Twenty #2
It was like softcore Miles Callahan porn, the urge to save them all to my camera roll stayed only by the knowledge of who had taken them.
Her followers certainly appreciated the pictures as much as I did, yet as someone whose gaze had often lingered on him in just the same way, I felt a deepening disquiet.
Either she was deliberately using her relationship with him to grow her following with intimate photos he probably didn’t know she was taking, or she was in love with him.
I wasn’t sure which was worse.
BETWEEN MY MATCH, Tina’s social media frenzy, and an evening sponsorship event, I didn’t see Miles all day.
And that was probably for the best given what I might have said about Emily, and that we still hadn’t talked about our chance of meeting in the third round.
Although, when I’d told Tomas we hadn’t, he’d rolled his eyes and shifted our booking at the practice court the next day to a slot right after Miles.
“I am not going to talk to him about it during a practice change over,” I had pointed out.
Tomas had shrugged and said, “Well, since it seems you’re not going to talk about it any other time either, it’s worth a try.”
We arrived fifteen minutes early to start warming-up and found Miles on court with his coach and his trainer.
Other players were going through their paces on other courts and still more were standing around waiting and talking, yet having been granted an opportunity to watch Miles with his team, I had eyes for no one else.
Miles was working on his serve, and as we stopped on the other side of the fence, Leo Mannering snapped, “You’re not hitting your spots.”
“I noticed,” Miles grumbled back.
“Go again.”
Scowling like he could set the court on fire, Miles launched into his motion, only for the ball to clip the tape on the way through.
A second serve sailed just long, while a third slammed into the net.
They’d taken the court farthest from the spectator stands and I couldn’t decide if this was for the best given Miles was struggling, or it had merely emboldened Leo Mannering to keep snapping at him.
Another ball missed the service box by a mile.
Tomas leaned toward me. “He’s too tense,” he said. “His shoulders are practically rigid.”
“I’d be tense too with that sour old fart bitching at me,” Macca muttered.
“Careful.” Tomas shot him a warning look. “That old fart is Leo Mannering. He was a top-ten player in the seventies, and coached Olivier Penders, Grigor Vasilyev and Ismael Gil, among others.”
Macca let out a low whistle, lifting a hand to shade his eyes so he could better see the impressive old fart. “Three number-one players? That’s some record.”
“Yeah, he retired when I was on tour, but I guess he saw something in Callahan to make him come back.”
“Or in Callahan’s wallet.”
“Again,” Leo Mannering barked as Miles smashed yet another serve into the net.
Over the busy buzz of the grounds, Tomas hummed a note of dissatisfaction under his breath. “Can’t say I think much of his observational skills though. Your man needs to shake something out or his shots are going to keep tanking with his mood.”
Your man. He’d spoken quietly enough not to be overheard, making the words a danger only to me as they dug into my chest and nestled there.
Miles ought to have been able to rely on his team to take care of him, but in the seeming absence of basic attention, he was my fucking man and I wasn’t going to stand silently by.
I stepped to the edge of the court. “Hey, Callahan,” I called, leaning on the low fence.
When Miles turned, still scowling, I gestured him over.
With a word to the equally scowling Leo Mannering, he strode toward us, bouncing the ball he’d been about to serve.
“Russo,” he said, stressing my last name with an unamused little smirk.
“What’s up?” He flicked a glance at Tomas and Macca behind me.
“If you’re after a hitting partner for your session, I’ll have to disappoint.
I’ve wasted most of my own hour already, don’t want to waste yours too. ”
“Relax.”
“What?”
“You need to relax,” I said.
His brows flew up. “Don’t worry, he’s well used to my moods and I’m used to his. Although this, by the way, isn’t going to improve his.”
“Well, I’m sorry your coach is an arsehole, but I’m not going to apologise for taking two minutes to do his job for him. Tomas says your shoulders are too stiff. The tension is pulling you all over the place.”
Another glance thrown at Tomas over my shoulder. “Yeah, well, being tense in practice is just a day ending in Y for me. It’s never been an issue before.”
The urge to set my hand on his arm was strong and I had to squeeze my fingers into a fist to stop myself. “A lot of things aren’t the way they were before,” I said instead. “You were never tense when we practiced in London. Maybe you got used to it.”
“Miles! Come on!” Leo Mannering called from the court. “You’re wasting time.”
Miles flinched, his jaw setting. “Sometimes, I swear he gets off on ordering me around like I’m an annoying child.” He met my gaze, only to look as quickly away with a sigh. “Relax, huh?”
“The problem is here,” Macca said, stepping forward to prod my shoulder like I was a demonstration doll. “You probably can’t feel it, but try a few deep breaths to shift yourself out of fight-or-flight mode. Or get it all out by punching Mannering in the face.”
“Ben!” Tomas snapped as Miles laughed. “That was uncalled for.”
Macca shrugged. “I get paid to give the right advice, not the nice advice.”
While Miles’s laugh turned wry, Leo Mannering started toward us across the court. “Uh-oh,” I said. “Sorry, Macca has no filter, but hey, if you want to try to relax and keep going another hour, I’m more than happy to share the court.”
“Miles, we’ve only got five minutes left,” Mannering said, sweeping a glare over us as he reached the fence.
“I know. They had some advice.” Miles spun his racquet before gesturing at me with it. “If I get half of these serves in then I might take you up on that offer. Otherwise, I’m going to camp under a hot shower.”
He walked off on the words, calling to his trainer for more balls. Rather than follow, Leo Mannering lingered, eying the three of us for a few long, drawn-out seconds. His gaze settled on Tomas. “Think you can do this job better than me, Cheverall?”
“No,” Tomas said, his voice impressively even. “Just that perhaps you didn’t notice how much Callahan was struggling, since otherwise you would have helped him out.”
“He’s struggling because he got lazy over his UK swing.” The old man’s narrowed stare flicked my way beneath his bushy grey brows. “He needs to work harder, not take advice from the likes of you.”
Quiet words that worked like a slap, but when I bristled, I wasn’t alone. “And what is that supposed to mean?” Tomas asked, equally quiet.
“You know very well what it means. He doesn’t need help from you.”
“Watch out then.” Macca nodded toward the court. “Because he’s gotten the last two in. Right into the corners.”
Mannering turned in time to see Miles put a third serve away, the ball kicking up at a ridiculous angle that would have been near impossible to return.
“Will you look at that,” Tomas said. “Got to be pleased with that.”
The glare Miles’s coach spun back on us seemed designed to sear skin from bone. “I don’t need a pack of fairies anywhere near my player, understood?”
“You fucking what?” Macca said, stepping right up to the fence with his fist tight. “Say that again and I will punch you.”
Leo Mannering grinned, the expression as nasty as it was humourless. “Of course you will,” he said, about to turn away. “Because both your boys here are too nancy to stand up for themselves.”
My heart hammered sickeningly fast as the man strode off, leaving me feeling like someone had tilted the world to a strange angle. On the baseline, Miles had stopped serving to watch us, his expression hard to read.
“Keep it up, Miles,” Mannering called. “Six more.”
Miles’s gaze lingered on me a moment, before he swung into his service motion. The ball hit the centre of the net so hard the force rippled along the mesh.
“Wow,” Macca said, finally breaking our stunned silence. “I was half joking when I said he ought to punch that guy, but now . . .” He lifted his brows at me. “Do you think he knows Callahan’s gay?”
As Miles put a second ball into the net, I thought over everything I knew about his closeted life: pictures bought from the paparazzi, playing matches after getting railed, and quite a lot of practice giving blowjobs. “I don’t think there’s any way he doesn’t know.”
“I was afraid you’d say that.”
Three more balls hit the net and another went long, and without so much as a glance my way, Miles snatched up his bag and strode off toward the locker room, leaving us the court.
HE CAME TO my room that night, quiet and needing.
And because I couldn’t tell him how I felt or help him with his troubles, I put all the words I kept caught behind my teeth into every touch.
I worked on him with singular focus and Miles responded by letting himself go entirely.
He melted in wanton abandon, his lips parted and his brow creased, head turned on the pillow as he came on my hand – that expression one I could at least be sure Emily Rose Johnson would never see.
The petty joy of that thought was thoroughly beneath me, yet I revelled in it, as I revelled in being the one who made him feel so good.
In the afterglow, I wanted to keep holding him against me for as long as he would allow, but without the excuse of sex, the tenderness tore at my heart and I headed to the bathroom before I blurted out words I could never take back.
We needed to talk about Emily. We needed to talk about our collision course in the draw. We needed to talk about how desperately I was in love with him, yet when I dropped back onto the bed, I said, “I hope that was sufficient railing for tomorrow’s match?”