Not My Match (The Game Changers, #2)(52)

“Indeed,” I say, propping my elbows on the table, feigning a new love for weather.

Greg keeps going, his eyes lighting up. “However, cumulus clouds are influenced by weather instability, air pressure, and temperature. Cumulus clouds form via atmospheric convection as air warmed by the surface begins to rise. As the air rises, the temperature drops . . .” He goes into an honest-to-God five-minute TED Talk, and I keep interest plastered on my face. I can’t stop the glee when Giselle’s eyes glaze over.

“Of course, most people don’t study clouds. I realize it can be quite boring.” He darts his eyes at Aiden, who’s checking out a girl that’s swaying past our table.

“Never,” I say as Giselle takes a sip of her water, her gaze on me, thinning.

Giselle says, “Maybe we should talk about something—”

Greg cuts her off. “Weather is important. As a scientist, I’m sure you appreciate that.”

A frown wrinkles her forehead. “Science is wonderful.” Her shoulders rise and fall in a soft sigh, one so tiny I don’t think Greg sees it. He can’t read her like I can. He can’t see behind the cool facade to the girl with all the layers. “Sometimes I just want to have fun.”

Greg thinks for a moment, a silent debate going on in his head, then smiles at her, his gaze softening. “My fun is painting clouds in watercolor. I have a few pieces in my loft.” He takes a sip of whiskey. “Maybe we can drop by there later, and I can show you?” His later is husky, and my hands are under the table, clenching.

“Mom would love to meet you” comes from him.

“You live with your mother?” I ask. My comment comes out a bit derisive, and he reacts by frowning.

“She’s elderly and needs care. It’s a very large apartment,” he says to Giselle. “You’d love her.”

Shit, she loves older people.

“Did she tell you she’s writing a romance?” I blurt.

Greg’s eyebrows go sky high. “Ah, no.”

“Aliens,” I say as I take a sip of my water. “Purple with sparkly scales and prehensile tails.”

“I took the tail off!” she calls.

“Oh?” He blinks down at Giselle, who’s currently giving me a flat look.

Focusing on him, I try to decipher if he’s into it or thinks it’s not worthy of a scientist, but dammit, he’s not giving me any tells.

“Do you think that’s silly?” she asks him.

I don’t, babe, is on the tip of my tongue. Tell me more about them. Tell me everything. Put me back on your Pinterest board. (Yeah, I had to look up what that was.) You be the woman who can rock whatever she wants because she’s fascinating and intelligent and sexy as fuck.

Greg leans in closer to her, his eyes heavy lidded. “I’m guessing you used real science to explain the details?”

“Of course,” she says.

He bites his lip. “Damn. That’s hot—”

“All right!” I announce and shove at Aiden to get up. Standing, I roll my shoulders and try to shake off the antsy feeling crawling all over me. “Let’s hit the VIP room,” I tell them, waving my hands in that direction. “More privacy and free food and drinks,” I tell Giselle when she gives me a weird look. “Hard to talk over the music out here.” It’s actually not loud in the mezzanine. But who cares.

“I could eat,” Greg says as he drains his glass.

Giselle nods, and they take off ahead of us down the stairs.

Aiden’s shoulder bumps me. “What’s the plan? How are we going to get this dude away from Giselle?” He bristles. “He paints clouds, for fuck’s sake.”

Is he boring? To me, yes, but . . .

Is he to her?

Regardless of the tangents on weather and living with his mom, she digs him, my head tells me as my chest tightens.

I motion to the bouncer to let Giselle and Greg in the area roped off by velvet to the right of the bar that leads to the VIP rooms as I hang back with Aiden.

“No plan,” I growl.

Aiden gets a mulish look on his face. “All right, I see; you’re leaving it up to me. Fine. I’ll handle this.”

“I hope your plan doesn’t involve hitting on Giselle. Those days are done.”

He shakes his head, a disappointed expression on his face as he takes me in. “We’ve established you’ve got it bad for her—whatever. I will let you have her, because you had dibs or bro code, whatever, but I’m going to cock up that date, and you can’t stop me.”

Before I say anything, he grins, backs up, and dances across the dance floor right in the middle of a group of women, who squeal and put their hands on his chest. He looks at me and calls out, “You want Giselle, and I can make it happen. She’s yours.” He’s wearing his “I got this” expression, the one he gets when he’s surveyed the defensive line and has a plan to score.

She’s not mine, my eyes tell him, but my heart isn’t in it.

That cliff looms, and with a few more tugs, I’ll be falling over . . .





Chapter 14

DEVON

Aiden’s version of I got this is clear an hour later. I came in with them earlier, got them a table with a view of the floor, and made sure they had a server for drinks. I told the waitstaff to cater to whatever they wanted, and they ordered several appetizers from the kitchen. I sat with them for as long as I could (about half an hour), but when Greg put his hand on Giselle’s knee, I jerked up and went to check in with Selena.