“What if I get injured?”
“Not my problem. Don’t get injured.”
That checked out.
He started bouncing on his feet, getting himself accustomed to the weight and feel of the pillow. “Ready?”
He dropped the ball without waiting for my response. It was trapped under his foot in a split second, teasing right, lolling left.
I sighed, stripping out of the hoodie and chucking it to the side. A happy little smirk was already starting to pull at his plush mouth, and we hadn’t even started.
I’d never played with him before. Not one-on-one. He’d tried to goad me into it a bunch of times, but I’d never taken the bait. I wasn’t willing to give him the satisfaction of beating me at something so easily.
And he would have.
Even with the blindfold and his foot stuffed in a walking boot, he’d have won. He used to bethatgood.
But it’d been a few years, and it was safe to assume he wasn’t practicing or training at nearly the same level, so there was hope.
I cracked my fingers, stretched my arms, and gave each of my ankles one last warm-up roll. Then I moved.
Dominic flicked the ball behind him right when I reached it, nabbing it again before I could so much as blink. I tried going around, but he pivoted, retaining full control.
I tried tricking him into thinking I was going left, then sprinting right. He pretended to fall for it but tapped the ball away just as my foot grazed it.
“Nice try.”
“Okay, there’sno wayyou can’t see,” I said, sticking my foot between his legs to get to the ball.
“I don’t need to see. You’re not exactly good at this.”
He gave it a light kick, and we broke into a sprint.
“You seriously expect me to believe you’re not cheating?” I half panted when he sidestepped the ball and nudged it away from me. “Let me see.”
I stepped closer, reached up, pretended to check on his blindfold… and immediately went for the ball.
Dominic saw it coming from a mile away. I huffed, my hands forming fists as I started to chase him again.
He tutted. “I forgot how frustrated you get when you’re bad at something.”
“I’m not frustrated,” I ground out. “I’m focused.”
For one blissful moment, I had him. But only because he let methinkI did.
An annoyed growl crawled out of my chest when the ball slipped out from under my foot, my cheeks flaming. And I was so annoyed with the slick slipperiness and speed of Dominic’s footwork that I didn’t realize he was chuckling.
As soon as it registered, my “focus” was gone.
I kept glancing up between my failed attempts at retrieving the ball, catching glimpses of his easy, lopsided smile. It wasn’t hard to see why a housekeeper’s son had ruled in a private school filled with some of the most status-obsessed and scathingly hypercritical teenagers on the planet.
Michelangelo would’ve taken a hammer to David if he’d ever laid eyes on Dom. It was very upsetting.
A small giggle burst out of me when he grabbed my arm, tugging me to the side when my proximity to the ball got too close for his comfort.
“That’s not cheating?!” I exclaimed, failing to keep the laughter out of my voice. I meant to sound outraged. Or snarky.
I meant to call foul, stop the game, and sarcastically thank him for giving me the win. I meant to stay the course.
