Jake and Kev stood watching him. They began whispering back and forth. As if they knew something was coming.
I raised my hands in the air. “Okay, okay, maybe I was taking advantage of the situation, but seriously, who wouldn’t? It was like a free pass!”
Not that I was locked down before. I’d been single for more than five years and the wager was almost like a challenge. But after my recent string of bad luck, I was done with the online shit.
Carlos stepped back up to the plate and dug his right foot into the ground, as if he was covering a divot. “I think we need to adjust the wager.”
“Oh, no, no.” I wagged my finger. “You already made the rules.”
“And the profile,” Kev interjected on my behalf.
Carlos’s eyes narrowed at him. “Ones he’s breaking.”
“Woah! I met them through the app, talked about that ever soimportant connection.”
“The deal was you had to have the connection before you got involved,” Carlos said through gritted teeth.
Oops.May have forgotten that specific detail.
“You should know that not everyone has been a winner, though.” I ticked my fingers off, thinking about a couple of failures. “There was the one girl with the thick unibrow and the start of a mustache.”
Kev cackled. “Don’t forget the single mom with three baby daddies who only wanted you for the fourth. Didn’t she say something like, it was cheaper than IVF?!”
Jake opened and closed his mouth before squeezing his eyes shut, buckling over.
“Oh, and a terrifying encounter with a woman who must have used her college-days picture, because I was sure she was the same age as my mom.” I shuddered at the memory of her inch-long nails digging into my thigh under the table. I couldn’t escape fast enough.Glad I never gave her my number. “What did you expect from me? I’m not the guy who is going to buy flowers, talk about romantic shit, or fall into a relationship. I’m the guy who gives you a great time, for a short time.”
“That should be your tagline.” Jake scoffed, rolling his eyes. “I’m sure you’d have them lining up around the block.”
“Worked so far.” I flipped him off. A slight stretch, but before that stunt, it was true. I had a few that lingered for a few months here or there, but no one I was serious about.
“I’m sweating like a farm animal. I’m gonna hit the showers,” Carlos huffed at us.
Once he left, I turned to my teammates and pleaded for help. I had been juggling online conversations between warmups, practice, and travel. I was fucking over it. It was like a full-time job. “Guys, I fucking need help. This isn’tgoing to plan and I can’t lose to fucking Carlos. You know how he is.”
Jake nodded. “Yeah, he can be a real prick when he wins.”
“Try again. Maybe go for the opposite of whatever you’ve been doing.” Jake shrugged.
Kev scratched his jaw. “Change the profile?”
“Nah. He’ll need more than that,” Jake added.
We walked back to the locker room in silence, thinking about what to do next and how to up my game. What the hell could I do? Weeding through online chats was exhausting. Meeting someone in person was even harder with our season schedule. A night here or there was one thing, but if I was meant to date someone, it meant spending actual time with them.
Of all the fucking ways he could have screwed me out of winning, he sure knew what he was doing. And say what you want about the bet being about love, but this wasn’t it. This was strategy. It was about time, or lack of it, which was why he knew I couldn’t win. He stacked the odds against me before it even began. The problem was, I was a competitive fucker and he’d just motivated me.
Before we continued, Carlos came out wearing a towel around his waist, his thick hairy chest glistening from his shower. “Alright, how about an amendment?”
My brow lifted. “What kind of amendment?”
“Yeah, I wanna hear this,” Jake added, smirking at me.
“My sister…” My heart stopped with the wordsister. No freaking way. His sister was the exact version of him, just with longer hair. Never happening. “Relax,” he said, as if reading my mind. “Besides, I’d never let you near her.”
I breathed a sigh of relief.
He smirked. “Forget the online bullshit. How about we pick someone for you?”
