Page 42 of Perfect Playbook

“I’m fine,” she insists.

But I stand there like a board, not giving her an option to hand it back.

Eventually, she sighs and puts it back on like a cape. “So tomorrow we’ll move some things into yours while you’re at practice? I don’t have that much since most everything here belongs to Dad. Just my room and Nino’s to pack up.”

“I’ll get Tom to arrange a van.”

She darts her eyes to the curtain, and it closes quickly. Luis is anything but subtle.

Shay keeps her voice low. “I hope it’s not too hard on Dad.”

Her concern is knitted together with the same beautiful loyalty that tore us apart. But I could never fault her for it.

“You can invite him to ours anytime.”

“Ours.”She tucks hair behind her ear.“That sounds weird.”

I personally like the sound of it, but I don’t tell her that. An awkward silence lingers on the visible breaths passing between us in the frosty air. I’m not sure what else to say, but it doesn’t feel right to say goodbye just yet either. There is a mix of uncertainty and familiarity, and I can’t help but think all the best moments of my life can be described the same way.

It’s cold and late, and I’m depleted from last night, but when the cab I ordered pulls up, I have no desire to crawl into it.

She shoves those tiny hands of hers into her back pockets. “Okay, well, see you tomorrow when you get back from practice?”

“Yeah. See you then.”

How exactly do we part? She’s my wife, for God’s sake, I should kiss her.

The air crackles with tension. Damn, she’s still so radiant, her eyes pools of deep brown, and in them, there’s mystery. I read her better when we were younger, and yet her gaze is just as mesmerizing, inviting me into their depths. The shadow of a moth trapped in her father’s porch light dances on the delicate curve of her cheek. Amber light falls on her lips, drawing me in.

The cab driver beeps.

Without a word, I close the distance between us. My heart pounds with each step, even though my only intention is to give her a simple hug goodbye. But when my arms envelop her petite, curvy frame, it’s both achingly familiarand entirely new. She wraps her arms around me to embrace me back. I breathe in the sweet scent of her hair and really wish that cab wasn’t here yet.

Just then, her dad whips the curtain aside, allowing a sliver of light to become our spotlight. I see his creased face out of the corner of my eye. I know we didn’t plan it, but Shay is my wife, and I’m not about to let her dad think she’s living a life without passion, so I enclose my hands around her more firmly… and kiss her.

I catch her sharp breath in my mouth but I can hardly hold on to it because my lungs stutter, too. In a split second her lips feel like home. Everything in my head screams to be careful, to not go too far, to press my lips against her just enough to prove a point to the man behind the curtain. But connecting with her like this rips through my system, burning me in the sensation of our past and present colliding. My intention was for show, but the way my heart thunders against my rib cage speaks to a level of intimacy we never agreed on.

My body begs me to inch my hands up her waist, to take her harder and crush her into me, to slide my tongue inside her mouth… but I don’t.

A brief moment later, I pull back, and sharp air cools the hot space between our mouths.

I drop my forehead to hers, her waist still soft and womanly in my grip. I whisper against her cheek, “Sorry, but your dad is watching.”

I don’t even know if Luis is still looking.

She seems almost in a trance. Did I go too far?

The cab beeps again, and she jerks at the sound, breaking her out of the hypnosis.

I rub the side of her arm. “Are we good?”

She stares past me, into the darkness. “Yeah. Of course. It was fine. Go. Sleep.”

As I amble down the stone path toward the taxi in the darkness, I know I overstepped the mark, but it sure as hell didn’t feel like I was doing anything wrong. Quite the opposite. Shay’s lips pressed against mine felt so right I want to do it a million times over.

A voice of caution tells me we were right to make the no-touching rule. Still, I now know, no contract will protect me from the tornado that rips through me when I touch that woman.

Chapter Fifteen

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