The Grumpy Player Next Door: Copper Valley Fireballs #3

by Grant, Pippa

  He’s not necessarily smiley Max—at least, not until earlier today at Cooper’s place—but he’s not Growly Bear Max either.

  It’s different enough that I don’t know if we’re finally moving past the way I’ve tried to irritate him for the past four years, or if this new way of talking to each other is polite distance on his part without the intention of making me obsess over him.

  All I really know, though, is that I want to see him smile at me again.

  I hardcore want to see him smile at me.

  And to what end? It’s not like we’ll get involved. Not when it would put a wrench in the team’s dynamics.

  If ever there was a sign from the universe that Max is off-limits, it’s the team. They worked too hard this past year and need too much to stay tight next year to make all of Cooper’s dreams come true.

  I slip in my back door and dial Sloane as I turn down the hallway to my bedroom. “Hey. You done for the day?”

  “Yep.” She yawns. “Down time. I’m catching up on that show about the American football coach trying to turn around a British soccer—football—team. It’s my favorite. Want to come over?”

  “The Lady Fireballs are in town. We’re hitting The Grog. You should come.”

  “Whoa. Seriously?”

  I squint at the phone. “Why wouldn’t I be serious?”

  “Is Luca bringing his girlfriend?”

  She’s a little breathless and asks the question quickly, and I start grinning as I dig into sorting my clothes. I really should’ve done laundry three days ago. “Sloane! You’ve read her books? I didn’t know that.”

  “Spend your teenage years having to hide your romance novels from your family, you learn not to talk about it. I’ve been reading Nora Dawn for—oh my god, do I get to call her Henri? Is that weird? Will it be weird if I ask her to sign my autograph book? I don’t have paper copies of books anymore.”

  Dammit. My favorite sweater’s dirty. Favorite jeans too.

  What can I say? I hate doing laundry. “No. That’s not weird. She told me someone passed her a book under a bathroom stall once at what was supposed to be her wedding reception after one of her previous fiancés dumped her. I guess his aunt was a fan? So I’m sure signing an autograph book is in the normal range.”

  We’re both silent for a moment, and I’m no longer contemplating how I should do laundry more than once a month.

  “You’re going to say it’s weird to have an autograph book, aren’t you?” she asks.

  “Nope.”

  “But you’re thinking it.”

  “Never.”

  “Tillie Jean. Don’t lie to me.”

  “When Cooper was little, he used to wear the same socks every time we went into the city for a Fireballs game. He called them his future lucky socks. So you having an autograph book is not the weirdest thing I’ve ever heard of.”

  More silence.

  “Who else is in it?” I ask. I can’t help myself. I need to live vicariously through my friends, and I know for a fact that when she was working at a hospital in Copper Valley, she met a celebrity or two, though she’s never told us which ones.

  She sighs. “Not talking to you.”

  “But I’m your best friend.”

  “Georgia’s my current best friend. She brought me Nutella donuts when she got off work this afternoon.”

  “Good. You work hard. You deserve them. But can you really be bought off with donuts?”

  “Yep. Who’s going tonight? Will I have to put up with your brother flirting with me again?”

  “No. I’m going to call Mackenzie to get those Meaty the Flaming Meatball stress balls that I know she’s still hiding from Fireballs management, and then I’ll glue them to his hands and he’ll be otherwise occupied with… Huh.”

  She laughs. “I take it he retaliated for whatever it was you did last to him?”

  “No, he hasn’t.”

  “That’s really sad.”

  “It is. He’s either biding his time to do something seriously big, or he’s growing out of all of this. His pranks have been weirdly lame this year. Even the Jell-O in the toilet—he’s done that one before. It’s like he’s not even trying. Be honest. Are we being childish with pranking each other?”

  “Tillie Jean.” She clucks her tongue like she’s chewing me out with just my name. “Do not ever—I repeat, ever—feel like you’ve gotten too old for fun. Which would you rather be, sixty-three and telling your grandkids that you used to play pranks on your brother but that you grew out of it, or ninety and hanging with your great-grandkids while you all plant fake bugs in his flour?”

  “Clearly, I want to be Nana is the correct answer. Okay. Next phase in the prank wars it is.”

  “Good. Except I’m calling a no-go on gluing stress balls to his hands. Sorry, but he needs his hands to play, and to lift weights until the season starts again, unfortunately. What if you painted a sheet with a giant Meaty and hung it over his bed?”

  “I don’t think I have enough room to paint a sheet that big, and Cooper’s bedroom is massive, but also too small for how large of a Meaty I’d want to use.”

  “Glue his furniture to the ceiling?”

  “Grady tried that once a few years ago and almost gave himself a concussion when a chair fell on him.”

  “Oreo his car?”

  “Say what?”

  “Take Oreos apart and stick them all over his car. The cream acts like glue, though it’s better in summer when it melts.”

  “That might be a waste of good Oreos. Maybe. Maybe not. I could stock up the holiday colors and save them for summer…” I heft my laundry basket up and carry it around the corner to my itty bitty laundry room, my phone tucked between my ear and shoulder while I dump the first load into the washing machine. “Except I don’t want to distract him in the summer. Or ruin his car. There’s this line, you know? Push too far, and one of us will never speak to the other again.”

  “Decorate his hairbrush with Vaseline?”

  “That would be better for Luca Rossi. All that good hair, right? But I’m not going to prank Luca. He promised to get us all samples of the new bath bombs from the shampoo company he models for. Do you have a sweater I can borrow tonight? Maybe that burgundy one? With the low cut?”

  “It’s dirty. Just like your thoughts about Max Cole…”

  “Those are only semi-dirty and involve flinging mud pies, not getting naked.”

  She laughs. “Thank you. If you’re playing with mud pies, I feel much less embarrassed about my autograph book.”

  “Did you get all the guys to sign it? Because if not, don’t. The egos. Oh, the egos…”

  “Darren signed it. He’s such a nice guy, though.”

  “He is. Oh, he and Tanesha and the baby are coming tonight.” My clothes don’t all fit in my washer, and I’m having to pull some back out. If I don’t, it’ll clog and back up and I’ll have to wait a week for our resident appliance repair person to fit me into his schedule while mopping up gallons of water off my floor.

  Why, yes, that is experience talking. I mentioned I hate laundry, right?

  “Is Max coming?” Sloane’s looking through her closet. I can tell by the sound of hangers sliding on metal.

  And I’m really glad she can’t see my face right now. It would totally give me away.

  “I don’t know.” I grab my laundry detergent and measure a cup to pour in.

  “Tillie Jean.”

  “What?”

  “I know that voice. That’s your I have a crush voice. I mean, I suspected as much after watching you try to annoy him for years on end, but that’s the same voice you used last year when you were flirting with Deacon Gunderson during softball season.”

  “It is not.”

  “Yes, it is.”

  “Even if it was that voice, it’s irrelevant. You should’ve seen his face when he realized I was in the Ash costume for the video shoot today. It was like someone fed his last steak to Grady’s goat.” It was
so not like that. It was like, Oh, it’s Tillie Jean! My eyes are going to light up for that split second before I remember she’s Cooper’s sister and therefore off-limits.

  So I wish he’d glared at me like I fed his last steak to Grady’s goat.

  “Maybe you’re trying too hard,” Sloane says.

  “Or maybe he almost kissed me during our snowball fight and now we’re in this weird place where maybe I don’t annoy him and maybe I can’t stop thinking about him smiling at me, which is basically the worst thing ever. Cooper would have a shit fit. He knows I can take care of myself, but it’s the rule. You don’t screw around with his teammates. Especially the teammates who have reputations, and especially when expectations are so high for next year, and especially when—just especially, okay?”

  “Tillie Jean.”

  “Don’t Tillie Jean me. This isn’t superstition. It’s emotional reality.”

  “So you and Max hook up, it doesn’t go anywhere, maybe one of you is a little hurt, and then everyone gets over it. Cooper can shove it. He can’t protect you from getting hurt, you won’t die from a little heartbreak or relationship disappointment, and I would be more than happy to tell him so. Or maybe you and Max hook up, you both find something in each other that you didn’t even know you were looking for, and you’re the key to helping him pitch better than ever next year. There’s something to be said for being happy in your home life.”

  “You do read Henri’s books.”

  “Don’t oh, it’s just the romance novels talking me. Look at Grady. Look at Brooks Elliott. Look at Darren. You know what? Look at Robinson. He’s single, but he’s happy in his personal life, and he shines. Max Cole shines, but I get the feeling he’s missing something. If that something’s you, Tillie Jean—”

  “Enough about Mr. Growly Bear next door. Are you busy in ten? Because—AAAAAaaaaaahhhh!”

  Spike is in my house.

  Spike the Echidna mascot is in my house, and he’s standing in my laundry room doorway, arms crossed, and mascots are not supposed to be in my house

  I don’t stop to think past that, because demon mascot.

  I just act, dropping my phone, grabbing my detergent jug, and flinging it at him. “Dammit, Cooper, you are DEAD!”

  He ducks.

  I charge.

  And that’s mistake number two. The lid flew off my soap and there’s slick detergent coating the floor, which wouldn’t be a problem if I hadn’t pulled out all of my carpet last year and replaced it with tile in here.

  Instead, I take two steps toward my soon-to-be-dead brother, slip, and go down.

  My arms flail. My hand connects with the wall, and my ass tries to dent the floor.

  “Shit,” Spike mutters, and everything inside me freezes.

  That is not Cooper.

  “Tillie Jean?” Sloane calls from somewhere inside the washing machine. “TJ? You there? Tillie Jean? I’m on my way, so whoever’s there with you better be ready for a fucking takedown, because we don’t do this shit in Shipwreck.”

  Spike squats to the floor with me, not slipping at all in the carnage. He’s coated with laundry detergent too.

  Fireballs management won’t be happy. There’s one more mascot costume they’ll have to replace.

  “Fuck. Dammit. Are you okay?” Spike says.

  My tailbone’s cranky and my arm is probably bruised, but it’s the shock of realizing Max Cole pranked me that has me staring at the giant echidna in stupefied silence.

  And not just pranked me a little.

  He got me good.

  His giant mascot paw reaches for my foot. “Did you twist your ankle again?”

  I jerk out of reach and scurry back into the laundry room. “I could’ve been naked!”

  Yep.

  That’s the first thing that comes to mind.

  Followed immediately by what would he have done if I were naked?

  He makes another noise. “You broke into my house, so I thought this was fair game.”

  “And you couldn’t call out and announce your presence?”

  “I would’ve if I thought you could hear me over yourself.”

  “Did you just tell me I talk too much? Did you really just tell me I talk too much?” I’m arguing with a person inside a giant foam spiny anteater, and oh my god, I love it.

  “You—you—you glitter bombed me and you replaced my shower curtain with a gigantic image of your ugly face.”

  “And I’ve been nothing but nice to you since, and also, I respect the hell out of prank-backs, so why are we arguing? You don’t have to justify pranking me, but you do have to justify telling me I talk too much. There’s a line, Max. There’s a line.”

  “I don’t know what the lines are.”

  Oh, god.

  He doesn’t.

  And he sounds so horrified and frustrated and upset by it that I suddenly want to hug him. “Would you take that costume off and talk to me like a regular human being?”

  “Maybe I’m naked.”

  Hello, nipples on full alert, mouth going dry, and desperate yearning in my pussy. It’s been a while.

  Like maybe two weeks or so.

  You know. Since the snowball fight and near-kiss.

  Also?

  The odds that he’s naked under that costume are very, very high. He’s always naked. He’s like—he’s like my diamond in the buff.

  I hope he can see as well out of Spike as I could see out of Ash earlier—which is to say, not necessarily all that great—because if I’m visibly drooling over the idea of him naked, I’d prefer he didn’t know it.

  Or would I?

  He mutters something that sounds suspiciously like Cooper’s gonna kill me, but it’s muffled behind the costume.

  “Max. Take the mascot off.” My voice is breathy and hungry, and I suddenly need to know what makes Max Cole tick.

  I need to know all of what makes Max Cole tick.

  He doesn’t obey.

  Instead, he shoots to his feet, turns, and scurries down the hall. My front door clicks shut a moment later.

  “Tillie Jean!” Sloane yells from inside the washing machine.

  I need to answer her.

  Let her know I’m okay.

  But I’m not okay.

  Physically, I’m fine.

  Emotionally, though? Emotionally, I’m a mixed wreck of guilt that Max feels guilty, worry that he thinks I’m mad, and also horny as hell.

  He pranked me back.

  I know it’s weird, but it’s like…it’s like he sees me.

  For the first time in four years, I know without a doubt that Max Cole sees me.

  17

  Max

  There’s something wrong with me.

  Scratch that.

  There are many things wrong with me.

  One, my dick went hard as steel inside the echidna costume, and now I feel like I violated the damn mascot.

  Two, there’s a high likelihood that international incidents have nothing on the war I’ve just sparked with Tillie Jean Rock.

  And three, I can’t fucking wait for round two.

  The beast has been awakened.

  She’s going down.

  Christ.

  Now I’m picturing her sucking my cock, and this is not how I want to head into a bar where her brother’s waiting.

  Think about losing. Think about Cooper smashing my face in. Think about Luca’s dance moves.

  I think about overhearing TJ telling whoever she was talking to on the phone that she wanted to kiss me. Or whatever it was she said.

  All I know is, Tillie Jean wants to get naked with me.

  That’s my takeaway from her conversation.

  She wants to do me. And I want to do her. And I cannot cross that line and risk losing Cooper as a friend. Some of the other guys on the team know I take meds for anxiety, but they don’t know the rest of it.

  They weren’t there when I thought I was going to die.

  They didn’t pick me up without judg
ment, tell me it was okay, and help me get help.

  Friends like that don’t come around every day.

  Even if they did, I wouldn’t trust them, because I wouldn’t let myself.

  Fuck.

  “Max, over here, bro.”

  The Grog’s door shuts behind me, and I wave at Emilio, who’s at a table along the far wall with a bunch of the guys.

  If Tillie Jean were Luca’s sister, or Robinson’s sister, or anyone else’s sister, this would be okay.

  But not only is Cooper Rock the closest thing I’ve ever had to a best friend, he’s the heart and soul of the Fireballs, and there’s no denying it.

  Guy has lived and breathed this team since he could walk. Rumor has it Duggan Field was his first word. He still has a ratty old stuffed Fiery the Dragon that he slept with supposedly through high school. And I completely believe the story Tillie Jean was telling her friend on the phone, that he kept every pair of socks he ever wore to a Fireballs game as a kid.

  Screwing around with Cooper’s sister would be like asking to be traded away from the team.

  And I don’t want that.

  So I man up, walk across the bar, and sit down next to him at the long row of pushed-together tables near the dart board. “I pranked your sister. Again.”

  He grins. “Good. Make her think I’ve forgotten and you’re taking over. For the record, she hates clowns as much as she hates garden gnomes.”

  Good to know. Unfortunately, I hate clowns too. “I put on the Spike costume and broke into her house and scared the shit out of her.”

  That sounds bad when I say it out loud.

  But Cooper’s still grinning. “That’s next-level.”

  “She’s gonna kick your ass,” Francisco tells me. “TJ gets bored out here. She spends eight months of the year plotting for prank wars. You’re basically a dead man.”

  “Don’t leave your door unlocked,” Darren agrees.

  His wife, Tanesha, cackles. She cackles. “Like a locked door could stop her.”

  “I know. She can open my windows from the outside, and they don’t have locks.” My pulse is kicking up. Not sure that’s a bad thing. “You’re not pissed?” I ask Cooper.