America's Geekheart (Bro Code #2)(7)

Statistically speaking, we’re in for a bloodbath tonight, because we won last night, but I don’t point this out to Mackenzie, because she showed up approximately seven minutes after I tasered Beck Ryder and has been running my afternoon and distracting me from the internet ever since.

Now, I’m camped on the couch next to her with my laptop pulled up, ignoring the mailbox warnings that it’s about to overflow because of all the Twitter notifications, and I turn on the live cam feed of Persephone the Giraffe’s journey toward giving birth at the Copper Valley zoo.

I’ve been tweeting the feed since the zookeepers announced she was showing early signs of labor a week ago, and it’s fun to see that almost half a million people worldwide are watching with me.

“Our girl’s still pregnant?” Mackenzie asks as she settles next to me with her popcorn.

“She could theoretically go another month.”

“I wonder if her being pregnant is good or bad luck for the Fireballs?”

“Maybe she’ll give birth to next season’s good luck charm.”

Mackenzie’s my polar opposite. She’s blond-haired, blue-eyed, long-limbed, perky-boobed, well-dressed—even her jersey looks stylish, probably because her shorts fit right and aren’t stained, and she’s wearing it with jewelry—and she’s a trash engineer.

Which isn’t as different as it sounds from an environmental engineer, but on the surface, we’re night and day.

Especially since she’s only a trash engineer since she can’t get paid to be a professional Fireballs fan.

By the third inning, the Fireballs are down two to nothing, and it’s getting painful. Not as painful as thinking about how long it’ll be before I’m doxed and someone figures out who my parents are, but still painful. I tell Mackenzie I need to go tuck the bees in for the night, which is a total lie since they’re mostly self-sufficient this time of the year, but she doesn’t call me on it, so I slip out the back door to make sure nothing’s disturbed my hives.

It’s part hobby, part me trying to save the world.

All’s been quiet at my neighbor’s house since the taser incident.

Which I feel mildly bad about, because I didn’t really want to have to taser anyone, but who comes through a back gate to talk?

Ax murderers, rapists, and paparazzi. That’s who.

After I make sure the gate latch is closed and the bees have water, I head back inside. At first, I think Mackenzie’s listening to a commercial, but then I realize, no, she’s talking.

To a person.

Who’s also in my living room.

“Ow!” a male voice says.

“That’s for being a dick to my best friend,” Mackenzie announces. “Also, can I have your autograph? Ohmygod, I still have that first poster you did back when you modeled for Giovanni & Valentino before they split, and sometimes I—never mind. But seriously. Autograph. You owe me. And if you don’t owe me, you owe Sarah.”

“I know, that’s why—”

“And you better not be bad luck for the Fireballs.”

I step into the living room, and whoa.

Beck Ryder looks taller standing up.

I mean, duh, right? Naturally he’s taller standing up.

Also, when his eyeballs aren’t rolling in his head, they’re really striking. So blue. Like maybe all those billboards aren’t touched up.

He shifts his attention to me, starts to smile—eyes first, which is whoa—and then shrinks a little beside the gorgeous woman with him.

“I swear your sister let me in,” he says to me with a gesture toward Mackenzie. “I just want to apologize.”

She and I share a look.

Sister?

She doubles over laughing.

The ape’s girlfriend humors him with an exasperated smile.

“Do Mackenzie and I look like sisters?” I ask him.

His shoulders relax, and dude. The guy’s hands are in his jeans pockets—undoubtedly RYDE jeans, which are really freaking comfortable, which I won’t be mentioning to him—but his arms are long. I wasn’t really off in calling him an underwear ape with arms like that.

“No, but that doesn’t mean anything,” he says. “My sister and I don’t look alike at all.”

Is he for real? They could be twins—same eyes, same smile, same dark hair. “Only because she got the pretty genes.”

“Sarah,” Mackenzie hisses.

But the underwear ape barks out a laugh and winks at me. “You got that right.”

Mackenzie is swooning, but when I say I know Beck Ryder’s type—and how much I should never trust the charm—I don’t mean I read People and watch Secret Lives of the Stars on late night TV.

I mean even my best friend doesn’t know where I grew up.

“Apology accepted,” I tell him, because it’s the fastest way to get rid of him and that sexy smile, and also because I’m having this weird tingle in my breasts that suggests I shouldn’t call him by his real name or encourage him to stay any longer than necessary. Especially with the way his girlfriend is sizing me up.

I want to point out to her that if he’s dating her, really dating her and not just in some Hollywood stunt that his PR people told him would make him look good, then she has nothing to worry about.