Page 45 of My Brother's Teammates

She put her hand over mine. “This is already so nice. Thank you.”

My chest did a funny ache and I had to resist the urge to rub it. “I’m always here for you, Jenny. Even if you decide that you’d rather not touch my dick ever again. It’d be a travesty, but I’d still be here to make sure you’re okay.”

“Why?”

I was thankful for the darkness as I felt my face grow hot. I took the last turn to get us to where we were going and jumped at the distraction. “This is DuPont land, but it’s land my dad bought out from under a competitor just to be a dick. He purposefully doesn’t use it for anything, despite the fact that it’s positioned perfectly for a cattle ranch. It’s close enough to the auctions in the city but there’s nothing for miles out here. Except a small river that Papa DuPont’s rival was going to use to take care of his cattle.”

I leaned out my window at the gate my dad had people install and jabbed the code in. The gate swung open and I drove us through, making sure it closed behind us.

Jenny was still watching me. “Is your dad a dick to everyone or is he nicer to you?”

I let out a gut deep laugh as I navigated the shitty dirt roads back to the river. “I’m not sure I’ve ever heard anyone just say it so bluntly before. Heisa giant dick to everyone. I’m not sure if I get more of it or if it just feels that way because I’m sensitive to my own aches and pains.”

“I’m sorry, Hudson.” She laced our fingers together. “My dad has ties to the mob and he can have his people-”

My laughter cut her off and she grinned broadly back at me. I parked in front of the river and shut the car off. The moon was bright in the sky and it reflected across the water and made the darkness a little less dark. The sounds of the night rose up around us after growing familiar with our presence and the sweet scent of honeysuckle drifted in on the breeze.

“Oh, wow.” Jenny took off her seatbelt and leaned forward. “Oh, Hud… This is beautiful. Thank you.”

“Whatever you need, I’ll do it. If you need to talk, we can talk. If you want to sit in silence, I’ll take my vow of silence. Whatever. Just let me know how I can help.” It wasn’t easy being so sincere for so long, but it was the easiest it’d ever been with Jenny. I didn’t want to hide from her. Maybe that should’ve scared the shit out of me, but Jenny was trustworthy. If anyone in the world deserved to get the real me, it was her.

“Can we talk?” Her voice was small in the night and I had to fight the urge to bring her closer.

“I was hoping that’s what you wanted. I have questions.” I felt her stiffen up and rushed on. “Not about the shit with that asshole.”

She kicked out of her shoes that I noticed were glow-in-the-dark and curled up in the seat, facing me. “Perfect. I have questions, too.”

I swallowed a nervous response and squeezed her hand. “Me first?”

“Fine, but we have the option to skip any question too hard.” When I nodded my agreement, she nodded back at me. “Okay. Ready.”

“What is your career plan for the future? It’s adjacent to that earlier shit, but I realized I don’t know what you want to be when you grow up.”

She groaned and looked away. “Is it too early to skip?”

I scoffed. “You’re kidding.”

She seemed to think about it for a few seconds before going still and leaning closer. “I want to be an FBI profiler.”

Waiting on something embarrassing, or terrible, I didn’t respond for a second. Then I realized she was finished and grunted. “Okay… Why would you have skipped that? I thought you were going to say you wanted to be president or something. Nobel, but narcissistic, right?”

***Jenny***

Ileanedbackagainstthe door of Hudson’s car and frowned. “You don’t think that’s ridiculous?”

He stared at me like he was trying to read me as plainly as possible. “Being an FBI profiler? Why would that be ridiculous?”

My stomach fluttered with nerves. “I’m smaller than ideal. I’d have to become an agent first. I’m not scary. I’m afraid of the dark and I’m known to cry. Pretty often.”

Hudson shifted his big body in the small car and finally swore before reaching under the seat and grabbing some sort of tool. Then, as I watched, he did something to the steering wheel and it came off in his hands. He put both things on the dash and was able to stretch his legs out a bit more. “Sorry. I guess they didn’t have men my size in the sixties, when this car was made. It’s the only bad thing about Bianca.”

“Gas mileage, emissions, costs of replacing original parts?”

“Yeah, replacing that passenger seat ejector button was super expensive.” He grunted. “Anyway. Who put those ideas in your head? About the FBI being something you couldn’t do?”

“It wasn’t any singular person, I guess.” I saw his skepticism. “I talked to my family about it once. I’d just started thinking about the idea and I was probably fourteen. I read all these suspense novels and this one was about a profiler. It sucked me in. I loved everything about it. I did a quick google search and then I told everyone about it over dinner. They thought I was joking.

“You’ve seen my parents. They’re both tall and athletic, like Jason. I’ve always been the baby, even when I was clearly old enough to be treated the same way they treated Jason. They’re all so protective and act like I’m fragile.”

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