Page 42 of Slash & Burn

She swallowed, her eyes still pinned wide and holding mine like she’d cry if I looked away. “Okay.”

I held her hand tight against her thigh, hidden behind the seat back in front of us, as we turned back toward the camera. I squeezed it in a rhythm, willing her to just breathe as the giant screen above the outfield lit up with our faces.

When I lifted my other hand to wave, she did the same. It was impossible to hear the announcer over the crowd, but the words on the screen and some images from previous events showed the reading program we were trying to promote. A couple more seconds of smiling and waving and the camera in front of us turned away and I leaned back into my seat.

Jill bolted.

“Hey, wait!” I scrambled past a couple of kids with pens in their hands looking for an autograph, catching her by the arm before she’d made it to the ramp that led to the main concourse. “Jill, what’s going on?”

“I can’t be here,” she said, her eyes on the ground, her hair falling around her face like she was hiding behind it.

“Why? What happened?” The camera bit was over, there was nothing left but watching the game. I didn’t understand why she was running.

“He’shere.”

Jill had no sooner gotten the words out of her mouth when I felt someone crowding us from the side. I pulled away to find a guy—shorter than me and rail thin with wire-rimmed glasses—with his eyes on Jill and an expectant grin that made my jaw tight.

“Jill?” he asked, reaching out to move her hair out of the way.

I swatted his hand down before he touched her, shifting to put her behind me. “Who are you?”

Her warm, slender hand closed around my bicep as she stepped up beside me. “Adam.”

One word. That’s all she said and it was like the world stopped. The urge to knock this asshole off his feet for hurting her was so strong I could almost feel his jaw against my knuckles. But I knew better than to lose control. I’d seen what I looked like when I snapped and I wasn’t proud of it. Even if this asshole deserved it.

Adam ignored me, looking only at Jill as he spoke. “I thought I saw you outside, but then when you popped up on the screen there was no room for doubt.”

The guy was talking to her as if she wasn’t white as a ghost, as if she wasn’t half-hidden behind me. Not that she’d put herself there, but it’s where she’d stay if I had anything to say about it.

“We’re doing a program for the library,” she said, her words sounding more like a robot version of her than the spirited one I’d known since I was eleven.

“I saw that. Good for you.”

My interpretation of this guy and everything he said was never going to be anything but biased, but the condescension in his tone was so clear there was no way I was imagining it. Jill didn’t seem to notice. Watching her shut down in the face of this loser was more than I could stand.

Wrapping my arm around Jill’s shoulder I dropped a kiss to the top of her head. “I think you’re giving me more credit than I deserve. That program is allyou.” I gave her a nod when her gaze finally rose up to meet mine. “I’m just lucky they picked me to do it with you.”

Her eyes pinged back and forth between mine, trying to figure out what I was doing. But every word I’d said was the truth, and she shouldn’t have looked so surprised to hear them.

“So you’re still at the library then?” Adam interjected, his beady eyes on her. “Same old, same old.”

I pivoted, glaring at the asshole, as Jill’s shoulders slumped a little more. “The library values Jill and everything she brings to their programs. But loyalty doesn’t rank too high with you, does it?”

That finally drew his gaze my way. “Whoare you?”

“Grady Holloway.”

Jill straightened, piping up from beside me, “He plays for the Brawlers.”

Adam’s disapproval or disappointment or disdain—whatever it was—flashed only briefly on his face before he covered it with a slick grin and a pitying bend of his brow. “That must be nice for you.”

Giving him my widest winning smile, I held out my hand. Adam took it, his own feeble and small by comparison, as he narrowed his eyes at me. But those eyes got a hell of a lot bigger as I closed his hand in mine. My hard handshake was as far as I’d let myself take this, but it finally got this asshole to look something other than superior and unaffected. He was affected all right.

Jill’s smile got a little brighter as she turned it back up to me. “He’s going to be captain this year. I can’t wait to see him with that C on his jersey.”

My chest pinched at the pride in her voice. I didn’t want to think it was just an act, put on thanks to the appearance of this jerk. But I’d never mentioned to Jill how important captain was to me, so I had no idea why she’d said that. Whatever her reason, hearing the words come out of her mouth had my chest aching with a yearning I wasn’t sure I’d ever felt before.

“Congrats?” he asked, a sort of bemused grin on his ugly face as he glanced between the two of us. It was like he was trying to piece together what we were to each other.

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