?” I don’t fully speak the question, and I regret it almost as soon as I ask because if the answer isn’t the one I want, it’s going to be too much to hear tonight.

“No.” She shakes her head.

“He didn’t try anything?” I’m skeptical given his self-assured smug exit when he’d talked to me.

“He kissed me. He touched me… He tried. But I told him no.”

I nod. I want more details. I want to know exactly how long he kissed her. Where he touched her. But I keep that to myself.

“What did he say to you, anyway?” She looks up at me. “He and Joss said you had a run in.”

“Nothing worth repeating.”

“He’s jealous of you, you know. You have everything in front of you. And he wishes he did. So whatever he said, it’s bullshit. Okay?”

I nod, but I can’t help it that some of the things he said are still rattling around in my skull. Replaying like a bad B movie on late night television. Because some of what he said about her, I’m not sure was completely wrong.