Page 72 of Single Dad Dilemma
“I am going to make you run sprints across this entire field for the next hour,” Barrett snapped.
“Worth it. Now, I’d like to hear the lady answer, if that’s all right.”
The heat in my cheeks slowly started to ebb, and I arched an eyebrow slowly at the pissing match playing out in front of me. “We’re not friends; I’m his neighbor.”
“Interesting,” Justice mused.
“Go back and run the play, Tyler,” Barrett warned. “You owe me those sprints tomorrow.”
“He’s in a bad mood,” Justice explained. “I’m sure he’ll tell you why.”
“He’s very forthcoming about his feelings,” I said. “I can’t get him to shut up most of the time.”
Barrett looked up at the ceiling and sighed while Justice let out a hoot of amused laughter. “Oh, I like her, Coach. You better lock this one down.”
“Go run the play, Justice,” I said, giving him a warning look of my own.
He saluted crisply, then jogged back over to the other players.
For a few moments, we watched the players line up facing each other. I didn’t know what the fuck I was looking at, of course, but after a quick glance at Barrett’s facial expression, I knew he was dissecting something I couldn’t see.
“Watch the line, Carson,” he yelled. “See the blitz before it happens.”
Every single guy was tall and muscly and fast, a veritable ocean of testosterone as far as the eye could see, but one in particular stood off to the end of the group of players not lined up, glaring over to the man at my side. He had a bruise on his cheekbone and jaw, muscles popping on his arms where they were crossed over his big chest.
“Oh my.”
“What?”
“That one,” I said, lifting my jaw toward Grumpy Face. “If looks could kill ...”
“I’d have been dead a long time ago,” Barrett finished. “My quarterback is mad at me.”
I pursed my lips and studied the gentleman in question. Like Barrett, he was tall, with long legs and a sharp jaw. “Did you make him cry in practice?” I tilted my head. “Wait, there’s no crying in football, right?”
“Wrong sport. There’s no crying inbaseball, and that’s a great movie.”
I lifted my brow in concession, allowing my arm to brush against his as we watched the play unfold. The guy who yelled a bunch of random words caught the ball when some other dude snapped it from between his legs (like,what?), held the ball in his hands, and danced tothe side when someone tried to tackle him, then heaved the ball down the field, where it landed perfectly into the hands of a waiting receiver. Justice picked the receiver up and yelled, the celebration unfolding like I was watching a game and not a practice.
Grumpy Face turned and stalked away, and Barrett watched with slightly narrowed eyes.
“They always get this worked up for throwing a ball?”
Barrett shook his head. “No. I have our backup quarterback in on this play.”
“I don’t know what that means.”
The edge of his lip tugged up, and my chest tightened in anticipation of a smile that never came. Damn him and his stingy, non-smiling soul. I’d perish if I ever saw one for real.
“Between my players—backups, starters, practice squad—and my staff, I’ve got a lot of personalities to balance. Big egos too.” He scraped a hand over that stubbled jaw, and my mouth went dry at the sound it made as it dragged over his skin. “I’ve been accused of being a perfectionist.”
“No.”
He gave me a long-suffering look, then turned back toward the players as they milled around the field, discussing the previous play with the other coaches. “That I care more about my reputation than anything else.”
My brows furrowed at the unexpected turn in the conversation. Did we share things now? Were we ... friends? Maybe the broken shovel had been a bizarre friendship ritual I wasn’t aware of and now we were stuck with each other for life. “I don’t know if I believe that,” I said carefully.
“No?”
