I don’t know him, but he looks like a wolf ready to eat her alive. He stares down at her in that red dress, and I can see his thoughts scrolling across his head like they’re printed in a little bubble. Where has this tiny red pixie been all my life?
I’m moving before I’m consciously aware of it, not bothering to say bye to Melody or the other women I’ve been forced to endure for the last half hour. I’m across the room and in front of Candace, casting my shadow down on her before I’ve taken my next breath.
“They’re so good, right? Definitely an underrated flavor.”
That’s the guy talking, trying to wow her with a discussion about the chips I bought for her.
“Do I know you?” I ask him brusquely.
His eyes widen and he pauses with a chip halfway into his mouth. Then he drops it back into his other hand, wipes his palm on his jeans, and extends it out to me. “Oh shit! No. I came with Paul, but I’m a huge fan. I mean huge. That Hail Mary pass you threw against Miami this season was just—” He mimes his head exploding.
Beside him, Candace mimes the same thing.
My sour mood lifts immediately.
She nods enthusiastically, playing along. “Right? Best pass I’ve ever seen. Huge. Really changed the whole inning.”
“Quarter,” I correct her. “Innings are in baseball.”
“Are they? Bugger. I was so close.”
I think I’ll kiss her then, take her red lips for myself in front of the whole party, but I hold off for some insane reason. Maybe out of fear, maybe out of some desire to prolong the inevitable. I’ll kiss her before the night’s over; that much I know.
“If you’ll excuse me,” I say to the guy beside her without looking his way. “I need to talk to my date.”
“Your date? Oh. Right.” He takes a pointed step back. “Sorry, man. I had no idea. I wasn’t flirting with her.”
He gets the hint that I don’t really care what else he has to say and wanders off. Candace waggles her eyebrows at me.
“Date, huh?”
“Yes. Date.”
“Am I one of the flock? You’ve got quite a few women over there shooting daggers at me. I’m not trying to step on anyone’s toes.”
“Even if you did, it wouldn’t hurt.”
“Tonight, it would,” she says, pointing down to her heels. They’re not sky-high, but they still have a thin spindly heel that could do some damage.
“Sounds like quite a threat.”
“You’ll do well to remember that whenever you feel like getting handsy. Are those crisps for me?” she asks, pointing over her shoulder.
“Chips. Yes. Who else?”
“I just wanted to be sure. It’s a nice gesture, buying me crisps.”
“Chips.”
“Whatever, agree to disagree I suppose. I probably say quite a bit that would annoy you. For instance, you lot call them bathing suits, but we usually call them bathers or swimming costumes.”
“Swimming costumes? Sounds like something you wear to cover you from neck to knees.”
“The ones I wear do,” she quips with a wink.
“Oh yeah?” I nod outside, to the pool on the outdoor balcony. “I can’t wait to find out.”
Her eyes go wide. “You’re kidding! You’ve got a pool all the way up here too? What in the—” She shakes her head in disbelief. “That’s it—in my next life, I’m coming back bloody loaded. No rearing children for $2 an hour. I’ll be a Saudi sheikh or some warlord, just you wait.”
“I can see it now. You seem just the type.”
She reaches out and throws a punch at my arm as retribution for teasing her and it’s probably supposed to hurt me, but I don’t even flinch. I catch her hand before she draws it back, and I twine our fingers together. We’re touching palm to palm. Blood rushes south. It’s such an innocent touch, like something two teenagers would do, and yet, standing here, holding her hand in front of everyone feels as intimate as anything I’ve ever done in the privacy of my bedroom.
“You’re overwhelming, y’know,” she says, blinking her blue eyes up at me. “I already thought you were too good to be true with the hair and the face and the arse, but then I come here and it’s like you’re a real prince, fancy palace and all. You’ll make some girl really happy someday.”
She tugs her hand free and turns away.
I frown, not quite sure what she means by that. Everything I’ve done, every flirtatious move has been to show her I’m interested in her, to show her I’d like to make her happy if she’d give me the chance.
“There’s Yasmine and Kat!” she says, waving them over. “They went to find the loo ages ago, but they probably got lost in the west wing or something.”
Once they reach us, any chance I have of getting a private moment with her will be gone. I can’t let it happen like that, her slipping through my fingers, quick as sand. I’ve been in motion for so long, on and off the football field, going from one play to the next, listening to my coaches and my agents and my financial advisers and my nutritionists and my trainers. I’m so good at shifting from one task to another that I’ve completely left out this huge chunk, the personal part of it all, the life part of living.