Page 71 of Sliding Into Love
“What?”
“That…that…that I just witnessed.” She waved her hand vaguely in the direction of the apartment building. “Kissing the wife and kids goodbye.”
A vision of the future popped into Ethan’s head: waking up to Ivy every day. Making breakfast. Kissing her goodbye. Would she want that too?
“Dude. What happened yesterday?” Jen slid mirrored sunglasses up her nose.
After the perfect night he’d spent with Ivy, Ethan had forgotten about his parents and…everything else. He scrubbed his eyes with the heels of his hands.
“It’s a shitshow, Jen.”
“Do you want to talk about it?”
“What is this, Therapy with Jen hour?” Ethan kept his tone light as he deflected.
“Shut up, asshole, you know what I mean.”
“Yeah, I guess I do, Dr. Jen.” Ethan ran his hands through his hair, staring out the window.
“So, Ethan Fisher, huh?”
“That’s me.”
“You going to tell the team?”
“You think I should?”
“I think they’re going to find out eventually, and I think it would be better if it came from you, especially with all this ‘team building’ shit of Harkness’s.”
Fucking Harkness.
“Do you think we’ll have to do yoga and meditate again?” He hoped not, but fully expected the torturous practice to be added to the rotation in team meetings.
“Probably. Guess we’ll have to get used to it.”
They groaned in unison.
When they reached the stadium, Isaac appeared and grabbed Ethan by the arm, uncharacteristic seriousness casting a shadow over his dark skin.
“Look, I’m sorry man. About oversharing yesterday.”
Ethan rolled his eyes. Isaac had always been horrible at secrets.
“It would’ve come out eventually. Does the whole team know yet?” Ethan asked.
“I kept my mouth shut. This time. You’ve got a scary reputation around here, and I didn’t want big, bad meany-face Ethan Ford after me.”
Ethan rolled his eyes again.
“Shut up, Isaac.” But it lacked venom.
Isaac danced around Ethan, singing, “Who’s afraid of Ethan Ford? Who’s afraid of Ethan Ford?”
“Reyes.” Harkness’s voice cut through the singing like a knife. “Must you be so juvenile? We have a visitor.”
Ethan turned to look past Harkness, and sure enough, there was Laura Lorne, who nodded curtly at them both.
“Boys,” she said, and Ethan needed to stop rolling his eyes, or he’d wind up with a migraine.
