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I also knew that after a full weekend’s worth of busting my ass and running on fumes, I’d have a reward waiting for me back in New York in the form of Holland Maxwell. I was already thinking about filling my hands with those tits I felt pressed bare against my chest this morning, and about every surface in the city I wanted to fuck her perfect body on. And at this point, I knew it was wrong for reasons beyond her age, who her brother was, or the fact that I’d watched her grow up.
It was wrong because it was rousing the animal inside me. Tempting my self-restraint and the discipline I’d been practicing like a religion since I came to this city. I was playing with fire right now—I knew that. But I couldn’t bring myself to stop.
So I told myself I’d at least earn it.
“So, word on the street is you negotiated a very player-friendly extension this morning.” Drew wiggled his eyebrows at me while pushing his beer swiftly away from the grabbing hands of his toddler, Kai.
Kai strained another few seconds for the pint before smacking his little hands on the table, cutting a look to his dad and declaring something in very spirited gibberish.
“Dude, what? That’s not yours,” Drew said.
I snorted. It was clear that Kai shared not only Drew’s coloring with the dark blond hair and hazel eyes, but the same exhausting levels of energy. It made me feel for Evie since I couldn’t imagine dealing with both Drew and a mini-Drew on a daily basis, but she was all smiles and laughter, radiating joy even as she excused herself a minute ago to take an urgent call from work.
She’d apparently made the trip out to Boston to surprise Drew this morning. That topped with the day’s win and Drew was grinning from ear to ear, even as he went through his customary bitching at me for things that didn’t actually bother him.
“So, you gonna tell me all the juicy details of this contract, or do I have to hear about it on ESPN tomorrow like a fucking plebe?” he asked, catching a fork that Kai swatted off the table without so much as taking his eyes off of me.
The morning’s meeting at Fenway had wrapped just in time for my client to walk off the mound following his loss against Drew and the Empires and take comfort in hearing about the staggering hundred-and-two million dollar contract extension I’d negotiated well into the afternoon. The signing was tomorrow morning, and the news would be announced shortly after, but my work in Boston wasn’t quite done. I still had a late-evening meeting with my team followed by several rounds of client video calls for the night.
But before the latter half of my day kicked off, I had an hour-and-a-half-long window, which I was using to have dinner with Drew and his family at a downtown brewery.
“Well, it’s not your contract, so there’s no reason for you to know the details,” I said, taking a swig of my beer.
“Yeah, but I can use this as a comparison for the new deal you negotiate for me with the Empires, because my contract’s up after next season, and Lord knows I ain’t goin’ nowhere. This team’s about to dominate the American League for the next five years at least. Plus, we just busted our asses to get Kai into Saint Clare’s,” he said, referring to the prestigious pre-school in Brooklyn that I’d been hearing about for a year now. “They made us pay just for the application. I had to write an essay on Kai’s hobbies and interests. He’s one.”
“You wrote that essay? Or Evie did?”
“For your information, we FaceTimed and worked on it together. It was mostly about Mega Bloks.”
“Nice.”
“Yeah, figured I should keep quiet about the fact that the kid can already pitch a clementine across the room,” Drew said, peeling Kai’s fingers off his own baby shoe that he seemed so determined to remove. “By the way, your eyes are glazing over right now. You’re usually better at pretending to be interested.”
I laughed. “Trust me, there’s nothing that interests me more than your full transformation into a Brooklyn PTA dad. I just have a lot to think about today.”
“Like what? Getting back together with your ex?”
I squinted at him with genuine confusion. “What are you talking about? I’m not getting back together with Keira.”
“Okay, just making sure. Because none of us liked her.”
“Yes, I know. You tell me this almost every time we talk.”
“Well, yeah, because she sucked. Evie hated her,” Drew said just as Evie got back to the table, already cocking her head at us both as she sat down.
“Hated who?”
“Iain’s ex,” Drew said.
She smacked him hard. “Drew!” she yelled before turning to me, already exasperated. “Omigod, I didn’t hate Keira. I just thought she was… a little in your face. And she talked a lot, which made her seem kind of like an unlikely choice for you.”
I nodded and smirked, saying, “Fair enough,” just as a waitress came by to coo over Kai, and effectively divert the attention from the topic of my ex.
Who was in fact an unlikely choice for me.
I was aware of that.
But I’d met her shortly after moving to this city and we’d struck an arrangement. She had agreed to my lifestyle, because like me, she was focused on her career. She knew I wasn’t interested in having a traditional relationship, and on top of that she knew she was never going to understand why. My past was off the table, as was knowing me beyond a certain level.
