Page 74 of Stealing Home

“Yo!” King says.

“What’s up, man?” I say so he can follow my voice to where I am.

I finish pouring the ice into the cooler just as he comes up to me. I ball up the bag now that it’s empty and turn to King.

“How was the ride?” I ask him.

“Not too bad. It’s peaceful. I can see why you and Ty moved out here.”

“Yeah, it is definitely different from the city. Having a yard and a pool is nice.”

“Oh, I’m sure. I don’t think I’m ready to give up city life just yet.”

“And why is that?” I ask, already knowing the answer.

King laughs at my question because he knows what I’m thinking.

“Why do you think?” He answers my question with a question.

“I think you enjoy the life of being a starting pitcher on a professional baseball team and the perks that come with it.” I laugh.

King nods his head and laughs right along with me.

“Yeah. You aren’t wrong there. I’m not ready to get rid of the bachelor pad,” King says.

“Come on, I’ll show you around.” I nod my head towards the door to go into the house.

King follows me into the house, straight into the kitchen. I walk through the living room to head upstairs. Once we go through the top floor, we make our way back down to the first floor and then end in the basement in the movie room.

“You did good for yourself, Cole.” King tells me as we sit on the couch.

“Thanks. I’m glad it worked out.” I tell him.

“Oh, I bet,” he laughs.

“What does that mean?” I ask.

“Don’t play dumb. That’s not you.” King calls me out.

“Yeah, yeah. I’m not mad at how it all went down. Adriana is amazing.” I confirm.

“I’ve never seen you want to fight someone over a woman before. How’s that going for you?” he asks.

“Yeah, her ex is an asshole. Too bad for him. It’s good so far. We had actually talked the night before we went out in Colorado. We had our first official date the other night.” I tell him.

“Look at you getting back into the dating world. I know Layla fucked up, and it was hell for you not to say anything. But you seem a lot happier these days.”

I take a moment to think about what King says. He’s not wrong. I struggled for a bit after agreeing to help Layla by not speaking up about our breakup. I was fine after the first couple of weeks and did a lot of self reflecting.

“Yeah, it was good until it wasn’t. It sucked even more because the relationship itself wasn’t that long for it to have ended the way it did honestly. But, it’s all good. I’ve moved on and I’m a lot happier now.” I reply.

“Good, you deserve it, bro.”

“Let’s head back upstairs before everyone gets here.”

King and I make our way to the kitchen to find Ty in it.

“Well, look it’s my least favorite Evans.” Kings says as he slaps Ty’s shoulder.

---