By the Playbook

By the Playbook (25)

 "Addie! How many times am I going to have to tell you to stay at your damn station?"

I fantasised about grabbing Ryder by the hair and slamming his face into the window of the blue station wagon I was currently sitting on top of. Instead, I just grit my teeth and gave him a (probably threatening) smile. "Sorry, babe. It's not like my hands are frozen to death or anything."

He looked up at me, mildly amused but mostly exasperated. Water, which I knew for a fact was icy like the arctic ocean, ran off of his bare chest in tiny rivers and I glared over his shoulder at Anna Redwick, a busty redhead who was ogling his back and drooling into the bucket of water she was filling from a hose. "We've got to hit numbers, baby, I'm sorry," he said, sounding not very sorry at all. "There's only a few more."

I huffed and slid down the hood of the station wagon, walking carefully along the hood before jumping to the ground in front of him. I looked pointedly at the long line of cars winding through the parking lot and around the streets of the school. "Oh yeah, the crowds are really thinning."

Ryder rolled his eyes. "You were the one who suggested it."

The carwash that Cassie and I had suggested and organized had been, in every sense of the word, a complete success. The football players all strolled around shirtless and made a show of spraying each other with hoses while the cheerleaders, who Cassie had talked into helping out, giggled and jumped around in bikinis while the more brazen of the team pressed themselves against the window of cars for bigger tips. We'd been outside since eight o clock in the morning and, six hours later, I was starting to get tired of the owners of the cars ogling my chest every time I walked past a window.

It had been about a week since our anniversary and Ryder had mostly retreated back into being pissy 24/7, spending all of his free time working out, practicing, or studying. The only time I saw him properly was when he crept into my room at night, and most nights he came when I was already asleep and left before I woke up to go for an early morning run, leaving only rumpled sheets on his side of the bed and the smell of his cologne on my pillow. It was having an effect on both of us – he was exhausted and grumpy and took it out on me, which in turn made me exhausted and grumpy. It was a catastrophic cycle.

Ryder nudged me towards a red Cadillac. "Cassie needs help on that one. And quit sitting on cars, John Taylor keeps staring at your ass."

I frowned at him. "John Taylor has a girlfriend."

"So do I, and Hayley Prasset looks great in a bikini."

I whipped my sponge at him, scowling when he dodged. He reached out and shoved me in retaliation, laughing when I glared at him, then wrapped one arm around me and pressed his lips to the top of my head before striding away. I sauntered over to the Cadillac as he chuckled at his own joke. Gavin was spraying a couple of cheerleaders more than he was the cars, looking pleased with himself as Tanya Raynolds writhed around on the hood of Kate Carnold's blue sedan, shrieking under the spray of a hose. I rolled my eyes at how obviously she touched her body, "deflecting" the spray of water from her chest, then pushed my hair back from my face as I heard a clicking sound from behind me.

"Quit taking pictures of my ass, Damien," I said, turning. Damien smiled at me, an expensive looking camera in his hand and his blue shirt damp in places. Kasey had bullied him into documenting the day – apparently he was into photography, and I had no doubt she'd promised that he could take pictures of her or talk to a high-up photographer friend of Olivia's to get him to agree.

"Don't flatter yourself, kid," he said, his green eyes warm. "Have you seen Kasey? She took my wallet and I want to go buy lunch."

I fought the urge to laugh. "I think she's inside. Want me to ambush her when she comes out?"