Page 37 of Home Game

I breathed evenly. I closed my eyes for a second and re-centered myself. The air smelled amazing. My beer was delicious. There was no reason this should be any different than any other fall evening.

Other than the fact that I couldn’t stop thinking about how good his arm had felt under my hand. How good it felt to have his eyes on me now. Or, for Christ’s sake, that he’d called me adorable. Had I heard that correctly?

“Can I ask you something?” Storm said.

I pulled in a long breath. “I’m already afraid of what it’s going to be,” I said. “But yes. Lay it on me.”

His eyes danced across my face. “Why does it upset you so badly when I say that you just want money?”

“It doesn’t tick me off that badly,” I said.

“Bullshit.”

I paused for a moment, already feeling my guard go up. “Okay, it does. For personal reasons.”

“And those personal reasons are…”

“You think I’m going to tell you?” I challenged him. “They’re personal for a reason.”

He watched me close. “You don’t have to tell me,” he said. “You don’t have to tell me a damn thing. But I’m allowed to ask. Right?”

“I guess so,” I said.

I let my words hang in the air, expecting Storm to bite back with some quick comment. Instead we lapsed into silence, with only the sound of faint music in the air and the occasional laughter coming over from the Fixer Brothers’ table.

After a minute, it seemed like Storm had just accepted that I wasn't going to answer his question, and he’d respectfully not pushed it any further. I really hadn’t been planning on answering it. Itwaspersonal, and it wasn’t the kind of thing I talked about with anyone other than Landry.

I swallowed hard, watching a small bird fluttering from one pine tree to the next, noticing emotion rise up in me again.

“I was dating a guy named Sam,” I finally said, breaking the silence. “For a long time. Sam was… great, to be honest. Graduated from Princeton the same year I graduated from Harvard. He was handsome. Considerate. Husband material, you know?”

I looked over at Storm. I was surprised to find he was listening intently, watching me with those annoyingly soulful eyes. Eyes that could make anyone’s guard go down.

“And then… you two lived happily ever after?” he asked gently.

“Not exactly,” I said, shifting on my feet. “Well, I’d bought him a ring. I was ready to propose. Then my dad died. Then Sam ended up leaving me anyway, a couple of months later.”

Something twinged in my chest. I was really doing it. I was telling someone the sad little story about my ex, something I wasn’t even a little bit prepared for.

Storm furrowed his brow. “I’m sorry, Emmett. That sounds shitty beyond belief.”

“It wasn’t a good time,” I said. “The reason I don’t like you saying I only care about money is because it’s something Sam told me a few times, too. He really saw me as a millionaire first, and a person second, I think.”

His gaze hardened. “Nothing pisses me off more than that.”

“And then he never paid me back for the fifty grand I lent him, but that’s not the important part.”

“Fuck that,” Storm said. “Want me to go find him and beat him up? I will, you know—”

“Thanks, but no thanks,” I said. “I’d rather leave him in the past.”

Storm reached out a hand and brushed a lock of my hair to the side on my forehead. It was the smallest gesture, but it struck me like lightning.

Storm could besweet.

Actually sweet.

The same guy who wanted to fight all the time, who wanted to fuck with me at every moment, was being tender with me.

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