Chapter Nineteen
ISOBEL
Boston
Adrian’s grandfather was my new favorite person. His deep, weathered voice, the ever-present smirk, and the knowledge that he completely had his grandson’s number was truly impressive. It also had me aching for my family to be that close. My grandparents were all gone now, but I knew I’d never had the spark bond the men walking in the stadium gates in front of me shared. Adrian carried the heavy weight of his family on his shoulders, and while I hated that he’d masked himself for so long, part of me was thankful that he was letting his guard down for me and no one else.
I wasn’t sure I wanted to share his kind and compassionate nature with the rest of the world. His dickish fa?ade had kept people away from his heart, and it wouldn’t be here for me, open to the possibility of more, if someone else had come along and claimed it.
For the first time in a long, long time, I felt my spark returning, my once dormant dreams flickering to life at the possibility of something I thought had been snuffed out long ago.
“You alright takin’ a seat toward the middle?” Adrian asked as we stood at the top of the stairs leading down to the general seating area. The ballpark was still half empty, but people were steadily filtering in and finding their seats.
“Which row? ”
“Fourth one down, the four seats on the aisle.” The hair on the back of my neck stirred as his warm breath flowed over the side of my neck. “If you go in first, I can help Pops get settled. It’s easier for him to sit in the end seat.”
“Four?” I asked, wondering who else would join us. Going to the game was enough of a surprise, much less meeting his grandfather and some mystery stranger.
“Hutch isn’t here yet,” he smiled, pressing his hand to the center of my back, his fingers flexing against the material of my shirt. “He’s dealing with some tween drama right now, but I’m sure he’ll show up before the end of the first inning.”
As I started down the steps—Adrian carefully leading his grandfather down the steps behind me—I racked my brain trying to place the name. I wasn’t sure he’d mentioned Hutch before.
Once we were settled into the seats, Adrian sitting between me and Pops, he leaned over and squeezed my knee, whispering in my ear. “Did I not tell you I have a twin?”
There were a lot of words constantly coming out of Adrian’s mouth, but the word twin hadn’t been one of them.
“You need anything? Drink? Frank?”
“Did you forget my name again?” I teased, turning toward him, watching his face go from confused to mildly insulted.
“You’re not that na?ve, Is. I know those heathens in Wrigley call them dogs, but they also desecrated a classic.”
I tried not to laugh but couldn’t help myself. “No, Ad. I don’t need a sausage to fill my mouth right now. Maybe later.”
It may have been years since I attended a ball game, but I wasn’t completely clueless. I knew ballpark franks were apparently a religious experience at Fenway. Even though I’d never actually eaten one, Chicago dogs were something I’d always remember. As a child, I hadn’t been a fan of onions, but my dad loved them. The smell of those loaded hotdogs was something I’d always associate with summer and baseball.
“I’d be happy to help you out if you want it filled later,” he whispered, mirth in his eyes. If it were anyone else, I’d be shocked at him flirting so blatantly in front of his grandfather, but it was Adrian, so it wasn’t surprising at all. His sense of shame had left the building a long time ago, nowhere to be found. “My sausage seemed to fit pretty well.”
“I’m sure you would, but I’m here to watch some men in tight pants handle their bats, not flirt with you over ballpark wieners.”
As Adrian opened his mouth to respond, a booming, eerily familiar laugh sounded from behind my back as a warm shoulder settled against mine. “Did I hear yah say yah wanted to see some men playing with their bats? Sounds kinda kinky.”
My face flushed red as I turned, not expecting the rugged doppelg?nger of the man on my other side.
“Aw, did I embarrass yah, sweetheart?” he chuckled, glancing over my shoulder to his brother. “Sounded like my brother had finally found someone who shared his affliction of telling thinly veiled dick jokes no one else finds funny.”
“Not all my jokes are about dicks,” Adrian laughed from behind me, his fingers squeezing the inside of my knee.
“But yah didn’t argue them not bein’ funny,” the bearded man to my left boomed before settling against his seat next to me.
“If I didn’t know better, I’d think he was overcompensating for something,” Hutch whispered, leaning in closer, my shoulders instinctively moving toward Adrian, but I was trapped between the two of them. “But since we’re nearly identical, I know that’s not it.”
Blinking to clear my head, I gasped when Adrian’s warm lips grazed my earlobe. “Am I trying to overcompensate, Is?”
Wedged in between them, I was feeling overheated, but not from the bright late spring sunshine.
Working in editing romance novels for as long as I had, you’d think I’d almost be immune to fleeting fantasies of being shared by two men, but I was woefully unprepared to deal with the situation off the paper .
Thoughts of heaving chests and more than one set of warm lips tracing my exposed skin flooded my brain, and I was beginning to think maybe Adrian had been right about my genre. Maybe we were a bit obsessed with sex. Not that I was thinking about Adrian’s twin brother in that context. That would be wrong. Down girl.
But they did look alike. It had me wondering if Hutch’s comment about everything being identical was accurate. Sounded like a mystery that needed to be resolved.
With a yardstick.
There was something seriously wrong with me.
“He tryin’ tah mark his territory with this?” Hutch smirked as he playfully pulled at the brim of the hat on my head, drawing me out of my completely inappropriate line of thinking. Adrian had clearly been rubbing off on me.
Mmm…rubbing.
And it was official. Trapped between two equally built, equally desirable men, I’d lost my damn mind.
“Can you believe he wouldn’t let me wear my Cubs hat in here?” I whispered conspiratorially, still trying to study his features to see the differences between him and Adrian. Other than a few greenish flecks around his irises, if Hutch shaved his full beard and cut his hair, they’d be hard to tell apart.
Which was kind of freaky. It had me wondering how many poor unsuspecting souls they’d fooled when they were younger. I could see them using their identical looks as a challenge to befuddle people.
“Ah. I get it now. No wonder yah like Adrian. You’ve got a thing for pussies who can’t figure out how to score.”
My shoulders shook as I tried to hold in a laugh, biting my lip as Adrian’s warm breath ghosted over the side of my neck.
“Think I figured it out pretty well a few days ago,” he whispered, his hand gripping possessively on the inside of my bare thigh.
“With a little coaching, I think it’s salvageable,” I snickered, trying not to moan as Adrian dug his short fingernails into my flesh.
“Yeah. Diehard fans always say that until they get some new talent, and then they’re screaming for the new guy no problem the first time he hits a bomber.”
“Sometimes a little home team loyalty pays off when a struggling player figures out how to drive one home,” I quipped back with a grin.
“Didn’t have to struggle much,” Adrian’s amused voice was in my ear once again.
“Yeah, but it’s hard to go back to a struggling player when you’ve experienced the rush of an all-star.”
“Hutch, you leave that poor girl alone,” Pops chuckled from past Adrian’s shoulder. “Besides, some women like the underdog. They try a whole lot harder to get the job done. Sometimes those all-stars get lazy. All flash and no bang .”
My eyes watered as I tried to smother a laugh. The O’Neill men were not what I would have expected. But they were all endearing in their own way.
As the game started and the day warmed up, Adrian and Hutch really got into it, shouting at the players, cursing at the umpire, high fiving behind my back when the Sox scored. It was loud, and I was sweaty, and likely sunburned, but I couldn’t imagine being anywhere else.
Hutch and Pops welcomed me into their little circle, teasing me just as much as they teased Adrian. Making crass jokes and not trying to mansplain the game to me. It was strange to feel so comfortable around a man’s family so soon. It’d taken most of the four years we were at Cornell to be comfortable with Grant’s family. Even though Adrian and I hadn’t even defined what was going on between us, I was trying not to question how right it felt.
My cheeks flamed while Adrian’s fingers traced the ragged hem on my shorts. He’d been touching me all day. Not anything blatantly sexual. But it was possessive. And I liked it.
The big screen on the far side of the stands drew my attention. The infamous kiss cam scrolling across, pausing briefly to capture a sweet kiss between an older couple as they laughed.
As the camera zoomed in again on its next unsuspecting victim, I was too distracted by the men on either side of me to register that it was my face staring back until Hutch leaned in, his beard tickling the side of my face.
“Which one is it gonna be, Bel? You want me to lay one on you to make my brother jealous?”
My cheeks heated while I continued to stare at my likeness, sandwiched in the tiny stadium seats between Hutch and Adrian’s broad shoulders.
“Nice try,” Adrian growled, leaning over and planting his palm in the center of Hutch’s face as the crowd’s laughter surrounded us. “She’s mine.”
I didn’t even have time to respond as Adrian firmly grasped the back of my neck and pulled my lips to his, claiming me with a searing kiss.
The noise of the surrounding crowd couldn’t compare to the sound of blood rushing in my ears when he slipped his tongue into my mouth, stealing any coherent thoughts.
“Damn, Ad,” I heard Pops chuckle from a few seats down. “Don’t eat the girl’s face. Let her breathe.”
When I regained my ability to speak, I took one from Adrian’s book, letting my uninhibited thoughts fly after I cleared my throat.
“I think I’m ready for that sausage now.”
“You alright with me dropping these two off before we head to my place?” Adrian asked while we followed Hutch and Pops out of the stadium. We’d waited in our seats for a while after the Sox narrowly pulled off a win in the 9th, reminiscing about the impressive plays during the game. By the time we stood to exit, the crowd had thinned to a tolerable level.
“A little presumptuous of you to think I want to go back to your place after our first date,” I answered distractedly, watching the two men in front of us.
“Cute that you think this is only our first date.” He chuckled, bumping his shoulder into mine.
“Eating take out with you on my couch hardly counts as a first date, and—”
“Eating you on your couch is now one of my favorite ways to spend a Friday night,” he interrupted with a grin, wiggling his eyebrows for effect. Shameless.
My cheeks flamed, but hopefully, my blossoming sunburn would conceal it, because recalling straddling Adrian’s smug face on my couch was warming up other things. Things I should not be thinking about when I had to spend the next half hour trapped in the car with his eighty-something-year-old grandfather.
“I’m sure this is breaking some kind of date protocol, but would you mind sittin’ in the back with Pops? He’ll probably be snoring by the time we hit the freeway, but Hutch has a hard time with his leg being crammed in the back seat.”
Tilting my head to the side, I studied the men in front of me again, noticing a break in Hutch’s gait, his balance favoring one side. He was also wearing cargo pants on a day when most other people around us were in shorts.
“We can talk about it when we get back to my place,” Adrian whispered at my questioning look, his fingers skimming the back of my hand. “He was injured when he served overseas. He’s got a prosthetic.” Another mystery about the twin I never knew existed. Apparently, Mr. Suit Porn’s brother had been in the military. “I know we’ve done this all out of order, but I think it’s time we sat down and talked. And not about anything related to work or how much of an ass you think I am.”
Nodding, I was startled when he slipped his hand into mine, squeezing before he laced our fingers together.
“You’re not a total ass,” I whispered, suddenly nervous at the butterflies that took up residence in my stomach. It was probably the hot dog.
“Don’t start overthinking, babe. I know you think I’m not capable of having a serious conversation without cramming my foot in my mouth, but I’m trying not to screw this up.”
The two of us sitting down and having a genuine conversation scared me more than any confrontation we’d had in the office. It’d been so much easier to dislike him than to see him how I was starting to.
As someone I could fall for.
I’d promised myself after Grant that I’d never go for the lovable asshole again, but Adrian was making it hard to stay away.
“You’re just trying to screw something else,” I teased, leaning into his shoulder and looking up at him.
“Some one else,” he said with a wink. “I’d be lying if I tried to deny it, but talk first, screw later.”
Adrian was right, Pops was snoring before we got through the exit of the parking lot. Which left me to watch the excited Sox fans still lingering on the sidewalks as we headed toward South Boston from Fenway.
I’d been in Boston for years, but I’d never had a reason to venture into what the locals called Southie. A creature of habit, I stuck to my little neighborhood of Jamaica Plain or downtown, where the Vivid offices were located. After the divorce, most of my friendships fizzled, except for Leila’s.
Throwing myself into my professional life made sense then, but now I was questioning all the choices I’d made along the way. If I didn’t insulate myself with endless manuscript acquisitions, long hours and a hectic travel schedule, would I have met someone by now? Or was it all building up to what was unfolding with Adrian? I found it hard to believe that the man I thought I’d despised for being a pig for the last five years was suddenly the man I was supposed to end up with. But it wasn’t like my romantic radar had really worked out for me before.
The overhead light startled me when Hutch opened the passenger door, turning in his seat to aim the O’Neill signature grin in my direction. Oh yeah, those two had been dangerous once upon a time. Actually, they still were.
“It’s been a pleasure, Bel. I hope my dipshit brother doesn’t screw things up and I’ll get to see you again sometime soon.” He extended his hand through the break in the seats to grasp mine and drew it toward his mouth, his eyes intent on mine. Soft lips gently caressed the back of my hand, his beard tickling my knuckles before he pulled away, chuckling.
“Don’t hit me, you fuck,” Hutch laughed, rubbing the back of his head while Adrian aimed a deathly glare at his brother.
“Don’t kiss my... fuck .” Adrian trailed off with a groan as Hutch smacked him in the stomach.
“Boys,” Pops huffed from the seat beside me, now wide awake. “Let’s pretend we have some manners in front of the lady.”
He turned toward me, mimicking his grandson, softly placing a kiss on the back of my hand and leaning back with a wink.
“I’ve got my eye on you, old man,” Adrian laughed while watching our interaction in the rearview mirror.
“It’s not our fault we’ve got more game than you. Better step it up if you want to keep this one,” Pops chuckled before he turned back to me. “Don’t be a stranger. I’ve got a feeling my boy might already be over his head with you. Be easy on him, sweetheart.”
Hutch helped Pops from the backseat, the two of them waving as they ascended the concrete steps of the row house we’d parked in front of. The siding looked a little weathered on the old building, but the front door and the trim were nicely painted. It wouldn’t take much to imagine two dark-haired troublemakers spilling out of the front door and running amok in the neighborhood. Seeing it just added to the ever-changing picture of who Adrian was in my mind.
My door pulled open, Adrian leaning over the top with a soft smile. “You want to ride shotgun or pretend I’m an Uber driver?”
“You mean I have to be seen in a car with you? How embarrassing,” I teased.
“I can throw you in the trunk if you’re that worried about it.”
“Maybe you’ve been reading a few too many of Evan’s novels,” I laughed. “Although it usually is the pretty ones who end up being the serial killers.”
“No black coffee here, remember?” he shot back, holding his hand out. “I’ll make you suffer sitting in the front with me. I kinda enjoyed being able to watch you squirm with my hand on your thigh all afternoon.”
Unable to argue with that, I took his hand. I’d never admit it to him, but I too was craving the feeling of his palm after it’d spent most of the game possessively gripping the space where my denim shorts met my thigh.