Page 7 of My Brother's Teammates

I searched his face and silently begged for him to be okay with never knowing. “I can’t.”

“That’ll make kicking his teeth down his throat hard.” Axel seemed just as angry as Jason. “Why don’t you whisper it to me and I just handle it?”

That brought a smile to my lips but Jason’s frustration bubbled over and erased it as if it’d never been there. “Who the fuck is it, Jen? Does Mom know? I’ll call her right now and have her tell me.”

I grabbed his arm and shook my head. “Please, Jason. She doesn’t know. No one does. I don’t want anyone to ever know. Okay? Can’t that be enough? I just want to move on. I don’t want to ever think about him again. I was an idiot and now I know. Lesson learned. We can all move on. Okay? Okay, Jason?Please.”

He stood up and walked to the other side of the room. He paced near Ryder and I fought to keep my eyes away. Jason finally sank onto the couch next to Ryder and leaned forward with his elbows on his knees. “I won’t push right now. That’s all I can give you.”

I nodded and stood up. I felt like we’d covered all our bases and I could go.

***Jenny***

“Wheredoyouthinkyou’re going?” Jason stood up again and glared at me. “If you think you’re actually going to sleep in your fucking car, you’ve lost your mind.”

Anger finally slipped into my voice. “I don’t have anywhere else to go, Jason!”

He smiled then and held his arms out to gesture around the living room. “You do. Some of us need tutoring. Well, three of us need tutoring if we want to stay on the field. We talked about it earlier and if you’re willing to tutor a few days a week, you can stay here until you find somewhere else.”

I looked around at the guys and back at my big brother. “You’ll let me stay until I have somewhere to go?”

He nodded. “Maybe I should’ve led with that.”

I raced across the room and threw myself into his arms. In an embarrassing display of sibling love, I squeezed his head into my armpit and he dug his fingers into my sides. We retreated right back into our kid selves when faced with too much love for each other, anything to not look like we cared too much. He easily tossed me onto the couch next to Ryder and flexed his arms at me.

“You’ve never been able to best me, kid.” He kissed his muscles and laughed maniacally. “And you never will be able to. Not while I’ve got the twins with me.”

I faked a gag. “I hope none of whatever you have rubbed off on me.”

“Are we done here?” Ryder’s voice was gravel-filled in a way that made me feel it in my chest when he spoke. “I’ve got shit to do.”

Jason shrugged. “We just have to go over house rules. Any you want to add before you leave?”

“Don’t go into my room. Don’t touch my shit.”

I nodded. “Don’t go into your room. Don’t touch your shit. Got it.”

His hard stare caught me off guard. With ice blue eyes and dark eyelashes as long as any I’d ever seen, those eyes should’ve been soft, almost feminine, but on him they were arresting. “Not a joke.”

I swallowed and nodded again. “I didn’t think it was. I assure you, I don’t plan on going into your room or touching your shit. To a degree that makes me hope you never need to be pulled out of there in a fire or something.”

Axel laughed. “I think I heard a threat in there.”

Ryder stood up and looked back down at me. “In case of a fire, I doubt you’d be much help anyway. Youmightbe able to lift Axel’s ego, but you’re not lifting anything heavier than that.”

I didn’t even get a chance to reply before he stalked out of the room and upstairs to what I was officially thinking of as his lair. I looked at Jason and shrugged. “I don’t think he likes me.”

“Ryder doesn’t like anyone. He’s the only one out of us not getting anything out of you staying. Except Hudson did promise he’d clean up after himself if we brought in another roommate, so I guess he’s getting something. Just not tutoring.” Jason shrugged as if it was no big deal. “Okay, more house rules. We throw parties here when the mood arises. I don’t know if I want you hanging out at them, though.”

I bit back the urge to argue. “I don’t want to be at them. No problem.”

“We have girls over. You’ll need to close your eyes and ears.” He laughed at the grossed out face I made. “If you wanted to help clean up after Hudson, it would be welcome.”

I crossed my arms over my chest. “Do you help clean up after Hudson?”

He shook his head. “I just thought I’d give it a try. Okay, fine. No one cleans up after Hudson and Hudson learns to clean up after himself like he said he would.”

Hudson seemed unbothered as he scrolled on his phone. “I’ll hire someone.”

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