Clay: Today was a good day too.
13
NOVA
“Ohhhhh, that’s a miss.” Brooke groans next to me on the couch. She slaps her controller in frustration. “Dammit, I still need practice before I can kick Jay’s ass. Let’s change up the teams.”
Brooke wanted to hang out and get the scoop on LA, so I came over the day after I got back. She was playing Pro Ball NOW when I arrived, and I asked if I could try it.
It’s strangely addictive.
She resets the game to the main screen, flipping through eligible players to add to her team.
“Miles know you play him?” I ask.
“Never. And you won’t say a word. How’s your team?”
I bite my lip and go back to the choices.
At first, I picked people I knew, including a few Kodiaks like Jay and some other big names. I steered clear of Clay because he’s on my mind enough without him taking up the screen in front of me, but now I add him.
“Nice addition,” Brooke comments. “You’re missing a little grumpy tattooed hottie in your heart?”
“No.”
“In your pants?”
I hit her on the arm and she laughs.
“He wished me luck and we talked after the show.”
“And?”
“And I might have had one dream about him,” I mumble.
“This dream in which you were both fully clothed and talking about the weather.”
I shift down lower against the couch.
In my dream, I was still in LA the night of the premiere. After hanging up the phone, I walked to the end of the alley, and Clay was there in a dress shirt and jeans.
He backed me up against the wall and kissed me, reaching under my skirt to touch me until I was writhing against him.
“I know you miss me, Pink,” he murmured against my ear. “I know you miss this.”
I woke up sweaty and tangled in my sheets.
“I think he’s working on himself. And I’m working on me. And right now, that’s what we both need,” I decide.
Still, it does strange, not unpleasant things to my insides to be playing a game with Clay’s avatar.
What I appreciate most about him isn’t about basketball, and it isn’t only about our chemistry. I miss his quiet, growly presence. The secret smiles for me and only me.
The knock at the door has me rising to answer.
When I pull it wide, my breath sticks in my throat.
Clay’s on the other side, looking gorgeous and freshly showered, his hair sticking up in every direction and his hoodie shoved up to his elbows.
“Nova.” He says my name as if he’s every bit as surprised as I am.
“Hey. I’m hanging with Brooke.”
“I, uh…” He frowns, straightening like he needs the extra two inches in height when he’s still the biggest person I’ve ever seen in real life. “I came to get my game back.”
“We’re still playing it. Come in,” Brooke calls from the living room.
He ducks through the doorway and follows me inside, close enough I can smell the woodsy scent of his body wash.
Brooke shows him her team.
“Miles?” Clay scoffs.
“Watch him beat your ass,” she challenges.
“My ass?” he echoes, cutting me a look. “Pink, did I make your team?”
Embarrassment rises up, warmth spreading through my cheeks.
Brooke’s phone rings from the coffee table. “Yeah, I got the clothes,” she answers when she picks up. “It’s on my schedule for next week.”
She bounces up, waving between us. Keep playing, she mouths.
I can’t shoot my friend side-eye because she’s already out of the room.
Clay sits next to me and takes Brooke’s controller.
“You haven’t played it in forever,” I say.
He brought a small stash of games to LA, but although I’d seen him play once or twice in Denver, he never seemed to once we moved.
“Figured I might see if I remember how.” He shifts next to me, lowering his body onto the couch.
It’s Brooke’s fault I’m suddenly hyper aware of Clay, and the fact that I haven’t had an orgasm that wasn’t self-perpetuated in far too long.
“You’re pretty good at this,” he says after we play a few sequences.
“So are you,” I say as his avatar moves down the court and dunks the ball.
I throw up both hands in victory as he collapses back against the couch.
He rubs a hand over his jaw. “I’m jealous of my avatar. They haven’t programmed in my knee problems yet.”
I set down the controller and turn toward him, my knee brushing his. “He’s a game character. You’re a real person, flesh and blood.”
“You say that like it’s a good thing.”
My heart squeezes hard at the vulnerability in his voice.
“Tell me more about your drafting strategy,” he murmurs, oblivious to the fact I’m basically undressing him in my peripheral vision.
“I pick people I like. People I think will love playing together.”
He chuckles as he starts the game. “Like who?”
I rattle off my other starters. “And Jay, of course. You guys are obvious.”
He swears under his breath.
“If you’re honest with him about what went down, how much it sucked, I’m sure he’ll forgive you,” I insist.
Clay exhales. “I tried when we first went to LA. He didn’t respond to my texts or my messages.”
This is the first I’ve heard of it. The idea that Clay was too ashamed or hurt to tell me makes my chest ache. “Then try again. Things change.”
“Oh yeah?” Clay hits pause on the game and turns toward me.
He shifts an elbow along the back of the couch and I jump, dropping my controller.
We both reach for it at the same time, our fingers brushing.
His knuckles are big, his hand twice the size of mine. He could easily grab two controllers in his palm, but right now, his thumb rests across the back of my hand.
“So, you and basketball. You’re still taking a break?”
His dark eyes move across mine, searching. “Looks that way.”
I’m aware of every nerve in my body. The ones he’s lighting up with his simple touch, the ones I wish he was.
“It’s only a break if it ends,” I say. “Otherwise, it’s just a breakup.”
He leans back against the couch. “We still talking about basketball, Pink?”
My heartbeat is unsteady, as if I’m dancing instead of sitting perfectly still.
It would be so easy in this moment to say I want him back, want us back.
I move closer. An inch, maybe two.
My gaze drifts to his mouth and he inhales.
Clay shifts off the couch in a graceful move, straightening to tower over me. “I should go.”
“What about the game?” My throat is dry.
He glances toward the PlayStation as if seeing it for the first time. “Tell Brooke she can hang on to it.”
14
CLAY
The next two days, I pick up Coach and take him to Kodiak Camp. It feels good, playing even though it’s not full out.