“Oh, he did that, too.”
“Excuse me?”
He gasps. “How does it feel knowing Micah and I both kissed your man before you did?”
“What?”
Aleks waves me off as if it’s no big deal. “Micah said that when Sour wasn’t sure if he wanted you specifically or a man in general, he asked Micah to kiss him.”
I think back to the night of the New Year’s party and recall Hendrix saying something about Micah and him kissing. I guess I forgot about it in the tsunami of newness and awe that followed our first kiss. Now, though, I’m curious. “And?”
“They kissed, and neither felt anything. Hey, that’s kind of hot, though, don’t you think?”
“Nope,” I declare with finality. “I don’t think that is my kink, man. Were you supposed to tell me about that? Was Micah supposed to tell you about that? God, are there any secrets between the four of us?”
“I can probably think of some,” he muses, and the lascivious glint in his eyes tells me that I definitely do not want to know.
“Nuh-uh. No. No, thank you. Keep those secrets to yourself, please.” I push past him, cheeks on-fucking-fire, and his laughter follows me out of the room. No amount of pressing my cooler hands to my face seems to help either.
Downstairs, there is no staff hard at work making breakfast or cleaning, so I put several pans of frozen cinnamon rolls in both of my ovens before grabbing a trash bag and walking through each room, throwing away countless discarded cups of alcohol. Aleks, for once, actually helps, which is a pleasant surprise. Usually, he is against all activity that isn’t football or sex-related, but recently, I have noticed Micah—adorably—chastising him for his laziness. It’s a cute sight: a hundred-pound-when-wet man, hands on his hips, staring at a big professional athlete with sassy disapproval.
Micah is good for him—if only either of them would communicate that to the other already!
“Does Sour’s agent think he will get signed with us again next season?” Aleks asks out of nowhere.
I shush him quickly. “Dude, you can’t talk about next season yet! We still have the playoffs and . . .” The Bowl, if we’re lucky enough to make it, I think but don’t dare say aloud. Everyone knows you don’t talk about the end of your season before it is actually over. That’s like asking to go out early.
“You and your superstitions,” he scoffs, not at all concerned. “This is serious. What if the team doesn’t sign him again? How would you two work around him being on another team—or worse, if he can’t get signed anywhere else?”
“Of course he would be able to sign somewhere else. He’s amazing.” I’m perhaps a little quick to defend him.
Aleks chuckles at my unintentional hostility. “I’m just saying.”
“Well, don’t.”
“But he does have an agent, right?”
I’m not sure how to answer that because— “I don’t know.”
“You don’t know?”
“We haven’t talked about it.”
He stops what he is doing, dropping the full trash bag on the floor, where it spills with a loud rattle of beer cans.
I gesture half-heartedly at the new mess. “Dude.”
“You’re telling me,” he begins, stalking toward me. “That you, a seasoned player, haven’t been showing your boyfriend, a walk-on rookie, the ropes of this sport? He needs to do events, commercials, advertisements, charity auctions—and he needs an agent. Who is his manager? Who runs his socials? Who is putting his name out there?”
Fumbling my words, I try to explain myself but end up digging a deeper hole. “I don’t know, Kiss. I forgot all that stuff even exists. Like, I got my draft contract, and my parents already had people hired. I’ve never had to think about it. I’ve always just . . . assumed that stuff works itself out somehow.”
Aleks just stares at me with incredulity before erupting, hands flailing in the air. “That’s some privileged shit if I’ve ever heard it.”
“Hey!”
“Don’t ‘hey’ me, Gin. ‘Hey’ your boyfriend—which you didn’t deny, by the way—and tell him to get an agent ASAP. I want him on the team next year.”
“Me too,” I mutter under my breath as I resume cleaning.
It’ll be fine, right? Technically, the season cut-off is in March, so there is still plenty of time to get him an agent. Assuming he doesn’t already have one, that is. Maybe he does. He hasn’t said anything to me about it.
God, spending the summer as a free agent is probably one of the scariest things I can imagine. From the end of season in March to the September roster deadline, it would be hell not knowing if I was playing in the next season or not. I can’t imagine—
“Holy shit.”
My head snaps up to look at Aleks. He’s standing in the same place, gaping at his cell phone.
“Holy. Shit,” he repeats.
The sheer disbelief in his voice makes me abandon my trash bag and walk over to him. “What? What is it?”
He scrolls some more, speed-reading before finally dragging his eyes away to look at me. “Dude.”
“What?”
“Kane fucking Kennedy,” he exclaims as if I will magically know what he means based on the Miami Pirates’ tight end’s name alone.
“What about him?”
