Twenty years old and still unable to make my own decisions.
On a sigh, I say, “Fine,” and turn toward the arcade.
Lincoln falls in step with me and, being the outgoing, people-person that he is, says, “I’m Lincoln, in case you didn’t get that.”
I glance in his direction and catch a charming smile, the type of smile that pulls the attention of everyone around us . . . even the men.
“Indie,” I say, and leave it at that.
“So, you play soccer at Brentwood?”
“Yup.”
“Cool, I play baseball.”
“Yeah, I know who you are.”
“Uh-oh. Why doesn’t that sound like a flattering ‘I know you,’ but more of an annoyed ‘I know you’?” He pulls on the back of his neck. “Did we . . . you know . . .”
I pause and snort. “Seriously? You don’t remember the girls you’ve slept with?”
“No. I mean . . . there have been occasional drunk nights.”
I snort and shake my head. “Trust me, Lincoln Castle, if we’d fooled around, you’d remember.” I snatch the game card from his hand and walk over to the air hockey table where I swipe the card, turning the machine on.
Air floats up from pinholes in the table, a cheap version of Jock Jams plays through the table speakers, as I grab my paddle and the puck.
Looking shy and not like the confident guy I’ve seen around campus he says, “I feel like a dick that you know me and I don’t know you.”
“I don’t know you personally. I just know of you. Kind of hard to go to Brentwood and not know every guy on the baseball team.”
“Yeah.” He looks to the side and says, “We don’t see much of the women’s soccer team.”
I grin at him and place the puck on the table. “It’s because we don’t tend to hang out with douchebags.” I cock back and hit the puck right down the middle, scoring a point before he’s even gripped his paddle correctly.
He blinks at me and then down at the goal. “I wasn’t ready.”
“Not my fault.” I shrug.
He bends down, grabs the puck from his slot, and places it on the table. He pins it to the table as he looks me in the eyes. “We’re not douchebags.” Then he whacks the puck off the side, but I track it perfectly and return the shot, bouncing off a bank and into his goal.
When he looks up at me surprised, I smirk.
“Did my mom bring me here so you could bust my balls?” He grabs the puck and sets it on the table. He whacks it up the middle this time, so I hit it back—barely missing the goal. It bounces off his paddle, right back at me, so I angle it better and score.
“I think she brought you here hoping for a love connection.”
Grumbling, he grabs the puck and says, “That’s going to blow up in her face.”
“Are you telling me you’re not instantly in love?” I roll my eyes, and we volley the puck back and forth until I shoot it down the middle into his goal.
“The only instant thing that’s happening right now is the blow to my pride.”
“Can’t handle losing to a girl?” I raise a brow at him.
He hits the puck and we go back and forth. He almost scores a few times, but then I double bank the puck and make it in. That was a little trickier.
“Can’t handle losing. Doesn’t matter what sexual organ you carry in your pants.”
We go back and forth a few more times, but once I hit seven goals, the table cheers, announces player one as the winner, and then turns off.
Lincoln tosses his paddle on the table and then grips the sides, staring me down. “How are you at basketball?”
“Want to find out?” I smirk.
“You know, I’m kind of scared you’re going to annihilate me at that too, but I’m too tempted to find a weakness at this point.”
I brush past him and head toward the basketball games. “It’s going to be difficult to find one.”
“Are you always this cocky?” he asks, catching up to me.
“Not cocky, Castle. Confident.” I wink and then slide the card through two machines, releasing the basketballs into the bin in front of us. “Want to play random?”
“Sure.” We both push the button for random and the clock counts down from three until it beeps for us to go.
In rapid-fire motion, we both shoot our basketballs. I don’t bother focusing on how he’s doing, even though I can hear his points dinging next to me. I focus on my basket, shooting ball after ball. I’m so in the zone that I lose track of time and when the buzzer sounds, I glance at my score of sixty-three and quickly look at his.
Sixty-three.
A tie.
“Fuck, are you serious?” Lincoln laughs, and lets out a heavy breath. He leans against the machine and sizes me up. “Rematch?”
“Obviously,” I answer, sliding the card through both slots again. “There is no tying in sports.”
“At least we have that in common.”
“You crossed the line.”
“I did not cross the line,” I counter.
“Uh, I saw your toe cross the line.”
“You’re delusional.”
“You’re fucking cheating,” he shoots back.
I cross my arms over my chest and turn toward a sweaty Lincoln. “I do not cheat.”
“Maybe not intentionally, but I was watching your foot, and it crossed the line. The rules we created on this napkin”—he waves our rules napkin in front of my face—“it clearly states if you cross the line you’re immediately disqualified.”
“I know what the napkin says. I wrote it down.” I snatch the napkin from him. “But I didn’t cross the line.”
“Shall we review the footage?” Lincoln asks, holding up his phone now.
“You recorded me?”
“Of course I did. After I saw your foot inching forward during the first round, I knew I had to keep an eye on you.”
Not worried, I nod at his phone and say, “Sure, review the footage. It’s going to be really embarrassing when you’re wrong.”
“We’ll see about that.” He makes a show of typing in his password and pulling up the video. At this point in the night, I honestly wouldn’t expect anything less from him. After nine rounds of basketball, he was the winner. I took him down in Skee-Ball, and now at the football tossing game, he’s held the high score for the last three rounds, putting me behind.
When we reached the football game, Lincoln grew more serious than before, and he demanded we come up with rules to abide by, because according to him, I like to lean forward, bringing me closer to scoring. Can you tell the boy’s reaching? But I gave in to his demands and we wrote up a “contract,” one he apparently has memorized.
Coming up next to me, Lincoln holds his phone, which has a crack right down the middle, and I can’t help but notice how big his hands are. Long fingers, wide palms, hands that can handle a ball . . . and a woman.
“This might be embarrassing for you, so I want you to prepare yourself.”
I clear my throat and lean in closer, ignoring the masculine and earthy scent of his cologne. “Just play the damn thing.”