Page 57 of The Saint

“He’s not.” Even today, Rolly had hardly shot any hoops. Nothing that wasn’t to show Gil how to correct his shot. Nothing that would endanger his healing injury.

Beside me, Tyrone chuckled. “I noticed.” He quirked his brow. “Hasn’t been around since the last time you were here.”

Guilt ate at me. Rolly had always had friends growing up. He’d always gone out of his way to help them out, to be around them. And since I stepped back into his life, he’d stepped out of theirs.

Tyrone bumped my shoulder with the back of his hand. “Didn’t say that to make you feel bad.”

“You didn’t.” But he did. And it made me wonder what else I’d taken Rolly away from. “What’d you tell him?”

“That he hasn’t been playing ball.”

“That it?”

“Isn’t any more to tell,” he said with a shrug before he stepped toward Rolly and Gil.

“How do you know Zee anyway?”

Tyrone stopped, raised his face to the sky. Then he turned back to me, shoulders squared, his whole being ominous as he blocked out the sun. His hand lowered to his hip. For a split second, I tensed, hands itching to reach for the gun I wasn’t even carrying. But then he gripped the hem of his shirt and lifted it, revealing a handful of scars crisscrossing his torso. And in the center of them all were the telltale signs of two old bullet wounds.

“Had the pleasure of meeting him in the streets in the middle of a fucking gang war, back when I was a kid.”

The angry lines vanished from view as he tugged his shirt back into place. His gaze drifted back toward Rolly and Gil, and the concern etched across every inch of him tugged at something in my chest.

Rolly had told me Jamal was his best friend here at the courts, but there was no doubt he and Tyrone were close. I wondered if that closeness had something to do with their injuries, or if they were like this before Rolly got shot.

Across the court, Rolly looked up, his eyes darting between Tyrone and me. He scrubbed a hand at the stubble on his chin, and my stomach flipped as my heart thudded heavily in my chest. I was moving his way in an instant, longing suddenly to be close to his side. We’d been here for hours, Rolly watching me from the sidelines as I played ball with his friends, joking and having fun even though he couldn’t join in. But since Gil showed up, he’d been working with the boy.

I missed him, even though he was right there.

Rolly’s hand immediately went to the side of my head, smoothing over the short hairs there as if he could tuck them behind my ear. “You ready to go?”

I glanced over my shoulder at Tyrone, who was packing his basketball and water bottle into his bag. Rolly’s gaze hit me like a wave when I looked back at him, and I felt like I’d been swept away by the tide. Coated in him. Bobbing in his presence while the very thought of him held me up.

Soaking me to the bone.

“Yeah. I’m ready.”

He looked ready to kiss me, his heavy-lidded eyes drifting to my lips, his whole being screaming that he wanted to dive in and get lost. But the scuff of Gil’s shoe against the concrete had us both jerking back.

Tyrone stood, smirking at us not ten feet away, and Gil dribbled the basketball closer, the noise driving a wedge between Rolly and me.

“What?” Rolly asked Tyrone.

“Didn’t say a thing.” Tyrone gave a smile that left me itching for a fight, but almost as if he sensed that, Rolly placed his hand on my shoulder, keeping me still.

“So, is she, like, your girlfriend now?” Gil grimaced as he spoke, and Tyrone laughed, reaching out to swat playfully at his head.

“What do you think, little man?”

“I ain’t little. And it looks that way to me.”

“Yeah.” Tyrone turned back to us, jutting his chin toward Rolly’s arm around my back. “To me too, kid. See you two around?”

“Sure.” Rolly shook Tyrone’s hand, the two of them going in for a hug and a slap on the back. When they parted, Rolly squatted in front of Gil, and Tyrone stepped toward me.

“Don’t be a stranger,” he told me, giving me the same handshake he gave all the guys. But he stilled as he pulled me in for the hug, hand firm against my back and not letting me go, as he spoke quietly near my ear, “Take care of him. And maybe… check in with Zee.”

I nodded as he released me. “Will do.”