Page 13 of The Tiger in the Sack

Shit. “I’m not weird, you’re weird.”

“You’ve been all quiet and up in your head since this afternoon. It was the meeting with Gabrielle, I know it was. She isn’t going to trade us or something, is she?”

He didn’t look up from whatever he was patting into his cheekbones. “Wait, is she just trading you? For being a weird feral raccoon at the press conference? Because we all know she’s never trading her movie star running back. It’s because of the press conference last week, isn’t it? You really need to study up on your media training, my guy.”

“The press conference was fine.”

“Isak. You called yourself a shenanigan enthusiast and waggled your eyebrows at the camera like you wanted to lick it until it said it’s safeword.”

“I have a reputation to maintain.”

Fox finally looked up. He had that face on, the one that looked like friendly interest and was actually a very sophisticated scanning system. Two years of living together had not made me immune to that face. I kept moving toward the fridge.

“The Gabster already sprung her takeover and a new coach on us. Don’t tell me she’s got more surprises up her sleeve.” he said. “What did happen at the meeting?”

“Nothing happened at the meeting. It was just the blah-blah we hope you’re happy here, what can we do to keep you happy kind of crap from Whyte. I honestly think Gabrielle was scoping him out more than me.”

“Then what? Because you were off your game all afternoon. You’re always laser focused on the first day of camp.” The sound of him capping something reverberated off the marble countertop. And I pretended he wasn’t staring at me and trying to worm his way into my brain.

The blender started without warning, because Fox believed the only time to make a smoothie was immediately and without announcing it. “Roper noticed.”

“He had a shit ton going on today. I doubt he noticed me at all.”

“Isak. You’re the QB, dude. Everyone notices everything you do.”

I rolled my eyes and closed the fridge with nothing in my hand because I’d opened it without actually wanting anything. Which Fox had also definitely noticed. He leaned against the counter with his arms crossed and an expression of unlimited patience and absolutely nowhere to be.

He didn’t say anything.

Fox was terrifyingly good at not saying anything.

I lasted forty-five seconds. “There’s a girl. A woman.”

He grinned and jumped up on the counter, planting his ass next to the blender and poured his smoothie. “Spill.”

I was kind of relieved to be able to talk some of this out. Clearly I had no idea what the hell I was doing.

“Yesterday, Vito and I were out on the bike.” I leaned against the opposite counter and looked at the ceiling. “She’d gotten stuck in a tree.”

He nodded and took a sip of his pink goo. “As one does.”

“Her cat got out. She went up after him. Branch went through her shirt, pinned her to the trunk. She couldn’t get down.”

“And you—” He was grinning from ear to ear.

“Got the cat and helped her down.”

Fox looked at me for a long moment. “Like a fireman? Wait, wait. Tell me you took the helmet off. Oh my god. You didn’t.”

He knew me too well. It was genuinely inconvenient. “I was on the bike.”

“Isak.”

I said nothing.

Fox nodded slowly, the way he did when he was filing information into a theory he was already building. Also, trying to hold in what I could tell was a barely contained giggle of glee at my ridiculousness. “Ahem, and where did this all take place?”

“That’s the thing.”