Page 13 of Try Hard

Eve

“A rcher,” Ophelia said, shooting me one of her characteristically guarded looks. “I didn’t even know you were attending.”

She looked beautiful. That navy blue suit fit her like a dream. Her hair was a flash of fire against it and, like a fool, all I wanted was to fly into the flames.

I could tell she was thinking about the fact that I’d been texting her when she was getting ready to leave.

Our parents didn’t live far apart. She knew I’d have needed to leave around the same time to make it here.

I hadn’t been trying to keep it from her.

I hadn’t realised we were headed to the same place.

And, honestly, I hadn’t wanted to admit I was completely ignoring the person giving me a ride to text her instead.

I smiled, holding her gaze and attempting to seem casual, as if her attention didn’t fill me with enough energy to run an entire pitch without breaking a sweat. “I didn’t know you were either, but I can’t say I’m disappointed.”

She sucked in a breath that felt so similar to other breaths I’d seen people take. That look, that pause… It was usually followed by flirting, kissing, sexual tension. I wasn’t foolish enough to assume it was the same thing with Ophelia—just foolish enough to wish it was.

Her gaze flickered to the woman beside me—Sammy, Kim’s future cousin-in-law and one of the many, many bridesmaids Ophelia and Tanika were talking about.

I got the feeling Ophelia wasn’t taking to her, but then, Ophelia didn’t take to many people.

She managed to get along fine with them, but she didn’t like them.

Back in school, far more people had liked her than she’d ever seemed to like or feel comfortable around.

It was part of why she was so intimidating—and part of why getting even a smile from her felt like winning an Olympic medal.

Well… I’d done that too and getting smiles from Ophelia was ten times more challenging.

“I’m Sammy,” she said, reaching a hand towards Ophelia, suddenly equally guarded. “I’m Kieran’s cousin. The groom, you know.”

“Fia,” she replied, a placid smile on her face as she returned the handshake. “I went to school with Kim and Kieran.”

“Yeah, she’s mentioned you, actually,” Sammy said, and I could sense the tense undercurrent in her tone, a million miles from how she’d been five minutes ago.

I wasn’t ignorant enough not to put the pieces together, but I was busy trying not to beam over the fact that Ophelia had introduced herself as Fia—and over the fact that she’d referred to me by only my last name again.

Sure, some people did that to keep a distance between you and them, and, sure, as an athlete, I’d had plenty of people just call me Archer over the years, but it felt different with Ophelia.

A public callback to our private conversation.

Not anything others would bat an eyelid at, but something just the two of us fully understood.

“Interesting,” Ophelia said plainly.

I’d seen her be less standoffish with people—though I’d seen her be more so too—but there was still something magnetic about her. Perhaps it was from the fact that she’d never given into that subtle training that women needed to be pleasant and polite and constantly nice.

Sammy seemed to be having a difficult time figuring her out, too. The predominant emotion was annoyance at having our conversation interrupted. “It’s going to be a beautiful wedding.”

“I know,” Ophelia said, more genuine now, and she glanced at the gathered crowd. “If all the bridesmaids can inadvertently coordinate on such pretty florals for a casual brunch, I can only imagine how beautiful the actual day will be.”

Sammy faltered, more confused than ever by Ophelia.

But that was her all over—standoffish but not unkind.

She’d even taken a vacation from her life to come to an old school friend’s wedding.

There was a weird energy between her and Sammy, but she was still kind enough to support Kim.

She hadn’t even needed to compliment the florals—most of the bridesmaids were wearing dresses, but she’d commented specifically on the florals to include Sammy in her jeans and floral shirt.

Ophelia was that complicated book again, and all I wanted was to get inside and read every page.

“Fia here is a writer,” Tanika cut in. “She travels all over the world seeing glorious places, so I guess we know we’ve made it if she thinks it’s beautiful!”

Ophelia shot her a sweet look, and I hated the tiny twinge of jealousy that shot up inside me.

I wasn’t generally a jealous person, and Tanika had a husband she adored—and Ophelia barely even liked people.

But she and Tanika had been friends at school.

Close ones. She’d always had a part of Ophelia I never had, and I wished I knew how to get there.

“Right. The travel thing. Kim mentioned.” Sammy cleared her throat. “Tanika, we should go check in with her actually. It’ll be time to eat soon.”

Tanika beamed, the only one who seemed oblivious to the tension in the air, and gripped Ophelia’s shoulders briefly. “We’ll catch up properly in a bit, yeah?” And she ran off with Sammy without waiting for an answer.

Ophelia sipped her orange juice, watching them go and pretending she didn’t see me sliding closer to her. “I don’t think your friend likes me.”

I laughed. “Did you want her to?”

She shrugged. “I don’t want to make things complicated for Kim.” She shot me a quick, sidelong look. “Or you.”

I ignored the way my heart swooped. “I only just met her. She seems nice enough, but it’s hardly going to impact my life.”

“In my experience, people who spend that long touching someone’s biceps aren’t looking to remain random, casual acquaintances.”

“Is this you telling me you regularly have people feeling up those swimmer’s arms of yours?”

Her face crumpled hilariously with disgust. “Absolutely not. It’s me pointing out that Sammy was flirting with you. Do people hit on you everywhere you go?”

I snorted. “No.” It was just my luck that I’d been in two different places with her and she wasn’t the one hitting on me.

“At least you’re not denying the fact that you were being hit on this time.”

I looked her over. That could be jealousy from someone else, but she didn’t seem jealous. She seemed the same as always. I shrugged. “She was a little obvious, but it’s nothing serious.”

“You’re not interested?”

“No. And I don’t really think she is, either.”

Her eyes were wide when she looked at me and placed her glass back on the bar. “Are you serious? Of course she is. She was practically drooling over you.”

Jealousy? Ophelia had nothing to be jealous of. But, of course, she still didn’t actually seem interested—just like she was annoyed with me for being oblivious.

I sipped the remnants of my own drink. “We’ve been through this,” I told her, amused. “People like to flirt with celebrities. It makes them feel good. It’s not really about me.”

“You were just giving her day a boost by flirting with her.” Her tone was so flat, so unbothered.

“I didn’t flirt with her.”

She eyed me. “She seemed to think you did.”

“Because she was flirting with me?”

Ophelia shrugged, looking across the crowd. “Yeah. And she was annoyed that Tanika and I interrupted you.”

I grinned. “You didn’t. I invited myself into your conversation.”

Something shadowed across her face, some thoughts that went deeper than her words. “And you called me Fia.”

“You called me Archer.”

“I did,” she agreed, and it was there again. Something deeper, something more . I desperately wished that I knew what she was thinking.

I sighed. “I assumed you’d want her to call you Fia, so it seemed easier that way. You know, like with your dad. And Terrance, my mum’s partner. He called me out on it, too, because Soph calls you Fia.”

“Am I dinner conversation at the Archer house?” She was amused. I could have cheered. I’d amused her again. It was rapidly becoming one of my favourite things in the world.

I shook my head, unable to suppress my grin. “Breakfast, actually.”

Her bottom lip disappeared momentarily into her mouth and I was certain she was biting down on her smile. “Oh, of course. My apologies for getting the wrong meal.”

“I think I can forgive you.” I’d forgive her fucking anything.

“How magnanimous.”

“I’m truly a gift to the world.”

She dropped her head towards her chest, breathing the lightest laugh, and I thought I’d die of happiness.

How could she possibly think I’d flirt with Sammy while she was on my mind? Of course, she probably had no idea just how much she was on my mind, how she hadn’t left it for even a second since I’d first spotted her yesterday.

“Maybe don’t let Sammy know your whole family is so eager to talk about me,” she said. “I don’t think she’d like it.”

Sammy was lovely, but I wasn’t planning on telling her anything. I didn’t want to talk to anyone but Ophelia. Even at the wedding, two hundred and fifty people wouldn’t hold a candle to her.

I took a deep breath as subtly as I could, willing my chest to work normally. “I promise Sammy was just after a momentary ego boost. She flirted with an athlete who was nice to her. She’ll move on.”

“Will you?”

I barked a laugh. “Already there.”

“Devastating,” she said, smirking, and I knew she didn’t think the news was devastating at all.

That smirk was, though. The kind of devastating, heartbreaking smirk that destroyed whole worlds.

“Somehow, I think it will be okay,” I said, looking around when someone started calling us all over to the dining area they’d cordoned off for us.

“Did you ask if she wanted Sophie’s number?” she asked lightly, and I knew this was her calling out my repeated efforts to check if she wanted it, but it still rankled something inside of me, some fear it was her actually angling for Soph’s number.

“I did not. Do you think I should?”

She shot me a look, picking up her drink and heading for the tables. “If Sophie’s still the same person she was back then, I can only imagine she’d beat you up if you gave her number to every woman you met.”

“You’re not wrong there.” I walked close to her side.

Too close for friends, really. Definitely too close for two people who had never really been friends and only reconnected yesterday, but I couldn’t get myself to step any further away from her.

She was like a magnet, one I was more than happy to be swept away by.

“She’d hate me giving her number to random women. ”

Ophelia watched me with narrowed eyes as she turned sideways to slip through the excited crowd. “And yet you were insistently asking if I wanted it?”

My stomach clenched unpleasantly. “She wouldn’t have been upset about that.”

She was quiet for a moment, looking around to check there was no seating plan, before heading towards one of the tables in the back.

I followed after her like a lost puppy. And happy about it.

When we reached the table she’d picked, a four-seater, I pulled a chair out and gestured her towards it.

She raised her eyebrows and looked at me with a cross between confusion and amusement. But, after a second she sat in the seat, and that felt like a win, too.

“Sophie wanted my number?” she asked when I sat beside her.

“Maybe a little.” More than a little.

Ophelia looked like that was deeply unexpected news, though I couldn’t figure out why.

Weren’t women routinely falling at her feet, desperate for her number?

Sure, she made jokes about that happening to me, and she wasn’t totally wrong—that was part of the deal with being in the public eye—but the idea that they weren’t doing the same to her was preposterous.

Her gaze slipped over my shoulder and her expression hardened, highlighting again just how much she’d relaxed around me. Even elusive, she let me in more than she did with other people. I’d be riding that high for weeks.

“Watch out,” she warned, picking up her pale blue napkin and lying it in her lap. “Your girlfriend’s on the way over.”

I turned to follow where she’d been looking and, sure enough, Sammy was making her way over with Tanika.

“Ophelia,” I said fiercely. Saying her name, to her face, felt like a firework exploding in my chest.

She looked at me, that carefully curated facade cracking. Something real, vulnerable, a little thunderstruck took over her face, and I was acutely aware of how close I was sitting to her, of the distance between our lips.

She swallowed visibly. “Yes?” Her voice was barely more than a whisper.

“She’s not my girlfriend and I don’t want her to be.”

She nodded slowly as Sammy and Tanika got closer and closer to our table. “Noted, Archer.”

I followed her lead, looking up to welcome the other two to our table, but my whole body was fizzing with a desperate, nervous energy. I needed to throw a ball just in an attempt to chuck the feelings away with it.

How was it possible she wasn’t feeling the same way?