Page 49 of Power Play

Liam

Harrison and Denisecalled everyone to come and get some food. I was surprised and happy to see Tess take a full plate over to one of the chairs in the shade where we’d put our stuff. I got my own plate and joined her.

Still no sign of Kit. I sat so I could see the door to the pool house.

Was she sick in there?

“Hey!” I said, taking a big bite of a hot dog. “You do like food!” I said, and grinned at Tess as she shoveled in macaroni salad.

“This food,” she said, smiling back at me. Her face was pink from the sun and the ring of her goggles.

“Yeah?” I said and leaned over so I could get a look at the food on her plate. She had chips and veggies and fruit. A piece of cheese and some crackers. A heap of mac and cheese.

“You need some protein,” I told her. “You want a hot dog? Or a burger?”

“I’m a vegetarian,” Tess said, pushing those pink glasses further up her nose.

“No shit?” I asked. I don’t think I’d ever met a kid vegetarian.

She shook her head. Jeez. I thought about the pepperoni pizzas and chicken wings. I could not stop blowing it with this kid. I looked over at the pool house again, hoping Kit would come out. But the door stayed closed.

“You really like Kit, huh?” I asked Tess, finishing off my own hot dog. Something about hot dogs made me sad. They reminded me of my dad putting a hot dog in our hands for dinner and telling us we had to go outside and play because mom wasn’t feeling well.

“She is very nice and very fun,” Tess said definitively.

“Would you like it if she came and hung out with you while you’re staying with me?”

She looked at me with a lot of excitement. So I figured I’d do whatever I needed to do to actually make Kit the nanny.

Why did that get me excited?

Finally, Kit came out of the pool house with a gauzy, brightly colored cover up over her swimsuit and her glasses on like armor.

Which…fine. I had no business trying to get answers from her I wouldn’t like.

I knew what I knew. She’d been her father’s plant. She’d flirted with me. Made it seem like she was helping me out by giving me her father’s contact information.

Fucked me to take the sting away, I guess?

Kit got a plate and sat down on the lawn chair across from Tess and me. She had barely any food on her plate. “You’re not hungry?” I asked. “There are hot dogs.”

“I’m fine,” she said.

“Hey! Locke!” Cohen walked over and I was happy to see that Kit had no problem not staring at his chest. “What’s the story with your brother?”

“What do you mean?”

“I heard this rumor he got married to that singer… what’s her name?”

“Sydney Malloy,” Bingham supplied. “Friend in Vegas said they were out the other night and got shit faced. Vegas wedding, baby!” Bingham said.

“Is it bullshit?” Cohen asked, grinning like he already knew the answer.

“I don’t know, Cohen.” I asked, putting my hands behind my head. “Does Wyatt Locke seem like the kind of guy who engages in bullshit?”

I grinned at him. In game four Wyatt laid a hit on Cohen that made our winger look like a rag doll. He had to leave the game to get his breath and dignity back.

“I’m just saying,” Cohen said, who clearly did not know when to walk away. “The guy is going to be in a sappy break up song one of these days.”

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