“What’s going on?” I look around all four of them for an answer.
“Daddy over here beat the shit out of that one”—Isaiah points to a group of men with eerily similar builds to the ones I’m with—“last year when we played Atlanta.”
“I didn’t beat the shit out of him.” Kai takes another pull from his bottle, eyes locked on the inches that separate me from his catcher.
“You cleared the benches after delivering a right hook to Dean’s jaw that knocked him on his ass.”
“It was your throwing arm, Ace. Do you know how much money that’s worth?”
Kai pops his shoulders. “He deserved it.”
“What did he do?” Kai’s eyes finally flicker up to meet mine at my question.
He doesn’t answer right away, so Travis cuts in from beside me.
“Cartwright had an illegal slide into home while I was covering the base. Took me out by the knees. It was dirty and it pulled me out for the rest of the game.”
My head whips back to Kai. “You punched him for that?”
“Of course not.” He takes a leisurely sip of his bottle. “I hit him with a pitch the next time he was up at bat. I waited for him to charge me at the pitcher’s mound, then I punched him.”
A laugh bursts out of me because, well, Kai doing anything like that seems entirely out of character.
A ghost of a smile tilts from behind his bottle. “This was before Max.”
Ah. Of course it was. He told me he was a different man then, but I like seeing this bit of fire in him. And the way his jaw flexes when his attention falls to the minimal distance that remains between Travis and me tells me it’s still in there.
The table is small, the bar is crowded. I’m not standing any closer to his catcher than he is to his brother, so even though I like this side to him, he’s being really fucking dramatic.
Travis pops off the table. “I’m grabbing us another round.”
Cody and Isaiah turn their backs to us, facing the dance floor once again to entertain themselves by checking out every woman who walks by, but Cody also does the same to a couple of the cowboys. Kai takes the opportunity to slide around the table to my now unoccupied side.
He leans on his forearms, sipping his beer, and he doesn’t look at me when he tries to casually throw out, “Travis is a good guy.”
Here we go. “Yeah. He is.”
He nods, still refusing to look my way. “Close to your age too.”
“Well, that’s too bad. As I said earlier today, I’m into older guys.”
His eyes flicker up to mine. “He likes you.”
He’s a good actor.
“Does that bother you?”
He exhales a humorless laugh. “Isaiah asked me the same thing.”
“And what did you say?”
Kai straightens to his full height again, deliciously overbearing as he stands over me. “I told him it would only bother me because you’re here for Max.”
“And is that the truth? Because of Max?”
The corner of his lip lifts in a smile he’s trying to suppress. “If I were to tell the truth, I’d say it bothers me enough that I’ve been spending my entire evening watching you and plotting a way to get Monty to trade him.”
I huff a laugh, a smile on my mouth mirroring his. “And you call me ridiculous.”
“I’ve had my moments. I was a different man before Max came along.”
“A man who punches other players mid-game.”
“A man who protects his teammate.”
I raise a questioning brow. “A man who now wants that same teammate traded.”
“Well, we all have our limits now, don’t we?”
“And I’m yours?”
His eyes trail my face, once again landing on my lips. “I think you might be.”
Fucking make a move, Kai.
I know he wants to. I can see it from the frustration that’s grown all night, but it’s as if he’s decided it’d make more sense if I were into Travis or any one of his teammates I’ve danced with, so he’s held back. And I’m worried the boys’ little game of forcing his hand has only revealed that Kai is no longer selfish enough to take what he wants.
That concern is only amplified when Travis returns to the table, the necks of bottles laced between his fingers. As he sets them down, Kai leaves my side, making his way back to the opposite end with his brother.
“So, are we leaving or staying if Cartwright and his teammates are here?” Travis asks.