Chapter 9: Chapter 9

TYLER

The practice was rough, and that was only partly due to my lack of sleep the previous night. I really thought Kate and I had turned a corner, but she wanted to end things. I wasn’t even sure what drew me to her so much.

Maybe it was her eloquence and elegant behavior when in front of our team that turned to pure animal lust when I had her alone. There were two different sides to her, yet she was only one person.

Then I saw her maternal side when she received a phone call from that little girl, Tessa.

I wasn’t looking to have kids or anything, but no man can deny that seeing a woman be her nurturing self isn’t a turn-on.

While we were taking care of Tessa, she regarded me with a warm affection I hadn’t seen before. Her blue eyes blazed with a protectiveness for the girl, and there was care in them for me.

Kate smiled a lot while we were there, and it was the first time I wasn’t worried about the impending doom hanging above our relationship. That is until she rejected me just before I left.

I had to face the fact that she’d never relent.

“What the fuck is with you today, man?” Chris asked as we walked to the parking lot. “You sucked ass.”

I groaned. “Just shit on my mind.”

“Girl issues?” he asked.

“Yeah, I guess you can say that.”

Chris stopped beside my Mercedes and grasped the driver’s door. “Let’s go out tonight. We’ll find some tail, and you’ll forget all about your issues.”

~I won’t forget.~ “Sure. Why not?”

I moped around in my apartment, still avoiding unpacking boxes. I wasn’t excited in the least to go out with Chris that night, but I had to at least attempt to get my mind off Kate.

Chris and I could pick up any girls we wanted, someone surely not as complicated as the one woman who wouldn’t leave my mind.

I pressed my forehead against the wall of my shower, thinking about my plan for that night. Would another chick even be able to make my head spin as Kate did? Would I even want to find one who could?

I threw on some jeans and a t-shirt. Nothing special, since I never bothered going out of my way to impress any female. Unless the woman was Kate.

I picked up my phone and dialed my brother Jason. “What’s up, douche bag?” he answered.

“Not much, shit for brains,” I replied. “Want to go out tonight? Me and some guys from the team are gonna grab drinks.”

“Count me in.”

Despite being twins, we didn’t look anything alike. He was fair, with lighter skin, eyes, and hair. I was more of the dark and brooding kind, as he so often liked to tell me.

I asked Jason to call our younger brother, Steve, who had just turned twenty-one. He was kind of nerdy and worked with computers or some shit, but he was our brother and we loved him just the same.

My parents were in the process of moving to New York from Toronto. They planned to follow me everywhere, which, I guess, was good in a way.

Jason had been in New York since before I moved to the Blades. I was glad to be close to him again.

Mom and Dad would get heartbroken anytime they missed one of my games. I had no doubt they’d find a place close to me within a week or two. I even offered to help with finances, but they refused.

My mom came from family money, so they were pretty well-to-do; I just felt bad that they thought they had to move for my sake.

Every time I thought about my parents, I dreamed to have what they had. They had been married thirty years, and I’d never heard them fight.

Unless it was something small, like my dad eating too much cake and my mom worrying about his heart health.

Jason showed up at my door a few hours later. I let him in and slapped him on the shoulder. “You look like you’re from the fucking Jersey Shore.”

His hair was gelled back, and he looked ridiculous. He smiled at me and made his way to my fridge. Popping open a beer, he looked around my apartment.

“You’ve been here for two weeks and nothing is unpacked?” he asked.

He walked around my apartment some more, giving himself a tour. He whistled once he entered my bedroom. It was designed in the style of an open loft, with wooden beams ringing throughout.

Jason was appreciative of the style, being an architect himself. I dropped onto a box in my living room when he returned, a black lace bra draped around his fingers.

“I see you didn’t waste any time,” he said.

“Shut up.” I stood to grab Kate’s bra from him, but he turned.

“This wouldn’t happen to belong to that pretty little thing you were fighting with, would it?”

I sighed, annoyed. “That pretty little thing I was fighting with is, in fact, one of Blades’ owners; so no, it couldn’t belong to her.”

My twin brother eyed me. He wasn’t stupid, and he knew me as well as I knew myself. “You fucking slept with her, didn’t you?” he asked, before breaking into a fit of laughter.

I fell back onto the box, and he threw her bra at me. “Holy shit, dude. You’re my idol.”

“Jason, shut the fuck up about this.”

He playfully threw his hands in the air. “Don’t wanna piss you off, little brother.” He was only one minute older than me, but he never missed a chance to remind me of that.

“Is that why we’re going out tonight?”

“Yup.” I opened my fridge, cracking open a beer of my own.

“And I assume you don’t want to tell me about it?” His eyes gleamed, wanting details of my fucked-up love life.

“Nope.”

He dropped the matter but only for the time being. I knew he wasn’t done harassing me with questions.

Soon after, Ben showed up. Ben and Jason took the opportunity to discuss Kate among themselves. I tried to ignore them, but it hardly worked.

“You see Kate’s friend again?” I asked Ben, hoping to steer the attention away from me.

“Nah, we’re meeting up later though. I had to let my wounds heal first.”

Ben then began a detailed narrative of his first night with Piper. My brother ate it up, finding it hysterical how thrilled Ben was about being whipped and abused.

“You’re a sick fuck, you know that?” I asked my best friend.

“You’re so into Kate, you’d let her hit you too.”

I thought about it for a moment. I wouldn’t let her hit me, I knew that much. Unless I deserved it, but I definitely didn’t.

I had known Kate for barely a week, and if that idiot could already see how drawn to her I was, my obsession was going to fuck with my reputation.

“I’m not into Kate. We slept together and now we know it can’t be anything other than a one-night thing, got it?” I could hear the irritation in my own voice.

“It was just that once?” Jason asked. “That’s no fun.”

I lied. “Yeah, just that one time.”

Ben met my eyes; he knew we’d been together again, for I had sent him a goddamn picture of her sleeping in my bed. He acted as a good friend and didn’t call me out on my lie.

“You two can’t breathe a word about this. We’re meeting up with some teammates tonight, and no one can know.”

They agreed but continued discussing my non-existent relationship with her until we arrived at a club in the heart of Manhattan—Bangers.

My next game wasn’t until two days later, so I planned on drinking a decent amount that night. I pulled a baseball hat down low on my head, hoping to avoid as many prying eyes as possible.

I didn’t want to sign autographs or deal with slutty college girls throwing themselves at me. Not too long ago, I used to enjoy nights like that.

But meeting Kate had really fucked with my game. For once in my life, I wasn’t into meaningless sex with random girls.

“Over there,” Chris pointed to a group of easy-looking girls. “Eighteen and nineteen, easy lays. And they have fake IDs. I told them we played for the Blades, they’re down to get dirty.”

“A little young, dude,” Jason and I chimed in at the same time. We were always doing that twin shit. “I’m twenty-three, that’s kind of creepy,” I added.

Chris laughed it off and directed his attention to one of the girls. “She already asked about you.”

I looked the girl over; she was pretty, but nothing special. She also looked really young, which would make me feel like a sexual predator if I was actually trying to score with her.

Ben was already talking up a group of women, older than eighteen, thankfully. He and Piper had agreed that they’d be sleeping with other people, neither of them wanting anything serious together.

Steve, my younger brother, decided not to join us that night. He was probably at home, playing video games; I always envied his lack of need for womanly affection.

Chris seemed to be the only one interested in the young group of girls, but he was waiting for Jason and me to go over to the girls with him.

Jaromir decided to come out, but he was a married man and hence wasn’t going to spend his time chasing others. He knew how to be proud of what he had at home.

“Tonight is for you to get your mind off of your mystery chick,” Chris yelled to me over the club noise. Jason met my eyes but quickly turned away.

“But at least entertain the girls until I decide which one I’m taking home.”

“Fine,” I said.

We walked over to the obnoxious screaming females. One handed me a pen and asked me to sign her tits. I rolled my eyes when she wasn’t looking and signed.

She passed the pen along to her friends and I reluctantly signed three more breasts.

I checked my phone a few times while one of the girls talked my ear off about her friend or something equally annoying. Jason looked about as enthused as I was standing among those girls.

They were high-pitched and obnoxious. Chris had zero standards, moving around the group looking for the girl who had the least to say. He eventually nodded to me, indicating he had found the girl to take home.

If a guy was just looking for a quick lay, he definitely didn’t want to hear her life story.

The next hour was brutal. While the annoying chick next to me kept talking, I debated texting Kate; but I wasn’t sure what I’d say.

I had the final word when we left each other the previous night, and it wasn’t a pleasant moment. I had slammed the door in her face like a dick.

I could text her and ask what Bill had said, but I was nervous she’d see right through my questions. We’d be seeing each other again soon, in fact, the very next day.

My head wasn’t clear as I went back and forth between saying something then or just waiting until an awkward moment brought us together.

“So, are you single?” the girl asked, pulling me out of my thoughts.

“No, not really.” I practically choked on my own words.

Jason paused to stare at me, but then brushed it off and jumped into our conversation.

“We’re a little too old for you, anyway,” he said. “But you live in New York City, you can find a trillion guys your age.”

She scrunched her eyebrows. “But that doesn’t matter if the two hottest guys are standing right in front of me.”

My brother and I glanced at each other, unsure of what to say next. Her friends handed her one shot after another, and the more she drank, the more she rubbed her hands over my arms and chest.

I backed away every time, but she kept inching closer. It was as if she was following me. ~Weird.~

A while later, she was stumbling, gripping our arms for support. “She’s wasted,” Jason said. “I know you don’t want to, but we should get her a cab.”

“Alright.” We helped her outside and waited with her for a cab.

“Are you sure neither of you wants to spend the night together?” she asked, as we lowered her into the back seat.

“Just give the driver your address,” I spit out, harsher than intended.

She had barely gotten the address out of her mouth when a surprising amount of vomit fell all over the back of the seats and her clothes.

“Fuck,” Jason shouted.

The driver cursed and asked us to get her out. We had her address now, so the two of us held her up and walked a very slow walk to her apartment.

She announced that she lived alone, and I had a feeling that Jason and I wouldn’t be able to leave an underage, extremely sick girl alone at night.