Page 32 of Home Game

Shawn shook his head. “Not really. He’s friendly.”

Yet again, someone was describing Emmett as friendly, when he’d been anythingbutfriendly to me. My own interactions with him weren’t technically friendly either, though, so what the hell did I know?

A young guy with a shy smile walked in from the door to the back patio and came up to the bar.

“I’ll have another two of the fall ales,” he said.

“Hey, Jamie. How’s it going out there with Emmett?” Shawn asked.

My ears perked up.

“Really well, actually,” Jamie said. “He’s such a nice guy. Really good conversationalist. And I swear, he looks like Leo—”

“DiCaprio. I know, right?” Shawn said.

“Thanks so much,” Jamie told Rush as he grabbed the two drinks, one of them clearly for Emmett. “I want to get back out there. I’ll see you later!”

Jamie headed back out toward the patio.

“So that’s clearlynotEmmett’s lucky best friend, or whatever you were saying?” I prodded Shawn.

“That would be Jamie,” Shawn said. “He’s our camera guy Chase’s brother. And I had a sneaking suspicion he’d hit it off with Emmett, so I’m playing a little bit of Cupid.”

Suddenly it felt like a miniature dragon had reared its head inside my chest. A possessive flash came over me, and suddenly I felt even ten times more out of the loop than before.

Since when did Ieverfeel left out? FOMO was a thing that my friends talked about, but I hadn’t felt anything like this since…

Well, since I was a kid.

Since I’d been left out of everything, all of the time, back in school. It was a feeling I’d been very happy to forget, and I wasn’t trying to start feeling it again now as an adult. So why did I suddenly care that Emmett was outside on a blind date? Why would I care about his world so damn much at all?

“I hope your Cupid matchmaking works out,” I lied. “Emmett needs something to distract him from how much he hates me.”

Shawn shook his head. “Emmett doesn’t hate you. He was super impressed with you today, actually.”

I watched Shawn like a hawk, very interested in what he meant by that. “Impressed with me, huh?”

“He thought you were nice to the Racks exec,” Shawn said. “He said he liked your outfit, too, and you know that’s a compliment if it’s coming from Emmett Waycott.”

I puffed out a laugh. I heard a gasp coming from the far side of the brewery, and when I turned to look, I saw Harlan, the lumberjack brewer, picking up Sawyer and covering him in kisses.

“The Fixer Brothers’ landscaping guy is with the head brewer here?” I said. “I just had a meeting with Sawyer an hour ago and now I’m literally watching him get swept off his feet. It really does feel like Cupid works all his magic here, or something.”

There was an ache deep in my heart watching Sawyer and Harlan being so completely in love.

It wasn’t that I wanted love that badly.

Or was it?

Regardless, it was yet another thing I’d had no idea about. Everyone here had a rich history, a story of their own.

For all I knew, Emmett was out on the back patio with a guy who would become the love of his life.

I was one of the best pro football players in the nation. I was famous on just about every social media platform. I was supposed to be the next star of the Fixer Brothers show.

But right now I was just part of the background.

An hour later, Emmett and Jamie still hadn’t come back inside the bar. Mom liked to say that it was “a dangerous thing when Storm Rosling gets bored,” and as a kid, I’d rolled my eyes and laughed.

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