Page 23 of Play the Game

“Earth to Tam.”

I cleared my throat. “I think that’s a bad idea.”

He dumped the coffee grounds into the French press and turned on the electric kettle, then turned toward me and crossed his arms over his chest. “It’s not going away, and we can’t keep this up.”

I disagreed. Keeping this up was exactly my intention.

“It’s bad for the team,” he said. “And worse for our friendship. I hope that’s still important to you.”

The pain this was causing him came through in his voice. I collapsed back in my chair. “Of course, it’s important to me. Both are—our friendship and the team. I’m just not sure what we can say. And we certainly can’t say it here.”

He looked out through the kitchen door, toward the IT and logistics rooms. “Your place or mine?”

I shook my head. I was not going behind closed doors with him. I didn’t trust either one of us. Actually, Jason hadn’t touched me or even gotten within a few feet of me since Tuesday night, so it was unfair of me to distrust him. That left me. I was the problem.

“Okay, then, here it is.” He would not be deterred, so I crossed my own arms over my chest and stared back at him. “We don’t need to go into the details. Let’s just say we both went off-book Tuesday.”

That applied to our time in the warehouse and in the hotel. “More than once.”

“More than once,” he agreed. “I fully admit my part in it. I’m willing to admit I probably own the lion’s share of the blame. But not all of it. I wasn’t alone in my choices.”

“That’s not fair or accurate.” That was the problem; the greater blame was not on him. Maybe at the competition, but not after that.

“Tam, I wasn’t alone. It wasn’t all my fault.”

“That’s not what I’m saying. In fact, I’m saying exactly the opposite.”

He raised his eyebrows. His watch timer went off, announcing that the water should be the correct temperature for the grounds. He turned his back to me to complete the next steps of the coffee process. By the time he turned back to me, he was frowning.

“I should have seen this coming,” he said. “You blame yourself. If someone breaks a rule within ten feet of you, you think you’re at fault.”

“Don’t paint me as some kind of goody-two-shoes. I place plenty of blame on you, too. But I have to own up to my responsibility. The truth is, Tuesday wasn’t the first time I thought about...”

“You mentioned that on Tuesday night. And I was very happy to hear it because if you’ll recall, I’d been thinking my own impure thoughts for a long time, too.”

My face heated with a blush. That was true, but I still felt more responsible. Which meant he was right about overreacting to others’ behavior. Shit. I was a goody-two-shoes. I was Sandy inGreasebefore she donned the leather pants and went all sexy seductress on Danny. Although I guess I’d done my own version of that on Tuesday. Hell, no wonder I was a mess. I was having an identity crisis.

“Tam, stop it.”

I opened my eyes. “What?”

“Stop beating yourself up.” He pulled milk out of the fridge and poured some into the frother. “Look, we both admitted we’ve been thinking about each other differently for months now without acting on it. We can go back to that.”

“Do you believe that?”

Could we? Could he? Because I wasn’t at all sure I could. At the moment, I couldn’t even see my best friend in a red shirt without thinking I wanted to unwrap him like it was Christmas morning and he was the only gift under my tree.

“I have to.” He pulled two mugs out of the cupboard. “The alternative is losing you, and that’s unthinkable.”

He was right again. I couldn’t remember any conversation between us when he’d been so clearly right while I’d been…maybe not wrong, but at least unfair. I couldn’t bear the thought of losing him either.

But I wasn’t ready to move past Tuesday. With a shock, I realized I needed to grieve for the lost fantasy of having him, all of him. “I need some time, though. Some space.”

There was a clamor on the stairs, then the voices of Kessler, Li, and Kat. It was 7 a.m. sharp, and they were ready for their workout. Spotting us, they joined us in the kitchen.

“Sparks and Jensen, Tam and Jason!” Li said.

“Sparksen,” Hart said, getting in the spirit and making us sound like a romantic couple in the process.

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