A hint of his cocky smile reappeared. “Well…”
“She could kick your ass. I hope she does.”
“You haven’t seen me in the ring.” He flicked his finger down her bare arm. “Or elsewhere. As I have not yet seen you.”
Another sound rumbled from my chest, and this one bordered on a growl. “Enough. You’re fighting me, not fucking her, so cool it. I’ll buy you an extra bottle of lotion for your consolation prize after you lose.” I hit him hard in the stomach as I passed, grabbing my sister’s hand as I went. His surprised “oof” made me shoot my sister a triumphant grin. Pretending to be a man, my ass. “Let’s go, Carly. We’re done with him.”
“We made a deal,” he reminded me, idly rubbing his stomach.
The damn thing had felt like a brick. My knuckles already hurt.
“And I intend to collect on that date no matter what, Anderson,” he called.
We walked out, Carly swaying her hips so hard I swore I heard her pelvis pop out of joint. She practically vibrated with excitement. Or lust.
Yeah, lust seemed to be the most likely contender.
“Are you cold? Do you need a sweater?” I whispered furiously, tugging her down the hall toward the locker room. “If you shake any more, I’m putting you in a strait jacket.”
“You got what you want,” she whispered back, her eyes aglow.
I hadn’t had much experience with the emotion I glimpsed in her eyes until two weeks ago, and I so didn’t like seeing it reflected back at me. Especially not due to Overcocked Costas.
“So, what? Now I’m supposed to let you get what you want?” I asked, hoping she would toss back a reassurance.
“Yeah, Ame, maybe you should. You don’t want to have a sex life? Good for you. But I do. And you’re not going to make me ashamed of it.” She slammed the locker room door shut in my face.
I leaned against the wall. Great. I was supposed to be basking in the thrill of my accomplishment in getting Costas to fight me. Instead I’d have to borrow Carly’s laptop so I could do a search for chastity belts.
The idea of her having sex didn’t bother me. Much. We’d already covered that topic. I wanted her to have fun and enjoy her youth. But did she really have to go after a fighter? One that had busted Fox’s eye socket no less? That number on Giovanni’s stomach probably had to do with his number of sex partners or something. And he was older than she was. Not by much, but a few years was a lot with guys like Giovanni.
Plus, he spoke Italian and probably thought a date consisted of eating tiramisu off a woman’s thighs.
I didn’t know how I would renege on the agreement, but I would. I hadn’t made it anyway. It wasn’t binding, and besides, he hadn’t even named it as a condition of winning. He just had to show up for the fight and he got to take a big juicy bite out of my sister.
Why had I gotten myself into this mess again?
Tray’s smile flashed through my mind, and I rubbed my bleary eyes. Yeah. That was why.
I’d spent the last three days pacing and fretting every moment I wasn’t at work or at the gym. Last night I’d deliberately watched Pretty Woman so I had an excuse to bawl like a baby. Then I’d researched eye socket fractures and looked at videos until I wanted to cry for a different reason. He had surgery to look forward to, all because of me.
Sleep had been impossible. I missed him, and worse than that, I was still so fucking worried. Everything I’d read online had only increased my fears. What if he ended up blind from his injury or something equally awful? His beautiful eyes…God.
That wasn’t a likely consequence from the kind of damage he’d sustained. It still didn’t stop the crazy scenarios from spinning through my head at three a.m.
Fighting the guy who’d put him in that hospital bed was a crappy sort of penance, but it was all I had. I’d worry about the money I needed after that. And I wouldn’t think about the fact that I was having trouble remembering that money had been my reason for setting up that fight with Fox in the first place.
Two weeks had changed so much. I had changed. That scared me most of all.
Aggravated and completely out of sorts—and not at all eager to talk to my sister—I typed a quick text to Kizzy.
You took Italian. What the f does tesoro mean?
A moment later, her answer appeared.
Treasure. Y?
Inside the locker room, I could hear Carly banging around like a crazy person. A crazy pissed person. I sighed and dropped my head against the wall as I formulated my response.