Teardrop Shot(13)

Keith stood on the other side of the dish window, a scowl on his face.

The dirty bastard was going to take it and run. I knew how he worked.

But he just grunted, waving that B-oss mug in the air. “Trent, we’re going to start.”

Damn. He was all business. I was slightly disappointed… Slightly. I didn’t want to get ahead of myself.

But I couldn’t help it. “Hey, Keith?”

He paused and looked back.

“If you needed to confess one sin to save your life, what would it be?”

“Keep it up, Charlie. We have other alumni staff we can call.” He turned away.

“Oh yeah? How many of them can ask you—” A hand clapped over my mouth.

“Keep walking, Boss,” Trent called. “I got her handled.”

No one handled me.

Well, except Trent just now, and I needed it.

I gulped down some oxygen once he lifted his hand. “Thank you. I almost lost a second job there.”

He moved back, but his chuckle was strained. “I gotta go, but you need to get yourself in check. I mean it. I have to leave tomorrow for another speaking event, and I won’t be back till the end of their stay. You going to be okay till then?”

I nodded.

Once the camp weeks started, it wouldn’t be hard to avoid Keith. He tended to only show up for meals. He’d stay in the office other than that, so as long as he wasn’t poking his nose in at the gym courts, I would be fine. I could do the dishes and squirrel away a plate of food.

“You’ll help rein her in if she needs it?” Trent called to Hadley, walking by.

She threw him a smile over her shoulder, not stopping. She went out, picked up a steamer, and brought it back. “No problem,” she said as she passed us again. “Though I’ve always enjoyed Charlie’s feisty side.”

“For some reason, I’m not reassured.”

I slapped Trent on the arm. “Get on. I’ll be fine. And if nothing else, I’ll whisper my random questions.”

He gave me a dry look. “Right. Because that’s not creepy.”

I shrugged, going back to the dishes.

The players had started to migrate out the doors, leaving all their dishes on the table.

Normal camps had a process where campers were told how to collect plates on one tray, silverware on another, throw away their trash, etc. Adult camps were just told to take their dishes to the dish window, but these guys were none of those. I wasn’t surprised to see that not one of them brought their stuff to the window. That would add thirty minutes to the cleanup.

But just then Owen whipped through with a cart.

Owen was bringing the window to their dishes. It was decked out, even with a soaker tub for the silverware.

“Okay. I’m going to go.” Trent still lingered. “You haven’t asked about your baller crush.”

Hyperventilating.

Do you regret anything you did five days ago? Five weeks? Five months? Five years?

I was biting down hard on my lip. None of those questions spilled out, and I was damn proud of myself.

Then I heard Trent say, “He’s not here. He’s coming tomorrow.”

Oh good God.

If you can see a fart on a thermal camera, could you see a climax too?





It didn’t take as long to clean as I thought.

I was walking out of there thirty minutes later. Hadley had set a plate of food aside for me before they put everything away. I could’ve kissed her when she gave it to me because my stomach was doing some serious growling and rolling. I could’ve intimidated bears if I needed to, but because I was scarfing down my food, I was also cutting through the back of the lodge, heading for the gyms.

I wasn’t sure how long they’d keep everyone at the opening/welcome ceremony, but I hadn’t checked out the gyms yet.

Big mistake.

That was always one of the number one rules. Actually, we didn’t really have a list of rules. They were all considered the most important, and we had to figure it out from there. My personal number one rule had always been eating, so there you go. Smart girl priorities.

Anyway, I was in a bit more of a rush than I normally would’ve been, and I slammed through the screen door leading into the inside gyms, only seeing the silhouette at the last second.

“Oh shit!” I tried swerving around him, but I failed.

I hit the guy smack in the center of the chest, and down we went. My food rained on top of us.

Fuuuuck.

Is rain only called rain if it’s the liquid form of water? Could my food have snowed down on top of us too?

I bit my lip so hard as I rolled to my feet. “Sorry.”

I wasn’t sure if I should look, but I did. I sighed in relief. “Oh, Grant. It’s only you.” And then I immediately seized up in a mouth-twisting-biting-hands-wringing moment because I hadn’t meant to imply he didn’t matter—like I hadn’t purposely not asked about him, because I knew he was here or he would be here, and yeah. I was sucking at this whole thing.

I still couldn’t bring myself to look him in the eye, but I was very aware of our surroundings. Even in the dark, I was already taking inventory. There were two indoor gyms and in the corner was the cage where I’d be sitting and trying to write out a lame and overly committed-to therapeutic exercise. I’d come in through one screen door, but straight across from us, another screen door led to three brand-new outdoor gyms. Leaning to the side, I could see that the last court had a volleyball net up and shit. That’s probably why Grant was here.