Page 134 of Playing Mr. Perfect

“Dude, you’re afraid to get your hands dirty,” Noah says.

“That’s Seth, not me.”

Seth’s brows lift. “Says the guy who won’t go rock-climbing with me.”

“That’s because you take too long,” I remind him. “I’m halfway up the cliff before you’re even ready to start. And, Noah, you can’t do shit on land. You’re only good in the water.”

“That’s what she said,” Flynn chimes in, and we all laugh.

“You all are nuts if you think he’s not picking me. Right, boy?” my grandfather says.

“No way, old man,” I chime in. “He wants to stand next to this face in his wedding pictures.” I point to my face.

“Clay,” Pepper chides.

“It’s okay, Pepper,” my grandfather says. “Let the boy dream.”

As we jokingly argue about being Flynn’s best man, my mother and Victory saunter over. “Honey,” my mom says. “Can we borrow Pepper for a minute?”

Before I can respond, Victory says, “We’re saving her from the nonsense. Come on, Pep.” She drags Pepper away.

“Don’t believe a word they tell you,” I call after them.

Pepper glances over her shoulder and smiles.

I watch them sit on the sofa with Pepper in the middle. My grandmother and Sutton join them, sitting on the love seat. They talk animatedly, and Pepper laughs at something they say. I expected my family to love her as much as I do, but to actually see it unfolding before my eyes? That’s pretty fucking incredible.

My father sidles up to me. “She’s something special, son.”

“Yeah. She is. I’m a lucky guy.”

“How’s that glove you mentioned working out? Is it helping?”

“We pick it up this week. I guess we’ll see.”

“And your shoulder? Think it’ll hold up for another season or two?”

I scoff. “Of course. But I don’t want to talk about football tonight.”

He glances at Pepper with the others and says, “No, I don’t suppose you do.”

We watch as my mother touches Pepper’s shoulder, her hand lingering there for a moment. Pepper’s smiling, nodding. She looks down at her lap in that slightly bashful way she has, and then Victory says something that makes them all burst out laughing. Pepper looks over, happiness radiating from her, and our eyes connect with the same zing of electricity that grows stronger every day. But it’s the thrum of love beating a path between us that has me wanting to go over and take her in my arms.

“I haven’t seen that look in your eyes since you were five years old, when you saw your first football game on television in the airport.”

My father’s words mirror what I’ve been feeling all along, drawing me from my thoughts. “You think?”

“There’s no thinking necessary, son. Happy, mad, guarded, or elated, you’ve always been an open book. But you’ve been living life with blinders on, laser focused on football for so many years, I wondered if you’d ever give your heart a shot at anything else.” He claps a hand on my shoulder the way he’s done my whole life, only this time the way he’s looking at me makes it feel different, bigger, like he’s initiating me into some kind of exclusive club as he says, “Love looks good on you, son,”

I glance across the room at Pepper again, sitting with the people I love most, and my chest expands as understanding hits me. Being in love is different and bigger. Until you’re knee-deep and willing to drown in it, you can’t have any idea what it really is.

I meet my father’s steady gaze. “It feels good, too, Dad.”

“It’s time for Heart Stories,” Flynn exclaims.

“Everyone down to the media room,” my father says, sparking a gust of activity and commotion as we all head for the stairs.

And I head for the only woman I want to write my heart story with.