Page 98 of Wild Catch
“Turn, please,” Clary or whoever instructs. Sighing, I obey and rub my face.
It takes a while to finish my back and my arms. Afterward, I walk out of the dugout wearing my team jersey open at the front, and as the light hits my bare skin I have to admit that it does look like a sheen of sweat, and not like I’m trying to audition to be a nightclub dancer.
“Hey Logan,” Lucky Rivera calls out and I make the mistake of making eye contact. “You know what I’ve always thought about you?”
“No,” I growl.
He answers himself anyway. “That you’re a pretty sleek guy.”
To my surprise, the first person to join in his guffaws isn’t his best bud who already went through this humiliation, but Miguel Machado. That sends the rest of the team into peals of laughter, like this ridiculous dad joke is the funniest thing they’ve ever heard.
I slice my thumb across the air in front of my neck. “You’re all dead, you hear me?”
But they don’t, they keep ribbing off me even as I join the photographer. Somehow, Rose’s mood seems to improve as I approach, like the thunder on my face amuses her.
“Ready for part two?” she asks me.
I shake my head, unable to utter a word.
“Rose and I were discussing about the next stage,” Reynaldo says to me while motioning at his assistants to move. “Let’s head over to the water coolers so you can pour some water on your face.”
My eyebrow twitches. “Okay…”
I follow, resigned to my fate. Rather than keeping pace with the rest, Rose hangs back next to me and I can feel her eyes on me—somewhere. There’s a lot to look at right now.
“About the kissing pics…” She clears her throat and faces out to the front once I’m looking at her. “I was thinking about-to-kiss might do the trick just the same.”
“Fine.”
“Fine,” she repeats. “I’ll talk with Reynaldo about it while he snaps thirst traps off you.” She breaks into a little jog to put some distance between us, like she can’t stand to breathe the same air as me for a second longer.
My shoulders slump.
Sure enough, Rose chats Reynaldo up about her little plan while I pose for some saucier pics that consist of me squirting water into my mouth, trickles traveling down my chest and belly, and more shots of me sleeking my damp hair back. The reporter joins in to ask if we have issues with PDA, and Rose smoothly explains that part of her job is keeping media family friendly, and all that.
So here I am, holding very still while Reynaldo takes pictures of every angle as Rose and I don’t kiss, but look like we’re about to.
Rose’s back is against the cushioned barrier between the field and the stands, face angled up and slightly tilted to the side. Her lips are parted just a notch, plump and a tad damp like they’re ready for a taste. Her hands rest against my chest—under the open shirt—where she can no doubt feel just how violently my heart beats inside.
Those dark eyes that drive me wild lift from my mouth to my eyes. I have to grit my teeth to remind myself that this isn’t real. That I’m not actually about to crash my lips on hers.
It’s just really damn hard when our breaths keep mingling, when I have one arm propped against the wall so I can keep her cornered, when my other hand is on the curve of her waist over her leggings. My thumb has a mind of its own and sneaks under her shirt, tied at the front again, finding bare skin right away.
I’m not strong enough to stop it from stroking, even as Rose tenses and her eyes widen.
“Logan…” I don’t know if her whisper is an admonishment or a plea. Instead of pushing me away, she grabs harder onto my chest.
“I told you, didn’t I?” I whisper back, turning my face until our noses bump. “I can barely control myself around you anymore, Rose.”
“Can you guys get closer?” Reynaldo asks a second later.
Rose gasps as I pull her right against me. Her nose bumps into my lips and it’s torture to just not kiss it. It’s even worse to have her pressed against me and be unable to do anything else. But if that’s a metaphor of the situation I’m in, I wouldn’t know one if it hit me in the face.
Here she is, the woman I want, right in my arms. And when Reynaldo declares that the photoshoot is over, I must cut her loose and keep her at arm’s length forever. That’s the best I can do for her, and I hope one day she understands that.
CHAPTER33
ROSE
