Page 4 of Totally Played (Love In Play #5)

Chapter four

Ashley

It wasn’t how I thought the business trip would go, but we scored the extended investment and I got laid, so it wasn’t all bad.

Jennifer gushed half the flight home about how she can’t wait to visit again and spend some more time with the family.

I know she really means AJ. I should tell her that she’s barking up the wrong tree there, but really, how would I know.

Just because we hooked up doesn’t mean he isn’t keen to hook up with women, too.

Me, not so much. I’m totally a dude’s dude.

“Nice work convincing the Greys to commit to three years,” my boss and best friend, Redmond, says when I stroll into his office the following Friday.

“Once they saw the data, it was a pretty easy sell,” I reply, dropping into one of the brown leather armchairs in front of his desk. He closes the laptop he was working on. Another thing I love about Redmond. He’s always got time for you or, at least, for me.

“I hear there was a little more to it than that,” he says with a smirk.

“I don’t know what Jennifer told you, man, but it was all the numbers.”

“So it had nothing to do with them feeling guilty about you being poisoned by cheesecake?”

“Ha, no. I wasn’t poisoned.”

“Still, their son apparently spent a while in your room looking after you, I’m told.”

Fuck. Did Jennifer linger in the hallway to catch sight of AJ? Did she hear us?

“Yeah, he, umm, brought me some stuff from the mini-mart to, you know, get hydrated.” I cough on the last word and push up to arch my back over the armchair to get a glimpse of the baseball field.

With so many cities with RED Tech offices he could choose to make his base of operations, I was stunned when he chose Savannah.

More so when he told me it was because he’s become obsessed with Banana Ball.

I’ve never seen a game, despite him inviting me along a bunch of times. I’m more of a hockey guy.

“Well, whatever you did worked. Now we just have to replicate it with the Miller, the DeVos, and the Youkoti investors and we’ll be able to keep production in the US.”

“You just want to go down to the factory and watch it all come together whenever you want,” I say, and he smiles.

“What’s wrong with that?”

“Nothing, I guess, but the Millers are going to want more than a few numbers to get them to agree to invest for another three years. Can we maybe get the content guys down to some of these farms and film some real endorsements from the guys using the sensors?”

“That’s not a bad idea. I’ll get Rigs onto it. Here are your tickets for Belgium,” he says, sliding over the envelope.

“Jennifer tagging along this time?”

“No. I’m sending her to Tokyo to start charming the Youkoti family. They have a daughter a year younger than her, and they’ve already connected on socials. It seemed like a good fit. Plus, she speaks the language, so no translator costs for me.”

“Really?”

“Don’t sound so surprised. She actually speaks Italian, too. Did you think she was just some ditzy art student?”

I shrug, the guilt seeping in because that is exactly what I thought.

“I guess I sort of did. Sorry.”

He waves a hand like it doesn’t matter, but it does to me. I’ll have to make more of an effort to acknowledge her input.

“I’ll get prepared for the DeVos meeting, unless you need anything else?”

“Nope, I left your flight home open-ended because I have no idea how long you’re going to need there. We only just convinced them to invest in the first place. They’re all about the dollars and cents of it, so be ready to go with the numbers. Lina hates when you have to look it up.”

DeVos Capital is one of the leading AgTech venture capital funds in Belgium, and its CEO, Lina DeVos, is the main reason. She built her investment company up from the ground, starting when she was only seventeen and working on her father’s farm.

“I know the numbers backward and forward,” I reassure him.

“Good. You leave in three days, so maybe get some rest, see a movie, or watch a game. Or, better yet, come to a game. I have tickets to today’s Banana Ball match, Funky Monkeys vs Animal Control.”

“I’m good.”

“One day, I will get you to a game and then you’ll see. It’s awesome.”

“Doubt it. Besides, I have plans already,” I say, climbing from the chair and turning my back as I open the dating app and scroll through the matches. The app has availability markers at the top for the week, so when I spot one with tonight free, I click and then turn and show him my phone.

“Hot date. Sorry, maybe next time.”

He frowns but lets it go, returning to his laptop, and I leave.

I started using the dating app at first as a way to get me out of the house a few nights out of the week, and the guys I connected with were nice enough, easy to get along with, but I rarely took any of them home.

Despite what happened last week, I’m not usually one to sleep around.

Turns out, not sleeping around saw my score jump pretty fast. One guy posted a comment, “Turns out there are some decent men left in Savannah.” His name was Seth.

We had a great dinner at Riverside Barbecue and then took a walk around the park before I put him in a cab.

He was already at a five, the highest level, and we established at dinner that we were not a good fit romantically, but we didn’t let it spoil our night.

We’d gotten ourselves all dressed up, after all.

I wore my dark gray corset that night. It looked amazing with the dark blue dress shirt.

Sure, people stare when I wear them, but they stare anyway.

I’m a tall guy, and my natural body shape gives me a sort of hard-lined hourglass figure.

It was my unusual shape that had my tailor suggest the corset in the first place.

My shoulders are broad and my waist is tiny, so he had me try one on when I went in for a new suit a few years back.

I immediately loved the feeling of it hugging around me, so much so that I now own about sixteen different ones, and they’ve become a daily addition to my workwear.

I yawn as I step into the elevator. Maybe I should cancel. I click the button to undo the match, and a pop-up appears. If you cancel this close to your date, a zero-point-five deduction in points will occur and a late cancellation will appear on your profile.

Well fuck, I guess I’m going on a date. Who did I click anyway?

I go back to the photo. He’s cute, even if he is posing in a shirtless selfie, making a sort of duck face.

I don’t have an issue with the shirtless selfie, that part is always welcome.

He’s actually pretty hot, with more muscles than I can count, but he isn’t too bulky and veiny.

I am not a huge fan of veiny guys, unless the vein is the one pumping up his erection, that one I am a huge fan of.

His dark hair is wet and makes his blue-gray eyes stand out even more. He does look a little younger than the guys I normally match with, though, so I click his profile, and the second I see what’s listed under occupation, I have to laugh.

“He’s a fucking Banana Ball player. Redmond is going to love this.”

***

I get to the sports bar early and grab a stool to the side so I can watch the door.

“What can I get you?” the bartender, a middle-aged man with tattoos decorating his arms and neck, asks.

“A beer and a channel change to the Seattle Vegas game?”

He cocks an eyebrow in my direction, then glances to where two televisions on the other side of the bar are already showing tonight’s hockey game.

I expect him to tell me to move if I want to watch it, but he grabs a remote from a pile beside the register and flicks the television closest to me onto the hockey broadcast before pouring my beer.

“Thanks,” I say, checking the score. Vegas are up by three, and we’ve only got five minutes to go in the second third. We can still take it. That is, if Tennermanski can get his shit together.

“What the fuck was that?” I call, without thinking, and my face grows warm, but then I realize.

I’m probably in the one place calling out at a television is okay.

Tennermanski is one of the better players for Seattle, hell for the whole league, but he’s cocky as shit and yet again, he’s trying to give it to the Vegas winger Tyson Reverick.

He’s got the puck against the wall. “Come on, send it to Garrett,” I say like he can somehow hear me and do the smart thing.

But no. He sees Reverick headed his way and tries to deke him out.

I don’t know what it is about these two, but get them on the ice together and you can almost guarantee a punch on.

“Get it out of there,” I call just as Tennermanski loses his footing in the fight for the puck, and it’s turned over to Reverick, who’s off like a shot, and a second later the horn sounds. He’s got the goal.

“Fucking Tennermanski!”

“I take it you’re a Seattle fan?” a smooth voice says, and I turn on the stool to find Tony. Only he doesn’t look like Tony. The app version anyway.

He smiles nervously down at me, cheeks blushing a faint pink, and I settle on his gaze.

His eyes are so different to what I remember.

It’s not like I spent hours studying his photos, but I flicked through at least a dozen and none of them made my heart race like it is right now.

I swallow the lump in my throat and stand.

“Oh. Yeah, I am, despite how shit Tennermanski is playing,” I say and hold out my hand. “Ashley, but you can call me Ash.”

“So here’s the thing,” he starts, pausing to nervously bite at his lower lip.

He still hasn’t taken my hand, and the longer I’m holding it out there, the more awkward I start to feel.

My gaze moves over his slightly flushed face before settling again on his gorgeous gray-blue eyes.

They have a dark ring around them, and small yellow flecks dot closer to the pupils.

It’s then I notice the tiny freckles dotting his cheeks.

There’s one right under his left eye that kind of looks like a tiny heart, and it makes me smile. Could this guy be any cuter?

“I’m not Tony.”

“What?” Shit. Is this some sort of catfishing thing? No. He looks like the photo, those people use other people’s photos. “I’m confused.”

“You matched with my brother, Tony, but he’s sick. You were the first five he matched with, so I came to protect his score on the app thing. But also when I agreed, I thought you were a chick. He only told me after that you were… well, a guy. Tony’s bi, I’m straight. Hi. Calvin, nice to meet you.”