Chapter 23
CHAPTER 23
NOW
The blue jersey looked good on him. In it, Henry contrasted with the green of the grass and matched the blue of the seats as he dribbled left and right, then broke into a sprint until he was still an impressive distance away from the goal. He delivered the ball into the net with a whoosh that echoed through the empty stadium, and my hands fell away from my keyboard to clap.
Again, the sound echoed.
Amd again.
He repeated the same drill a hundred times more. Dribble, sprint, score. Dribble, sprint, score. And my intention really had been to focus on writing, on the blank pages on my screen and how I could fill them.
But the sweatier he got, the harder it was. My eyes kept drifting to him, watching him stretch, and run, and use the hem of his shirt to wipe his forehead. Just the sliver of midsection it revealed, had me squirm in my seat at what marveled beneath the jersey.
My gaze snapped back to him again—and unfortunately connected right with his.
“How’s writing going?” he asked sheepishly, jogging the last few feet toward the would-be VIP section above the sideline, where I’d gotten comfortable.
To make up for the fact that it wasn’t going great, and he was most likely the reason for it, I snickered. “Ask me again once you start doing something worth writing about.”
Henry grabbed his water bottle with an unapologetic laugh, then stifled the sound when he took a big sip.
I tried not to watch his Adam’s apple bob.
When he took the bottle from his lips, he looked back up at me, head shaking. “I’m sorry,” he said. “Am I boring you, Miss Castillo?”
“Terribly,” I whined, though diverted my attention onto the screen again.
I watched my cursor blink. Because I wasn’t quite sure how to say Henry Parker Pressley looked so handsome when he played soccer , and word it in a way that didn’t get me banned from every news house in the States.
“You’re pretending to work again,” Henry noted in amusement, and behind my screen, I grimaced at the accuracy. “Come here,” he chirped, looking up at me with raised brows. He held his hand out.
For me to take, presumably.
“What?” My eyes flicked to my screen again. “Why?” I wasn’t ready to give up on my document’s word-count goal just yet.
“Just come here, Paula.”
“What for?”
Despite the annoyed tone in his voice, his lips spread into a wide grin. Exasperated and amused and beautiful.
“Don’t make me come up there,” he threatened. “I’m sweaty and gross.”
I doubted it.
Still, I closed my laptop slowly, the gesture a small win for him in itself. “Tell me why,” I said, standing up.
“Do you trust me?”
“No.”
I slipped under the railing and the few feet to the ground regardless. Not taking my eyes off him, I narrowed them in suspicion when he grabbed one of the soccer balls sitting on the sideline. Dread formed low in my belly when we walked to the penalty spot.
“Kick it.”
My head shot in his direction. “What?”
“If watching me is too boring,” he said in a sing-song voice, “you might as well do it yourself.”
I shook my head so quickly, the stadium around me blurred for a moment. “Absolutely not.”
Look , obviously I’d kicked a ball before. Although soccer wasn’t at the top of the Dominican Republic’s favorite sports list, it was still popular enough. And with Dad forcing me to learn how to dribble when I was seven—only to give up on the endeavor a month later because I’d been a hopeless case—it had been impossible to avoid scoring a goal here and there.
But that didn’t mean I had to put that particular untouched skillset to the test now. In a twenty-five-thousand-seat stadium. With one of soccer’s most anticipated only a few feet away.
“Paula,” that same man whined from beside me now, nudging the ball right to my feet. “Come on. What do you have to lose?”
My pride and humility, among other things.
He interpreted my eyes narrowing as an I’ll do it . It was obvious by the way his lips twitched, and he took a few steps back to give me space. Then, he strayed his arms in the direction of the goal and said, “All yours.”
So… I lined up the shot, tried my best to get the angle right, and went for it. No time for overthinking.
I wished I could say there’d been too much force in my kick. That I hadn’t angled my foot right and it was the reason the ball flew so sideways, it would be an annoyance to get back.
Unfortunately, the ball hadn’t even made it into the vicinity of the net. It stopped a good ten feet short, slowly rolling until it ran out of momentum.
“Well.” Henry’s head tilted curiously at the thing. “No one can say you’re too harsh with it.”
I did not think before I hit him.
Only his shoulder, and it was more of an affectionate shove. But it felt good. And when he just laughed, I singlehandedly made it my mission to score that damn goal. The fact he thought I couldn’t was motivation enough.
I got the ball back. Placed it on the penalty spot. Again, I lined up my shot, tried my best to get the angle right, and… then Henry came up behind me, and my entire focus was elsewhere.
Who cared about a ball when I could feel his body against mine?
His hand lingered on my shoulder so lightly, it was barely a touch at all. He waited, silently asking if this was okay, giving me enough time to move away if I wanted to. I did not.
“Let me show you,” he offered. All the earlier amusement had disappeared from his tone, and although there was no one else between the thousands of seats around us, his voice was hushed.
As soon as I turned to him, the warmth of his body, the soothing sound of his voice, I realized it was a mistake. A mistake that left us standing about a hair’s breadth away, and I wasn’t quite sure what to focus on first.
The different shades of green in his eyes I’d slowly been forgetting? The residual pink in his cheeks from running around? The fact he didn’t smell like sweat at all, but pinewood and citrus. And bad ideas.
“I think I can manage to kick a ball,” I said—whispered, maybe?—because there was no room for bad ideas on this trip. Or any time after it. Right?
Something in his expression shifted. Determination and amusement in his gaze held mine for another one, two, three seconds before he shot forward, kicking the ball from where I’d lined it up perfectly. He ran until he was far enough. With the ball never leaving his side.
“Henry!” I yelled, the glare in my eyes so vicious, he snorted a laugh when he turned back to me.
So maybe not quite as vicious, then.
“If you’re so sure you can kick a ball,” he challenged. “Get it first.” He dribbled in place as if that would make the idea more enticing. If anything, it put me off the whole thing.
“Henry Parker Pressley,” I said seriously, still standing where he’d left me. “You’re about to do this for a living. I’ve never played a single proper soccer game. How is that fair?”
“I’ll go easy on you, charm,” he mocked, taking a step away. His brows rose, and when I thought I could use the moment of distraction, and faked a start toward him, Henry only hopped a few steps back. Quite leisurely. The ball secured under his foot again, with a cocky smile he said, “Be careful. The grass was watered this morning. It’s slippery.”
“Fuck you.” The words burst out of me. Which, with the way his laugh echoed through the arena, he seemed to love.
I groaned, looking up at the blue spring sky. There was no way I’d win, or even get close to him, by playing fair. It was overrated, anyway.
Without another second to change my mind, I charged toward Henry. Completely ignoring the ball at his feet and focusing all my strength into pushing him far enough from it, to get my chance. But our body parts became one entangled mess of limbs, my hands grabbed onto his shirt for support and I— oh God , I felt him falling, and myself going down with him.
I laughed. It wasn’t ideal, I know, but I couldn’t help it. Rolling onto my back, I snorted laugh after laugh—I think tears might have been shed—and I only noticed that Henry was, too, when I briefly calmed down.
When our gazes met, I wasn’t quite sure if it was him or the adrenalin pumping through my veins that made my stomach turn.
Somewhere along that line, we’d stopped laughing. Henry smiled at me, a long sigh rattling through his throat. Our silence lingered.
“And that’s why I do it.” He swallowed thickly, eyes not wavering from mine. His breath fanned against my cheek—that’s how close he was. “The adrenalin, the fun. The urge to win, even when nothing’s at stake. That’s why I love it.”
“Oh,” I offered unhelpfully.
I couldn’t imagine coming up with a better response when all my willpower had gone into not looking at his lips. Right there, so close and kissable I might combust.
“And that was a foul, by the way,” he added as an afterthought, finally releasing me from my dire situation by getting up, then holding his hand out. “But because I’m a good sport, I’ll help you anyway.”
“Do not pull away,” I threatened when I took it. He did not.
His hand wrapped around mine, tugging lightly and tightening once I was halfway there. I tried to ignore the tingling of my skin where it touched his, and the empty feeling in my palm when he let go.
“I should—” I threw a glance to my laptop in the stands. “I’ll have to write that down. The… you know.” I gestured around wildly. “The adrenalin, fun, urge to win bit.”
I flew across the pitch like a mouse hunted by a stray cat. I could’ve sworn I’d just beat Henry’s five-minute-mile pace. And when I got to my seat, the first thing I did wasn’t writing his quote into my document, but soundlessly squealing into the crook of my arm.